To think that the way people treat male toddlers....

[Yellowcrocodile]

Is what leads to male entitlement in society?

Name changed for this as potentially identifying.

So I have a 2 year old DD and am currently pregnant with a boy.

Spent the morning at a playgroup in a naice area. I’ve come home feeling furious by the behaviour of some of the children and their parents. Basically there were a few boys 3+ who absolutely ran riot, screaming, running, shouting, snatching and hitting, and generally causing chaos. Their parents just smiled indulgently, and made comments like ‘boys have so much more energy’. None of them told their children off, apologised to anyone or acknowledged that their children were badly misbehaving.

It’s like this every fucking week. My daughter has her naughty moments too, snatches, tantrums etc, but as soon as she starts I tell her off (calmly), explain why she can’t do xyz, and say we are leaving if she carries on. She generally responds and behaves herself, and I’m very embarrassed if she doesn’t, as I have high expectations of her. Almost all of the other girls and half of the boys are the same, not perfect little angels but parented appropriatley and respond to boundaries.

It’s making me worried that when I have my son:
a. He’ll be a horrible little shit
b. I’m turn into one of the terrible parents who attribute his poor behaviour to ‘being boisterous’ or ‘naturally having more energy’

These children are never told off, and their sense of entitlement is growing by the day. This is probably hormones talking, but I can completely see how some men end up not doing any housework, feeling entitled to the best of everything, and go around raping and murdering people, as they are told from an early age that any behaviour is fine as they ‘have more energy’ and they just aren’t held to normal standards of behaviour.

Also, they all seem to be call very boring middle class names like william, Samuel and Benjamin, don’t know what that’s about? The children with names that would raise a mumsnet eyebrow are much better behaved.

So, AIBU to blame toxic masculinity and male entitlement on the tolerance we have for poor behaviour from boys in childhood?!

Or are hormones making me crazy...

I’m determined not to treat my son any differently to my daughter for both of their sakes, but feel really sad about the society they will both be growing up in

I've got one of each and agree with you OP. People tend to overlook behaviours in boys that get corrected in girls.
I saw a lot of it at a visit to the Science museum recently - boys having no sense of other children's personal space, barging smaller children out of the way while girls were at least attempting to take turns and share.
It's an easy way out isn't it - oh boys will be boys, so I'll put my feet up while they run amok.
By school age I think a lot of it is entrenched unfortunately.

OP you sound a bit unstable.

Most of the problems with naughty kids nowadays is caused by gentle parenting with no boundaries in my experience.

Such a lot of casual sexism on this thread

Wtf is the comment boys are like dogs you have to exercise them a lot all about precisely

Such utter sexist tosh. Children (note children, not boys) are in fact very much like dogs. They have to be fed properly, have their jabs, exercised regularly and stimulated appropriately

Is it any wonder that sexism continues to exist when parents differentiate between the sexes as many on this thread feel quite happy and contented to do?

I don’t like the phrase boys will be boys and would not tolerate awful behaviour from my DSes. However some people have a funny idea about what is bad behaviour compared to what is normal for young children. I remember going to a playgroup in the summer months a couple of years ago and my DS1, then 18 months old, went in the garden area and got a small amount of soil on his trousers. You should have seen the killer looks I got from some other mums for letting him touch a bit of dirt

I would allow him to run around a playgroup but not do the other things you mentioned.

As a mother of 3 boys I am insulted by this post. I would not tolerate any of that behaviour in my children whether they had been girls or boys. Please stop making assumptions and generalisations about people's parenting choices based on what a small handful of people that you know have said to

Tbf, I do feel quite unstable, in the way you would expect a heavily pregnant woman with hyperemesis in a heatwave to feel. God help the next person who pushes in front of me in a queue

Definitley not got gender disappointment, wasn’t bothered either way either time. Me and DH are fine, well, as fine as you can be when one of you is a heavily pregnant woman with hyperemesis in a heatwave

I suppose it’s just a lifetime of witnessing shorty male behvaiour. Being groped and assulted, being mansplainex, being expected to make the coffee in meetings. Just the expectation from some men that they can do what they like, and are entitled to the best. My brothers are feminists, and aren’t like this. I supppose I was sheltered from it in childhood, now I’m around little children I can see where it all starts, and it’s horrifying.

@PellyBay's post is spot on.

