To think you shouldn’t call a child an idiot?

[littleemma1]

I was at the gym in the changing rooms and could hear a mother with her daughter and son in the next cubicles along (shared changing rooms between pool and gym)

Not a nice word to use but you don't know what he was doing. He could have been licking the floor for the 48th time that day and mum was at the end of her tether for all you know!

But you don't know what he was actually doing? It isn't great, obviously, but if he was doing something actively dangerous then I can completely understand her reaction. I don't have children either, but I don't think it's hard to imagine that she might have panicked as well as being cross.

I did quite recently hear a mum in the supermarket scream at her toddler to 'shut the fuck up you stupid little bitch'. That one I find harder to imagine the circumstances that would make it understandable.

The trouble with "idiot" is that it did used to be used as a medical term for those with special needs - I found this:

MENTAL DEFICIENCY
The 1913 Mental Deficiency Act defined four grades of Mental Defective. In each case the condition had to be present "from birth or from an early age". [Until 1927]

idiots were people "so deeply defective in mind as to be unable to guard against common physical dangers"
imbeciles were not idiots, but were "incapable of managing themselves or their affairs, or, in the case of children, of being taught to do so."

I know people don't use it this way now, but it does make it seem worse as a term - rather like you wouldn't use the words "cretin" or "moron" which were similar.

I get your point op, I'm careful to say to my dc she is acting like an idiot if the occasion arrives rather than out and out calling her an idiot. One is temporary and other is a permanent statement.

With my dc she faces learning difficulties anyway so I feel it would crush any confidence or her will power to overcome them.

If she calls herself an idiot I jump through hoops to explain she isn't but just did something silly which is normal.

It might seem trivial I suppose but to me it isn't.

I think its not so bad saying 'behaving like an idiot' compared to 'you are an idiot' - the latter seems much worse but I agree about the don't judge when you don't know the context. Most of us have been there.

Until you have kids you won't know what a stress they can be sometimes. For example this evening I called my 6 yr old a name. He was bring stubborn and awkward about getting changed after school. I was up until 5.30 this morning with panic attacks, I'm over tired and hormones are raging to top it off. I didn't mean to call him a name but it slipped out and I regret it. Sometimes you're just pushed to your limits as a parent.

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