To think most “mum friendship groups” are just thinly veiled cliques?

This sounds like a problem with the school’s communication systems though. Why on earth would one group of friends have access to school related information that others don’t?

I met my closest local friends via my daughter's school. In fact pretty much all the mums from the year group get on. There have been a few fallouts and there were a couple of mean girls but mostly we socialise, sometimes in bigger groups and sometimes in smaller ones

This is so sexist and sneery, how do you know they are 'chatting about nothing'

I'm sorry you're going through that but your attitude ("nice middle class area" vs "the village mums") might be why you're feeling isolated from other people.

There's only one Mum who might be described as left out in my daughter's class and it's because she can't open her mouth without turning the conversation to her husband's thriving business, their acres of landscaped gardens and her fabulous lifestyle of spa days, shopping and lunch dates.

That, and the mass invite she sent out inviting everyone to bring their kids for a group playdate then swiftly rescinded because her husband didn't want our kids in his house.

Everyone is polite to her but she's not "in the clique" and is often standing off the one side on the playground because her behaviour hasn't made her popular.

Probably because you are secure in your own skin and didn't look at picking your child up from school as some sort of social event or popularity contest.

Again the key question is - if these "cliques" are so exclusionary, and so bitchy and nasty, why would you want to be part of them anyway?

People are entitled to form friendship groups that don’t have to include everyone just because they happened to give birth the same year.

The OPs of these types of posts are never able to give a distinction between a group of friends and a clique.

That sort of thing never appealed to me so I have no idea. I had friends and also made friends at work, didn't need school mums chatting and laughing about nothing at pick up time.

If this was aimed at me for what I said about being on the "wrong side", then you have misunderstood. The woman I posted about has previously done jail time for attacking another woman and also stole from an old lady at her place of work, so no I've never thought she was superior to me. Rather, she probably knew I was superior to her in many ways and decided to try and bully me.
It's not about wanting and failing to be part of a group, but when that one bad egg seems to dominate every school based social interaction and every group it makes you quite withdrawn. In the end I just ended up mostly keeping to myself because I couldn't be bothered anymore.

I was never part of these school gate mums groups, but I was always friendly and would chat if given the chance. I mean wouldn’t everyone? I hate this “they must be bitches” if there’s a group of women talking.

I saw one of these women yesterday, coincidentally, and she was so pleased to see me. We had a lovely little chat and then went on our way. She’ll have her friends and I’ll have mine, there’s no need for any deeper thoughts on our motives for such an interaction.

it depends I think - location / demographic etc and how much gou want your like dominated by parenthood (ie have gou anything else in your life - hobbies etc )

I see it with my sister already (her youngest starts school this year ) she is cramming as much in to this summer as she has to write some blog about her daughter’s summer and the bar is obviously high !!!!!

NCT groups sound dire too - from what she has said !

That said , my kids went to a school in a deprived demographic and I didn’t feel any of it ( breakfast and after school clubs helped as didn’t do drop off and pick up often )
I did a what’s ap group for a collection for one teacher as son had her for 2 years .

I am still close to a couple of mums who I met at playgroups but our kids went to different schools . We hung out in beer gardens in the holidays - think Motherland

There were cliques when my DDs were at school. I was never in one. There were two mums who I would occasionally speak to (they weren't in the clique either) but certainly not every day.
I hated being stood on my own while other parents chatted. And heaven help you if you tried to join in with the general chat.
DS is on a reduced timetable and thankfully I don't see other parents and miss our on the clique behaviour

Load of old nonsense that the friendships
dont last! My fab group are a big part of my life see them several times a week! Few of our kids are still friends most on gap years / university now but the parent friendships have endured.

One more year and I’m out of it. Can’t fucking wait.

Me too. I’m an older parent so I didn’t involve myself in trying to get into groups. I made friends with a couple of older mums who I’m still friends with today long after the primary years. I’m generally more of a one to one friend anyway so didn’t even think about being part of a group.

Seniors they made their own way to and from.

I have 3 grown daughters. In all my years of doing school pick-ups and drop-offs, I never had the bitchiness that so many on here seem to encounter.

I was far too old a parent to get into that.

I met several though who are still friends today.

I worry about this occasionally, I have a group of friends whose kids went to my kids nursery and a few other mums who have become part of the same chat, I do worry some people end up excluded. I always try to include anyone around but there have been occasions where I'm going for pre arranged coffee after drop off to discuss something specific with a friend, usually about the kids, and we want to mull it over as friends. And I'm a woman who has often been not included so if hate to have someone feel like that. But then I still don't think it's cliquey to want to chat to a friend I've known for 6 yes now.

OP- what specifically is it that you think the "clique" should be doing that they aren't, in order to be offering sufficient support, access to opportunities etc? You are taking in very vague general terms so it is hard to understand what exactly they are doing wrong.

Why not just get your kid and go home? School gates doesn’t have to be a thing.

How does a group that supports each other exclude others from getting access to information though? Surely the school shares all the info equally on whatever channel - email/app/letter in bag.

If parents set up their own support groups, to remind each other or ask questions that is up to them. You could just as equally start a WhatsApp group with some people you chat to.

At the school gate I chat to the mum of my son’s best friend as we also hang out at weekends. We text each other about stuff. I’ve naturally included other people I chat to now we have a WhatsApp group of about 6-7 mums. No other mum has ever shown interest in chatting to me.

For my younger child I sent out 30 party invites and got not one reply.

So forgive me if I just communicate with the parents that actively seem to want to engage.

@Zov

I didn't ask you to apologise for anything. But thanks for confirming that you are in a clique!

I'm not in a "clique", actually. Or even a friendship group. For the record, since you're so interested, I am a member of a year-wide school WhatsApp thread (as is every parent in the year). Outside of that I have the numbers of three individual mums whose kids are friendly with my DD to arrange logistics. I don't socialise with them at all. I'm not on any school WhatsApp threads other than that.

But I am perfectly comfortable and happy that other mums at my DD's school might have a WhatsApp thread or go to the pub together once in a while. It doesn't threaten me or bother me at all.

Why are you so interested in my being part of a "clique"?

I am always on the outside - of everything. It is the sort of person I am. I accept that. People are polite to me, as I am to them, but rarely do they take to me. Again, I accept that. So from that standpoint I say, why on earth shouldn't they form cliques? Every friendship group is a clique, from one perspective. It's a shame if people don't want to "play" with you, but you can't make them. If they are unpleasant (as I understand what you may mean is a group who aren't pleasant to you) then why would you want to be friends with them?

If people are so insecure they can only really feel valued by reference to a third person who is not valued, then I also feel quite sympathetic towards them.

You may make friends at the school gate or you may not (pretty much like every where else) but why would you feel that because others have done where you haven't this makes them somehow wrong or unfair? Grow up

Come on now. I don't even particularly care about the OPs post. I'm just tired of all these fake AI content generating posts.

I never understand why if people are bitchy and horrible etc why anyone wants to then join that group. If they actively exclude people they don’t like for whatever reason why do you care?

Or perhaps some of us simply reject the idea that some groups are better than others? If you refuse to buy into the thinking that there's an aspirational crowd which you'll either be part of or excluded from, and focus on the qualities of other people, cultivating friendships with those you like and who like you, rather than those you think are perceived as superior, then you get a different perspective. If you persist with the thinking that some people are superior, for no valid reason, and focus only on trying to get them to include you (so you can be a superior person too) you've only yourself to blame if you end up on the wrong side of the hierarchy you are creating.