To take exception to the term 'mumtitlement'?

[MerchantofVenice]

I'm sure many people have spotted this rather insidious word popping up on recent threads. Personally I find it unpleasant and misogynistic. Depresses me that a number of people immediately piped up about how much they 'loved' the term as soon as it was coined. Bleurrgh.

Why do we hate mums so much?? If someone's being unreasonably demanding, then that's one thing... But to try and link selfish behaviour to 'being a mum'... Wtf?

I get the idea that there is this general feeling that mums are marching around being all 'entitled' and, you know, trying to carry on their lives without apologising for being alive. This desperate need to belittle the whole of mumkind every time one mum gets something a bit wrong is so bloody annoying! Ok, if someone is a twat, call them out on it... But using a term like 'mumtitled' is confrontational to all mums - as if twatishness is peculiar to them...

A lot of the time, the issues seem to be about what women 'should' be doing - should they be going there, should they be breastfeeding there, should they just clear out of the way with their offensive offspring so that more important people can get on with their lives in peace? Pisses me right off.

Anyone else?

I could understand everyone falling over each other to slag off mums if this were, say, chauvinisttwats.com or similar....but it's, you know, mumsnet...

Very well said ghostyslovesheep and MilkTwoSugarsThanks. Misogynism is the immediate 'go to' accusation many make for any kind of criticism or questioning of women's behaviour. The more its throw around for the slightest little thing, the less potency is carries.

It's no different to Mansplaining or Manlooking, which I have heard used IRL more often than I care to count.

Mumtitlement is a specific way of acting just because you are a mum. Dadtitlement would be the same.

Now the one I really hate is ''mumtepreneur' - seriously wanky.

Now the one I really hate is ''mumtepreneur'

What does that mean?

A mum that starts up her own business - generally shite like Forever Living or Jamberry MLMs. Calls herself the Boss and lists her employment on FB as a Mumtepreneur

Load of wanky 'look how successful I am' bollocks. How many blokes would write 'Dadtepreneur' rather than 'self employed'?

It's a bit extreme to feel the need to ask why we hate women so much just because another one of these weird blended words has come about describing a type of behaviour that Mums sometimes display.

Some mums do behave as if the world owes them a favour because of their children, and the feeling behind that is probably something we've all felt at some point. Describing that isn't insulting or derogatory to women, we don't need to turn everything into a feminist issue.

I've seen mumpreneur, but not mumtitled. But I disagree that we don't challenge attitudes that denigrate women. Perhaps you're not looking on the right threads! And not all terms are negative - I always thought "yummy mummy" was a compliment...

I agree that it describes a real behaviour.

And that if you think you've never seen any sexism then you must be very unobservant

I wouldn't use it because it sounds clumsy but I get the sentiment.

Criticising specific mums for behaving in a selfish and bratty way is absolutely fine by me. No one is saying all mums are like this. It's not a sex specific thing-if a dad were to behave similarly he'd be in for the same treatment on here.

I rather like, perfect
Description of a common affliction.

Tempted to add bumptitlement to that, unless someone's already done it.

mansplaining is used of a man using his supposed status as a man to patronise a woman: a woman cannot do that because she does not have male status

nobody is implying that all men do it, or that this is typical of men (sexist); simply it is undesirable behaviour which relies on status as a man

mumtitlement (never heard it before, but rather like it), seems to do the same thing: it is about a woman using her special position as a mother to claim special treatment

again, nobody is implying that all or most women or mothers do this; only that you have to have status as a mum to play this particular game

mumtrepreneur is rather different: it implies that something that is not specific to mums or women (setting up a business) somehow becomes different (less serious?) when done by a woman with a family. Don't like that one much.

YANBU

Mumpreneur/mumtepreneur: oh bleugh, boak, yuck. So pathetic. Not a real word!

Mumtitlement: hilarious! witty! I'm stealing that!

I look forward to it going mainstream and being used against us all for being stroppy bitches who demand maternity leave/affordable childcare/ the right to breastfeed in public or whatever new hormone-addled madness we come up with.

