"What? You?!" Sneery Teen

[PyongyangKipperbang]

He is 15 and literally NOTHING existed in the world until he heard of it, which I am sure he is not alone in.

He is into musical theatre. Goes on and on about various musicals he has found and likes. Ok, no problem there except he does it in a very sneery way as if I coudlnt possibly know about these things but I generally let it go.

When I was younger I planned to go into acting and part of my unofficial training when I was waiting to go to drama school was being trained in theatre production. There is a really good theatre nearish to me and I did some am-dram and got a lot of training in sound for stage productions and I really loved it. I decided that I would rather do sound than acting. Then life happened and I didnt go to school and blah blah but I did still do sound for am dram for a few years.

Last night I get "You probably wont have heard of it but there is this great musical called Blood Brothers which has great songs" and I said "yeah I know, they are good". "Oh you've heard of it?" and it just put my back up. So I said "Of course. Its been around for years and is very well known. I did the sound on it when it was on at X theatre about 20 years ago"

That was when I got "What? You?!" in an incredulous disbelieving sneery way. "You dont seem to me to be someone who could do that" And I got really annoyed and did shout that yes believe it or not I do actually know things, that I did have a life that didnt involve being a mother and to not look down his fucking nose at me. Oh and by the way, no he doesnt fucking know it all. I then asked him a few technical questions "do you know how to....." which he didnt and I could say "Well I do, so...." and he bogged off upstairs!

AIBU to think that sometimes it is justified to give them a smack round the earhole, because I have had the most incredible urge to do just that ever since.

Every time I am not completely terrible at something my DC express surprise. I particularly enjoyed firing tennis balls at them at high speed over the summer when they very kindly took their fat old unfit Mum to play tennis. I have also beaten them at table tennis and once on holiday they were amazed when I listened patiently to their detailed instructions on how to play volleyball and then whacked it past them several times
I can also swim faster than either of them.
Of course I do have to have a sit down afterwards but I am not as useless as expected at sports

Do you all think we were like this with our parents?

Since my 16 year old became a teen he acts like I'm the most embarrassing parent in the world and never wants to bring friends over (not that he can at the moment anyway). He is surprised if I know anyone who hr is a musically a fan of. He is surprised that I know anything about history as if teenagers invented the past!🙄

@JamesMiddletonsMarshmallows

Do you all think we were like this with our parents?

Oh yes.

I have this with my ds. He is generally a lovely kid with a massive heart but he seems incapable of believing that I might know anything at all. I can say something, he will ignore me or say I am wrong, dh will come in and say tbd same thing and they will have a lovely discussion about it. I often wonder if it is because I was a sahm for a while, or if it is ingrained misogyny that I haven’t managed to stamp out. It certainly doesn’t come from dh, who isn’t perfect but will often seek my opinion regarding work situations. Whatever the reason, it is infuriating and quite hurtful, and I often have to walk away. Yanbu op.

It’s like a campaign that a milk substitute company is running now - basically ‘hey kids and your dad old out of touch dad about not eating meat and switching to non dairy because he’s such a dinosaur’.

Yes - teens with no life experience beyond twitter and Tic toc lecturing the Greenham common/CND generation...

If they become a pain just remind them that they thought Barney was a real dinosaur and thought he was the greatest thing in Earth at one point.

I (used to) work in sponsorships, and did quite a bit with some major sports teams - premier league football and motorsports mainly.

DSD15 was very sneery when I was bowed over a laptop in the office and unable to drop everything to run her here there and everywhere, or turn a wash load around within minutes, but didn't hold back on the bragging about it when there was a friend over, and always wanted the intimate details when she was talking to a boy, funnily enough... 🤨

Almost, ALMOST got to excited when I had to go to a match and there were family tickets - almost, but not quite!

@GravityFalls

I teach sixth form and they are often like this when they start - challenging you, acting like you (the subject specialist teacher!) know nothing, baiting and goading...I always crush it completely, it’s the only way. Not unkindly, but firmly - “I’m paid to teach this. I’ve been teaching this since you were I nappies. I definitely know more than you about it. If I say something wrong, by all means correct me, but I’m not interested in your opinion of my teaching or my lessons. If you want to leave, please go now so I can get on”. It shrinks them but it’s temporary and they often are very keen after that.

Funnily enough upper 6th very rarely try it, unless with a brand new teacher. It seems to end by 18.

GravityFalls: “It seems to end by 18”. From your mouth to God’s ears ....please on the parenting front, at least! It’s not only that the assumption that you know nothing or don’t understand is so wearing and occasionally hurtful, it’s that you can see them heading for a fall and they won’t let you guide them to avoid it.... hard for me because I genuinely did listen as a kid always having been very risk averse....

@AnaisNun

God I’ve got a 4 year old who already mansplains, and also converses thusly:

“what’s that there mum?”
“It’s a picture of a tornado”
“No it isn’t. It’s a whirlywindyduster and they come from dragons. I know because I’m the Dragon Master and (etc etc)”
“Darling, that’s very creative - but it’s a tornado. Do you want to know about tornados?”
“Nah it’s okay. I know everything about them already and I control them with my superpowers”.

