Tuesday's Most Active Threads

As I predicted yesterday when I wrote about the thread about the presidential debate, that thread was the most active yesterday, exploding from 15 pages prior to the debate to 129 pages as I write this. But as I wrote yesterday, since I have already discussed the thread I'll skip it today. The next most active thread was titled, "Dave Grohl, sooo disappointed (had a baby outside of his marriage)" and posted in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum. As the title says, it was revealed yesterday that Dave Grohl, former drummer for Nirvana and frontman for the Foo Fighters, has fathered a baby outside his marriage. In an Instagram post, Grohl promised to take responsibility for the baby and maintain a loving relationship with her. He also said that he would now work to regain the trust of his wife and daughters. The original poster establishes what will be a major theme of responses in this thread, saying that she had a huge crush on Grohl and believed that he was a feminist with a strong relationship with the women in his life including his mother and daughters. As such, she is very disappointed. The original poster is joined in these feelings by a number of other posters who had held Grohl in high esteme and now feel that he let them down, if not outright betrayed them. Some posters who are also disappointed by Grohl at least respect that he is taking responsibility and planning to maintain a relationship with the child. They say that this is more than what many men in this situation would do. But others suggest that Grohl's statement was a creation of his public relations team and probably should not be taken too seriously. They predict little in the way of a true relationship between Grohl and his new daughter. A number of posters commented on the future of Grohl's marriage with some saying that if they were his wife they would immediately divorce him. Some guessed that this was likely not the first time that Grohl had cheated and they blamed him for putting his wife at risk of STDs in addition to being unfaithful. Others suggested that his wife may have been willing to look the other way in the past, but this public incident could not be ignored. Posters were divided between whether forgiving him would encourage Grohl to continue cheating or whether it was the right thing to do in this situation. Some posters argued that it was in her interest to remain married. Many posters were utterly disgusted by Grohl with some being particularly worried about the impact on his daughters, suggesting this showed a very negative attitude towards women. For other posters, however, this was no big deal. As a rock star, eager and willing women were probably a fact of life for Grohl and a rock star having sex outside of marriage is hardly news. For some, this was less an issue of morals and more of one of judgement and practicality. Sex is one thing, but unprotected sex is quite another and, at least, Grohl should have had a vasectomy they say.

Yesterday's next most active thread was posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum. Titled, "Quitting varsity sport mid season", the original poster says that her child is a high school junior who is not starting on the team and, therefore, sits on the sideline and ends up doing homework until 1 AM. Because the kid is not getting any playing time, the sport is a time sink and the child would like to quit. The original poster says that her kid is planning to apply for competitive colleges and wants to know whether this will have any impact on applications. The post, as I noted, was posted in the college forum and the original poster's question is purely about college. However, many posters ignored that context and, instead, addressed other aspects of quitting a sport in mid-season. Some posters argue that this would be letting down the team and, with only a month or so left in the season, the student should just stick it out. Some posters worried that an injury or unexpected absence by a starter could create a need for the kid who, having quit, would not be available. Other posters suggested that continuing to participate in a sport when not starting was part of the character-building inherent in sports. The posters who did address the impact, if any, on college applications argued that participating in the sport was practically irrelevent if the child were not going to be a recruited athlete. Some suggested listing the sport as an extracurricular activity, but reducing the hours to reflect the fewer hours devoted in the case of quitting. Others argued that if the child quit, the sport should not be listed as an EC at all. One poster suggested that the coaches might discuss the child with other teachers which could potentially impact letters of recommendation. Some posters advised that the original poster should do what is best for her child's well-being rather than what was best for college applications.

Next was a thread titled, "With little or no context, post a bad idea" and posted in the "Off-Topic" forum. This seems like a Twitter trend that someone imported to DCUM and, as I have said many times before, I don't like this type of thread. There is really no discussion involved and threads of this sort are difficult to summarize. The original poster's contribution of a bad idea is "A cook book called ‘A Pound of Ground’" which, I confess, I don't understand why it would be a bad idea. Some poster's had suggestions related to politics such as "Trump for President" or "Harris for President". Other suggestions were tips of the hat to DCUM threads, one referencing a recent thread about turtles and one referencing a classic DCUM thread about lightly frying tuna. Generally, I think most responders failed to follow the assignment. Due to my lack of interest in this thread, I'll refrain from further comment and leave the thread to those who have an abundance of free time they are hoping to waste.

The final thread that I will discuss today was posted in the "General Parenting Discussion" forum and titled, "Is this an American mom thing or specific to my kids school?". The original posters says that she is from the United Kingdom and has encountered problems making friends with other moms at her child's school. She says that in the UK it is tacitly understood that if you share information about a parenting challenge, unless you specifically ask, you only want support and solidarity. However, in the US, whenever the original poster discusses a parenting challenge, the person with whom she is talking immediately begins offering advice. The original poster finds this off-putting because she is not interested in advice and it creates a barrier to bonding with the other parent. She wants to know if this is simply a cultural difference. True to form, a number of posters immediately begin offering the original poster advice, most of it well-meaning and some maybe even helpful. In addition, there was plenty of advice that was, at best, mean-spirited. These posters were probably clueless how well they were demonstrating exactly the phenomenon that the original poster was describing. On the other hand, several of those responding said that they were familiar with what the original poster was describing and that it was not cultural as much as due to personalities. They explained that the DC area is full of individuals who are problem-solvers by nature and see every problem as something that must be solved. They are simply reacting based on their own personalities. Others agreed with the DC area being being full of such individuals, but they saw this advice-giving as much more nefarious. To this group. providing unwanted advice is a way of asserting superiority and is common among status-obsessed Washingtonians. Instead of simply commiserating, these folks offer advice in order to demonstrate their higher status due to knowing how to deal with such an issue. Many posters suggest that this attitude may be more common among private school parents and, indeed, the original poster's child attends a private school. These posters suggest that public school parents may react more frequently as the original poster would prefer and simply offer support. Other posters suggest making friends outside of the school environment. Some posters are inclined to believe that this actually may be cultural and suggest that British and Americans have different communications styles. By the most recent posts in the thread, things had deteriorated considerably with posters not only offering unwanted advice, but being fairly mean about it. They are not only ugly DCUMers, but ugly Americans in this case.