There's a sad lack of gender-specific insults for bitches bimbos feminazis sluts slags ballbreakers crones tarts prickteases icequeens battleaxes divas bunnyboilers golddiggers women. I'm really glad we've invented a new one. Stop being such a girl.

"I look forward to it going mainstream and being used against us all for being stroppy bitches who demand maternity leave/affordable childcare/ the right to breastfeed in public or whatever new hormone-addled madness we come up with."

Do people use it for this?

Or is it used for the mum who thinks her (collapsible) buggy should take priority over the wheelchair on the bus?
(I was once told by a bus driver re dd's wheelchair that "that will have to come off if someone gets on with a pram"- he had experienced some very vocal pram users and didn't want more trouble).

For the mum who expects her frail and elderly IL's to do all the travelling because you can't possibly travel with a toddler?

For the mums who occasionally post on MN explaining that they should have equal access to priority parking and seating "because having a baby is like having a disability". (yes, I have seen that one!!!)

Not ordinary women wanting equality, but women using their status to insist on more than equality.

Is mansplaining used of a man who does normal explaining in the course of his working day? Or a man who uses his position as a man to accord himself more status than is needed?

Ime behaviour I would classify as mumtitlement is not actually about using your position to get an advantage over, or equality with, privileged men: it is used to get an advantage over even less privileged groups, such as the disabled or frail.

Criticising specific mums for behaving in a selfish and bratty way is absolutely fine by me. No one is saying all mums are like this. It's not a sex specific thing-if a dad were to behave similarly he'd be in for the same treatment on here.

This ^^ definitely.

"It doesn't tarnish all Mums, though does it?

Just the wanky twatty ones who display entitled behaviour."

Yes. It does and it will.

A bit like "slut", which is a 'floating signifier' and used to patrol all women's behaviour.

I'm in the camp that hates the self-policing that subordinate groups, accorded negative behaviours by dominant groups, are coerced into performing on themselves. The whole "Oh, some women are like that. Not me, though. I am definitely not like that. Watch me be as much like that as possible"

"Entitled" can amount to little more than one woman chastising another for not being self-effacing enough and daring to think she has a right to be somewhere or another. It's easily done: women get used to being treated as people (and, yes, if they are a middle-class, white person, they may well get used to unconsciously availing themselves of the privileges - eg. access to public space/goods - that come with that). They have a baby and just don't receive the email telling them to render themselves a lot more self-effacing and undemanding.

It functions to patrol women - the use of a word is a way of corralling off acceptable and unacceptable mum behaviour.

And for all those who think they know where the boundaries of 'mumtitlement' are, I would suggest that - while they may have a working knowledge of where they'd set the boundaries - this may not correspond with what dominant society may think mum's are entitled to.

I hate, hate, hate the patrolling of women. This seems to me to multiply by 100 when women have children. I think we need to resist a great deal more - as a class. I hate the whole competitive parenting shit (which is 'hidden' in the whole 'my children aren't spoilt but hers are) nonsense. Or the competitive house-cleaning. I love mumsnet when I come across women hanging together and resisting this sort of crap.

Watch me be as much NOT like that as possible."

Typo - sorry.

I do think it's a type of grooming. A bit like the bitch ex-girlfriend trope. Where the next girlfriend is co-erced into proving how much NOT like that bitch ex-girlfriend she is.

(PS - To the poster whose quote I picked out. I meant to paraphrase and delete but I forgot. I've decided that picking out individual's posts can come across as a bit too aggressive and I'm trying to avoid it. Sorry for not deleting - it's not meant as an attack. It was more of an aide-memoir for a wider point.)

Ime behaviour I would classify as mumtitlement is not actually about using your position to get an advantage over, or equality with, privileged men: it is used to get an advantage over even less privileged groups, such as the disabled or frail.

That's your specific definition, but you can't actually limit the word to being used as that. You might think 'bitch' should only mean 'woman who acts in a deliberately unpleasant manner', but that doesn't stop some men using it as 'woman who vocally disagrees with me'. Or 'feminazi' is just 'woman with extreme feminist views', but is conveniently used, again, as 'woman who vocally disagrees with me'.

