Why are women so bitchy?

[BearingUp84]

For context - I'm a woman and I don't think I'm a bitch!

However there seems to be a group of school mums that seem intent on leaving me out of everything. I had no idea why. They meet up (pre covid obvs), have group chats etc. One of them can't even look me in the eye on the rare occasion she talks to me.

It's like the old adage, 2 company 3's a crowd. But it's when we're in a bigger group as well.

Why do some women just seem intent on leaving someone out? Constantly on the edges etc?

YABU - not all women are bitches
YANBU - these women are bitches, try make more friends

Just rah!

[Superfoodie123]

I feel you OP, I have been through this before. Let's be real, some women can be very bitchy and so can you. Its quite ironic that many of these posters are being quite 'bitchy'.

When I was on mat leave I used to go to a library club with my baby and made a couple of friends who were in a bigger group. When the group were together I used to feel like crap, standing on the sidelines, trying to get involved and being ignored. I stopped going in the end but feel bad for you that you can't do that. If I were you I would stand well away and just do your own thing.

[AtSwimTwoBerts]

Its quite ironic that many of these posters are being quite 'bitchy'

Theres no irony involved. YOU have chosen to characterise them as bitchy, it's not an objective term. There are a million other words you could have chosen, but YOU call them bitchy . No irony, your choice.

[AtSwimTwoBerts]

would say that on the ' law of averages' women do tend to gossip and form cliques more than men. They can be really nasty

Known, but less paranoid and malicious people as "chatting and being with your friends".

[AtSwimTwoBerts]

by less, that should say

[Superfoodie123]

*so can men

[MrsHuntGeneNotJeremyObviously]

Maybe the OP felt weird describing them as friends because their behaviour has made her doubt whether they ever really were. Sometimes people don't always choose their words with the foresight that other people will be analysing them to the nth degree.

[Superfoodie123]

@AtSwimTwoBerts bitchy is now an un PC term is it? Sorry to have discriminated against the female race! Please let me know what term is more acceptable then we can get back to the point

[AtSwimTwoBerts]

Maybe the OP felt weird describing them as friends because their behaviour has made her doubt whether they ever really were. Sometimes people don't always choose their words with the foresight that other people will be analysing them to the nth degree

Nonsense. If you start a thread about people not being nice to you, and they are actually your friends as opposed to total strangers, you make some indication that they are your friends. That isn't analysing anything, its normal human conversation.

[Ismellphantoms]

I totally relate to OP's first post. I've had such a bad experience of this that it made me ill. All was fine until one woman, I don't know why, took against me. She posted photos on Facebook of them all out on social evenings to deliberately upset me. We are a very specific group with a big common interest and qualification, so it was extra hurtful. Other people from outside the group would enjoy pointing this out to me. I'm naturally a very shy person with low self esteem and it broke me. I'm pleased they can only meet on group chats at the moment, which sounds mean, but this is something that has stopped me from ever making friends again.

[AtSwimTwoBerts]

bitchy is now an un PC term is it? Sorry to have discriminated against the female race!

You realise you just called every woman in the world bitchy with this sentence? WTF?

[Superfoodie123]

@AtSwimTwoBerts calm down and look at my post. I said men can be bitchy too. Turn your sirens off

[thepeopleversuswork]

Ismellohantoms

Sorry that happened to you. It’s very unpleasant.

But this sort of behaviour: genuinely malicious stuff, is rare. 99% of the time with these posts this is people massively overthinking minor social interactions.

The problem is people not having enough to do outside of school networks and amplifying it in their own minds so it becomes an unhealthy obsession.

There are some genuinely nasty people but most of this school mums stuff is imagined.

[Lovelydiscusfish]

OP, I hear your pain. The mums at my DD’s school were like this with me too. It made more sense when I discovered that the Queen Bee wanted an affair with my then husband (as it happens she is still with him now - good luck to her I say!). Also there was a class difference which I think made them dislike me - they were all super middle class (private school) whereas I am quite conspicuously from a working class background......

Don’t think it is just women that can be these kinds of pricks, tho. I know loads of men who are total bitches too......

