So - this question may get some a bit riled but that is not my intention, this is genuine question which really does piss me off sometimes.
Why do we grant sympathy to certain "choices" people make, resulting in bad consequences, but others are condemned?
For example, drug abuse. The recent sad loss of Amy Winehouse has brought this back up for me....although nearly all I've seen on MN is resepectful alot of seen elsewhere is not. Basically I've seen people saying it is good that she is dead, she deserved it, it was "her own choice".
Yet I see anorexic women getting sympathy poured on them - surely it is a choice not to eat if you believe it is a choice to take drugs? Anorexics have alot of mental health help and are treated like victims, yet addicts are treated like criminals. I cant help but wonder if it is because most anorexics are young women who play nicely into the "frail damsel in distress" role that society seems to want so much - yet addicts do not.
Another one - I see on super-nanny type crap and infact in the street mothers struggling with very difficult children - sometimes these children have additional needs, sometimes not, but I have seen women abused by their own children, sometimes violently attacked.
Ive heard comments that these mothers "just aren't strict enough" or that they are bad parents, also that ADHD and autism etc dont exist it is just lazy parenting. This makes me so angry. Someone I know has to practically beat down the door to get help with her violent son, yet if it were her boyfriend slapping her round the face instead of him, she would be getting help. Infact the "services" would probably even chase her to offer help. Again - why is it viewed as deserving of sympathy if you chose to stay with a man who beats you, yet its your own bloody fault if your child who you cannot hit back or leave is abusive towards you?
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AIBU?
To question why certain "life choices" are granted more sympathy than others?
51 replies
KilledBill · 29/07/2011 11:23
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