The broadest, most convenient definition of 'mumtitlement' is 'being a woman with a child, asking/requiring/demanding something'. And it'll be used as that.

All the examples you've listed show selfish, inconsiderate, demanding behaviour, demonstrated in a situation involving children. But I can't believe that the kind of person who refuses to move for a wheelchair, because they've got a buggy, is the kind of person who's not a total PITA in other areas of their lives -- the person queue-jumping at lunch, because they're in a rush, or blocking two parking spots because they can't be arsed to move their car.

So I don't see why it needs to be specified as 'mum' behaviour, as if it's innate to having ovaries and offspring. Some people are obnoxious and certain their needs come first. If they have kids, this gets extended to their family's needs coming first, and possibly justified by some rhetoric about children being little darlings who deserve the best. And this behaviour is more visible in women, because they tend to be the early-years primary carers. But it's not because they're women -- it's because they're arses. So it's crap to have a term like 'mumtitlement', which is exclusive to women, and will only be used against them.

(And, nope, I'm not saying let's ban all the words... just, do we have to make them up ourselves and celebrate them?)

Do they have to defined by being mums, though? Why can't they just be 'entitled' like everyone else?

I have never heard the term before but I instinctively hate it, in the same way I hate mumpreneur, mummy friends, tiger mother etc because they all aim to mock and belittle women.

Ok, I think I might backtrack here: I can see what people are saying re the use of language and the risk of this feeding general misogynism

Also, that people who are entitled mums were probably entitled people in the first place.

There does seem to be one difference though to the lunch queue type example, and that is that the status they claim for being mums actually seems to work to some extent. Very few people accept that somebody has to have the right to jump a lunch queue because they are in a hurry, but my example was not the only time I have had to give way with the wheelchair because bus drivers seem to believe that mums do have a right to claim precedence.

And again, very few people claim that being in a hurry in the lunch queue is the same as being disabled- which is precisely the claim I have seen here on MN regarding mums with babies.

I have known some very polite and gentle people, who would be ashamed to claim any special treatment for themselves as people, become absolutely insistent that the needs of their offspring come before anything else, even if on inspection it is clear that what is defined as the need of the child is very much about the convenience of the mother: it is as if the acquisition of a child gives them the right to live out behaviour they always wanted to but never dared.

Even so, I can see what people are saying and will not be using this word.

I think some posters have raised some really good points. We do need to look at the language we use and the prejudices it contains. It's lazy or simplistic to try to suggest that it's 'just' a word that describes a particular behaviour, with no other overtones or associations.

It was interesting that some people couldn't see the difference between the use of 'mansplain' and 'mumtitlement'. The difference, of course, is that women (generally) use the former when they're trying to push against ingrained, patriarchal attitudes. And it is women (very different women, presumably) who are, sadly, reinforcing old ideas about women when they fall over each other to explain how much they LOVE the word 'mumtitlement'. Sigh.

There are people who act as though their child and the fact they are it's parent is more important than anything or anyone else - interestingly they generally considered their offspring more important and interesting than anyone else's too and expect other parents to make way as much as anyone without a child - so it is not really the fact they are mums as it is only their own maternity they hold sacred, no odd else's.

And I do know dads like that - it is often a clue thing ime.

I also see an attitude that "mums" should make them self small and humble and meek and keep the fact they are mothers as quiet as possible, not talk about kids, not be in the way - that is more prevalent ime.

No, the people I was thinking of in my post were not generally bratty. In every other way they were considerate, even delightful. But they believed they had more right than their colleagues to have time off at Christmas, or to leave work at 4.pm knowing full well that the rest of us would have to cover for them. I've had a small child too so I know sometimes this is unavoidable but the normal, considerate thing to do is to 'say thank' you and reciprocate. They never did.

I'm genuinely torn on this on because part of me thinks, 'hell, don't we have enough words already for criticising women?' But this is not another generalised insult. It describes a very specific type of behaviour and we should acknowledge it exists because often, (not always) it is other women who bear the brunt of it. And it pisses them right off.