It’s cute now, but I can already see where it’s going....

(Also a LP....)

Aww, is your son Dwight Schrute?

Oh yes, same as a teacher - when I tell them I’ve taught such and such a unit lots of times and what always trips students up is X so please make sure right from the beginning that you’re on top of X and know what you need to do...cue panic two days before deadline when X is, indeed, not done, because they ignored you because they knew much better than you.

YANBU. The "What, you?!" seems particularly out of line. You will be doing his future partner a favor taking him down a peg or twelve. And, in a roundabout way, himself.

If there is ever a calmer moment, and theatres ever reopen, maybe there is an opportunity there to drag him along with you to work someday (assuming this is still a career you're active in?). Let him see for himself that he's vastly underestimating his own mum.

Different genre, same principle
www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/arts-entertainment/teenager-wants-to-tell-you-how-good-kurt-cobain-was-20190320183726

I always wanted to be a teacher. Told dd and friend. Reply was something like

What, you, you'd have been rubbish.

Dd and friend nodded agreement with each other and collapsed in giggles.

I spent 10 years in special constabulary before dd, but as there are no photos dd refuses to even believe this was possible.

I remind dd that she didn't used to be able to say the word spoon properly at this point.

I was talking to a friend about how it’s a shame really that teenagers today don’t get taken to pubs - hear me out! I mean when I was 16/17 if you were with your dad you were fine in a pub and he could buy you half a lager and nobody would ask questions. And when you’re in a pub shooting the breeze with adults they’ll soon disabuse you of any notions that your ideas are unique or new - and you might learn stuff too! I suppose it was the same when kids started working at 16. The rough edges soon get knocked off you in those sorts in environments. Now they’re treated as children much longer, which is good in some ways, but it does mean they don’t get that robust coming-of-age experience in the same way.

Teacher Helen Archer said: “I now realise what I was like when I discovered Jim Morrison in 1991, and I am profoundly sorry.”
Taken from the Daily Mash article apalledandshocked posted.
I too would like to apologise to my mum thinking that she could not of heard of Led Zeppelin in in 1980 when I was 15!

I think it is a bit difficult for teens now as all modern music is crap (according to mine, anyway) and with old music, well, we were there first!

When I was a teen there was only 20 or so years of pop/rock music behind me, but now there’re decades . And there used to be a “generation gap”. Parents liked old people music. My parents weren’t too bad, to be fair, but I had friends who weren’t allowed to play their records (or use the music centre - that’s one for the oldies!) as pop music spoilt the needle...

Kids don’t have their own space, as we are still occupying it. I can see why it is annoying that we’ve seen/done/heard it all.

This reminds me of the Mark Twain quote:

When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years.

Sympathies op.

I think you crashed on his cool OP. He will have to find something different now so that Mum doesn't also like it and make it unadventurous and boring.

@Ballstothis148

You sound like you’re gatekeeping on something he loves, he sounds like he’s trying to make his own space in that area. Come together on it and love it together!

No, he's doing the gatekeeping, and being unnecessarily rude about it

Mine asked me if there was electric lighting when I was a child so at least he recognises you being part of the current century!

Mine asked me if there was electric lighting when I was a child so at least he recognises you being part of the current century!

My Mother remembers seeing an electric light for the first time.

I'm sorry you're upset and that your DS doesn't seem to speak to you very nicely, but isn't there a way of coming together on this? I'm sorry - and perhaps I have the wrong impression from your post - but it's not a competition with your son. If he's "discovered" something suggest you watch it together, maybe later tell him of your experiences or may be not.

Teenager like things to be black and white and put people in boxes.

I've taught a lot of Health and social care, but my PGCE is in computing as is 50% of my degree.

I was helping a student with a laptop and had another loudly proclaim, "X can't believe you are asking for help from a health and social teacher"

He had to backtrack when I told him that it was part of my degree and I've been programming since before he was born.

@LuaDipa

I have this with my ds. He is generally a lovely kid with a massive heart but he seems incapable of believing that I might know anything at all. I can say something, he will ignore me or say I am wrong, dh will come in and say tbd same thing and they will have a lovely discussion about it. I often wonder if it is because I was a sahm for a while, or if it is ingrained misogyny that I haven’t managed to stamp out. It certainly doesn’t come from dh, who isn’t perfect but will often seek my opinion regarding work situations. Whatever the reason, it is infuriating and quite hurtful, and I often have to walk away. Yanbu op.

I'd stay around and say, 'that's exactly what I said' rather than walk away. It might sink in eventually.

My daughter is younger than your son but last week she asked if we could look through the Windows at school while on our walk to see what the teachers are doing without the dc there. I totally burst her bubble by reminding her the teachers don’t actually live at school and have lives outside of her classroom. Her mind was blown - teachers are teachers and mums are mums. They definitely need reminders sometimes that were individual humans. Dh and I often talk about stuff we did pre dc though so I’m not sure it would be such a surprise. If you’ve never mentioned it then how would ds know?