Reply to People with good parents/nice childhoods who are selfish, unkind, unempathetic?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]How does this happen? I have encountered several people like this. Very loving families, would themselves describe their parents and families as loving, supportive, and functional and also it looks that way via observation. No childhood trauma or evidence of abuse/neglect. Continued support into adulthood.

But then they are jerks. Or have the capacity to be jerks in certain circumstances where it's surprising to see it come out. I know several women with this background, for instance, who are total "mean girl" gossips -- spread nasty rumors about women they claim they are friends with, can be very selfish with their time, demand attention and can be petty or cruel if they don't feel they get it.

How does this happen? I thought good parenting was supposed to address behaviors like this. Were they too doted on? Favorite daughters whose behavior didn't get corrected? I always figured people who acted like this were acting out of insecurity and some kind of childhood wound, but perhaps I was wrong.

Asking partly out of curiosity, and partly because I want to avoid raising a person who behaves this way in adulthood.[/quote]

So many assumptions, so little time, OP.

Truth is, you have zero idea what people are going through. [/quote]

That's... not an answer. If it isn't family dysfunction or poor parenting that causes this behavior, what is it? [b]What are people "going through" [/b]that causes people with good parents and happy childhoods to be unkind or even cruel?[/quote]

Grief 
Illness
Divorce
Addiction
Adultery 
Financial troubles 
Job instability

Or any other adverse condition that happens to adults over their lifetime [/quote]

The people I'm talking about are not going through divorce, illness, job instability, or financial troubles. And they are protected from the last two because of comfortable backgrounds that helped ensure they started out life with the best possible education and a lot of financial stability.

Why would someone with loving, supportive family and no childhood trauma develop addiction issues? Does that actually happen? Everyone I know with addiction and mental health issues can trace it at least in part to childhood issues.

So that leaves grief and adultery. Which sure, can befall anyone. But shouldn't someone from a loving, supportive, UMC or UC home know of ways to handle those things that don't involve treating other people terribly?

I'm not trying to be argumentative, but these responses are still not explaining why someone who has the background we'd all like to give our children (presumably) would behave in ways that are unequivocally unkind.[/quote]

I am a very pleasant person, one of the friendliest you will meet.  Everyone told me forever how great my parents were.  They were not great parents and terrible role models.  To this day, people think we are super close.  We aren’t.

There was no abuse.  But they weren’t good parents - though they did try hard.  Most anyone who knows us would think I am being ungrateful.  I constantly hear what a great family I have.  But they weren’t good parents.  I got through it but it created a mental grit that few realize about me.

Unless you have some secret knowledge of what living with the parents for 18 years was actually like, you have no idea how parents shape their kids.  [/quote]

I’m curious to know what happened that was not abuse but results in awful parenting but that would be invisible to others?

Also, do you have siblings? Even if their experience was different, they would have SOME idea of what your childhood was like.[/quote]

Not PP but I have seen parents trying to parent a kid they don’t have.  Paying for all the sports and extracurriculars when they have an introverted bookworm.  Insisting on academically oriented private school and tutoring and Ivy applications for a kid who would rather focus on art and theatre and their friend group.  Trying to talk through every feeling immediately when the kid wants time to think things through and process on their own.  None of it’s abusive and it’s great parenting in some cases but it’s not great parenting for that specific kid.[/quote]

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