You have not seen where it starts ffs. You've been at a playgroup and you're bitching about toddlers.

Is your husband like it? Presumably not.
Are your brothers like it? You've said not.
Your boy will be fine (Although I argue men can't be feminists, but I don't believe married women can be feminists either-a rad fem lesbo here ) don't sweat it.

Op how would you like it I’m the future when your little boy acts up in public and someome said, “He’s a future rapist he is”

You’d be like, “What the actual fuck?”

I guarantee you.

*in the future

*someone

OP I'm with you, I'm certainly looking at situations differently since becoming a mother and even changing my language around little girls. I don't say they look pretty, or what a nice dress. I ask them questions and talk about what they are doing or praise them on an action and I do this as a mother of a son and because I shocked myself and how I behaved differently, almost awkwardly around girls. The disappointment I felt at myself made me really think about it. The things I would chose as gifts, the way I would patronise. I don't wonder or worry where it came from I just wanted to change it for myself.

Having a new awareness doesn't mean you are being critical or others necessarily and their parenting it's just you've noticed something and I personally don't think some comments made here are fair, based on your original post.

Yes, agreed. Although I think it's different parenting styles rather than any differences in the kids themselves.

I see it at kids parties. DD1 is at school but still young enough to be invited to lots of mixed boy/girl parties. The girls on the whole are managed quite well by the parents, as are some of the boys. But there's a group of boys who just tear around the place, jump on each other, and woe-betide any other child that gets in their way. The parents just stand and watch.

A previous poster mentioned Love Island and how the women are more bitchy than the men. I don't watch it, but have watched Big Brother for years and male bitchiness almost always gets ignored, unless it's really extreme. Women, however, make the tabloid headlines for the slightest catty comment. Women/girls are definitely judged far more harshly.

As for 'eating' I don't believe I have ever read a thread on here about teenage girls' having large appetites, but read plenty about teenage boys (I have been shocked at my 13 year old DD's increased appetite since she hit puberty).

I have experienced what you are talking about so think YANBU.
Most parents I know are good at treating boys and girls equally, especially the mum's who know what it's like growing up as an "inferior girl" and don't want the same for their dds, but the grandparents not so much! Girls seem to be given out to for the smallest things while boys do and get whatever they want, at least that is what I've seen from the older generations but I think it is changing.
Families with only boys seem to be quite bad too, it's like they need a dd for perspective.

“Families with only boys seem to be quite bad too, it’s like they need a DD for perspective”

What a load of garbage.

I'm a mother of 2 boys & would NEVER allow my boys to get away with behaving like that!
It's hardly the child's fault... it's the parents that are failing to discipline their children & to teach them right from wrong.
I'm pretty sure when you're boy comes along OP you won't treat him any differently to DD

Never thought about it before but YANBU

Oh and I am a mother of two boys.

they all seem to be call very boring middle class names like william, Samuel and Benjamin, don’t know what that’s about?

Alright captain judg-y, I get you want to discuss something and get opinions but picking on kids names is a bit out of line.
My DS has one of those names and I'm a tad offended! I know you were probably just cross and having a rant but just think it through next time! You're obvs not going to like everyone else's name choices but try not pass class based assumptions and judgements.

Society treats little boys and girls differently. I wish people would stop denying it.
Op is not saying all little boys will be horrid but that these attitudes towards boys and girls is leading to boys growing into men with a sense of entiltement.

Oswin, I see it as children growing up to have a sense of entitlement. Which means both boys and girls if they aren’t parented properly. I don’t think this is just a boy problem at all.

Society treats little boys and girls differently. I wish people would stop denying it.

If by that you mean boys are seen and treated more favourably, no they’re not. Not by a long shot.

I have a friend who insists her ds has so much energy that one of him is equivalent to my dtds the same age. I'm always at this comment as they are lovely but constant balls of emotional energy. I nod and smile! All 3 of my dds are very different in character, even the two "identical" ones so I'm pretty sure boys are the same and not all wild feral things you can't tame.

Mind you, my manager didn't invite me to an office thing as he'd only included the men (I'm the only female in the team). He said he wouldn't apologise as men need "men time!" I replied "I thought you were playing football, not wanking?!"

If by that you mean boys are seen and treated more favourably, no they’re not. Not by a long shot.

^^This. It's endless (fucking endless) girl power in fashion now. You need only look to threads like these to see that boys are just lousy men in waiting .