[MrsHuntGeneNotJeremyObviously]

Idk, people feel self doubt. They sometimes start questioning themselves - did they place more importance on something than was really there? Self doubt is a human trait and a reason why it's possible to gaslight people. Already the OP has had people tell her that it's in her imagination, that she's not important enough to figure in their behaviour, that they are just preoccupied with their own things. That might well be true in some situations but I believe that people are largely very much aware of the social cues of others - if the OP has picked up on a change, I'm inclined to believe it has happened and it isn't her reading something into it which isn't there. She might not have done anything at all to cause it and the group has turned again her for some total non reason. I remember it happening to a girl at university. It's happened in my daughter's 'friendship' group.

[Testingtimesheet]

OP do you have an onlyfans account?

[bloomingroses]

And its bad for women overall. It's self-destructive, time-wasting behaviour which makes us feel needlessly shit. Men generally don't waste time on this sort of thing. They crack on, don't worry about it and don't destroy their own self-esteem worrying about things that don't matter.

Which proves the point how completely different we are.

[PinkyParrot]

Motherland took it to extremes but I think there were aspects people could identify with.

[MarieIVanArkleStinks]

And its bad for women overall. It's self-destructive, time-wasting behaviour which makes us feel needlessly shit. Men generally don't waste time on this sort of thing. They crack on, don't worry about it and don't destroy their own self-esteem worrying about things that don't matter.

This is undeniably true. But men can afford to be nonchalant because they have less of a vested interest in the debate that's already reared its head on this thread: SAHM vs. WOHM (or 'D', as the case may be), because they haven't had to worry about it. That's why women sometimes take other women's choices as a personal affront - note all the threads about 'farming out your kids' vs. 'being kept by a man' and then construe it as 'bitchiness'. But of course men don't concern themselves with the division of work vs. domestic labour in other men's homes. Masculine privilege means they don't have to. Women do that work for them.

Some women do start families on the understanding of equal work/childcare and the men later renege on the deal. Why, because they can; because society is structured so that the woman picks up the slack. This situation still seems to be depressingly common judging by the myriad frustrated threads I see posted by women in that position (nor do I don't blame them one bit).

IMO some women are focusing their ire in the wrong direction. (i.e. a society structured to privilege males). As for feeling somehow in competition for a Queen Bee status (almost as horrible a phrase as the word 'bitch') men are just as much guilty on that score. Their attitudes to the Alpha Male ideal are evidence enough of this.

Just a few of the many reasons the 'bitch' stereotype sticks in the craw. Aside from anything else it's lazy thinking.

[the80sweregreat]

Some people just never grow up and away from the playground of their youth.
They like the drama and the pettiness of it all I think. They revel in leaving people out that don't fit in their ways.

[arethereanyleftatall]

Can the op and those in agreement with her answer me this please.

I have a group of mum friends where we chat at the school gates. We got out maybe once or twice a year. So, not close friends but I've missed this 10 minute daily chat enormously in lockdown. Can't wait to see them again.

Am I really expected, whilst engrossed in chat with my friends, to look up and check if anyone would like to join in?? Our chat goes way back to when our eldest were in reception so we would have to start new (and thus boring) with anyone.

[MsHedgehog]

@arethereanyleftatall

Yep, apparently so! Apparently when you’re at the school gates, or the park, or in a bar, or maybe even a supermarket queue, if you’re chatting with someone else, you need to regularly look around to see if there is anyone you’re excluding.

[arethereanyleftatall]

Lol, ok, noted @MsHedgehog

You're so right though. This is totally specific to school gates. Imagine if you're chatting to your friends at a bar, are you supposed to beckon others over?

[MrsHuntGeneNotJeremyObviously]

It's not quite the same situation though is it
arethereanyleftatall? The OP already knows and has socialised with these women previously. It's more like in the situation you experience, having those women you've been chatting to every day just stop talking to you/inviting you to things.

[LuaDipa]

@arethereanyleftatall

Can the op and those in agreement with her answer me this please.

I have a group of mum friends where we chat at the school gates. We got out maybe once or twice a year. So, not close friends but I've missed this 10 minute daily chat enormously in lockdown. Can't wait to see them again.

Am I really expected, whilst engrossed in chat with my friends, to look up and check if anyone would like to join in?? Our chat goes way back to when our eldest were in reception so we would have to start new (and thus boring) with anyone.

Of course not. But I assume you wouldn’t begin to actively exclude any of the current group without explanation. This is what has happened to the op and why she is upset.

[MsHedgehog]

I can’t help but wonder if the friendship was in OP’s head, rather than an actual friendship. She only claimed they were friends much later, after initially referring to them as mums at the school gates. That’s quite a big omission and IMO is very telling.