When your mother blames the woman...

[anxietyaunt]

My mother is... something else. She’s never been much of an advocate for women’s rights. I’ve always known this so I shouldn’t be affected by some of her comments, but I am.

Despite being a smart woman and (allegedly) knowing the statistics around domestic violence against women, she can’t help herself. She thinks courts are unfairly biased towards women. That women should “stop carrying on” and sort things out themselves. “Deal with it.” “Stop making things up and ruining lives.”

This woman raised me. Sorry, not sure what my AIBU is, but I’m so incredible saddened by it all.

A few of us have pointed out that this doesn't represent all women. Certainly not my DM who would have been 95 this year. She was a difficult woman in many ways, but valued her independence and clearly understood that the problem with male violence was men. She also kept her "Batchelor girl" fund throughout her marriage. Just in case.

Whenever I used to fuss about what to wear she used to cheerfully remind me that no one would be looking at me as they would be too busy looking at themselves. I only ever remember her commenting on women who looked smart, rather than focusing on any negatives.

What's interesting in challenging the "that's what life was like for women back then" narrative, is why people are so invested in insisting there were no choices yet being so resentful of women who followed different paths.

I think the whole fact there is no dadsnet board speaks for itself.

Men seem to have special interest groups (Dads for Justice, INCEL etc) but not a generic group.

Those limited groups reinforce each other more which is not necessarily a good thing.

There are similar problems on Mumsnet.

But sharing experiences is not a bad thing.

I think the whole fact there is no dadsnet board speaks for itself.
Er.....
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/dadsnet

there were just as many posters insisting that they much preferred their male partner/husband to go to the bar and buy drinks because it made them feel "like a lady", even if they had actually handed over their own cash for the purpose. I raised that it is a harmful attitude that reiterates the idea that men are heard and seen and do important stuff like handle money whilst womenfolk sit simpering in the corner waiting for the men. It did not go down well and there were comments like "I love feeling like a princess ". BOAK!

Oh for the love of god don't get them started on who should pay for the first date.

I take a great deal of satisfaction in going to the bar and getting two pints. If OH and I can't decide which beer we might like best we just get two different ones, taste test, and distribute them accordingly.

I remember being when I moved down South from Scotland and was asked whether the half pint of beer that I'd ordered was "for a lady". If it was, it was poured in a glass with a stem

In Scotland, the women get the same glass as the men

@prettybird don’t even get me started on that one! I get fed up of being asked if I ‘actually want a half’ when I’ve asked for a pint of Guinness. One man in my family told me that it wasn’t ladylike to drink pints and continually kept putting halves down in front of me... I got up and asked for a pint glass (no stem lol) and another half pint, took them back to the table and poured both halves into the pint so I could have my drink. He turned puce!

An older woman once said to me, there is no bad men in the world, only bad women.

And, if a man cheats on his wife, its the wife's fault for neglecting him.

I had no words.

For all the women here with misogynistic mums.

I must be very fortunate. My mother who was born in the 1930s was always looked at askance by other women of her age group because they thought she was a bit too alternative. But she brought my sister and I up to be proud of our womanhood and has a rather more sceptical view of men than her contemporaries. Last Christmas I gave her a ‘Smash the Patriarchy’ badge to wear for the day. Tbh, if I’m wearing a ‘Smash the Patriarchy’ badge in my 90s, I shall know that at least I’ve managed to achieve something.

@Cindy87

Why is this thread all about our mums? Do we all have feminist dads?

Nope. Mine fucked off when I was 1. And had four subsequent stepfathers (yes, she married them all!)

I've spent a long time unpacking that one as well!

Reading this has made me even more aware how fortunate I was with my parents. My mum would've been 80 this year and my dad is still around at 84. The example I got from their marriage was one of equals: they shared in the child care and although mum enjoyed cooking and baking, so did most of it, they worked equally in the kitchen and neither sat down until both could sit down. After mum had her accident, dad took over from her in the kitchen and is now a confident cook and baker (almost as if he is channelling her ). Mum was a full time student from the time I was 5 (dad was a mature medical student) and was then a teacher. They both always assumed and brought me up to believe I could do anything I wanted. My younger db didn't get favourable treatment we were both expected to wash up and to tidy up

I re member being asked a borderline illegal question when I was at 2nd interview with ICI back in 1984 to get onto their graduate recruitment scheme: how would I cope with having a family (iirc, they asked both male and female candidates). Rather than bristling, I answered it honestly and airily, saying my parents had both worked full time and I'd turned out pretty well adjusted so I didn't see it as a problem there's not much they can riposte to that

I got onto the scheme

I had similar from my mother, not rants but comments about not arguing back or women need to stop being pushy.

Then she found out about the abuse I was suffering from my husband and her attitude has genuinely changed. She knew I didnt deserve, she knew I certainly didnt do anything to provoke attempted murder.

@Tartyflette

When I went to university in the early 70s i opened a student bank account and had to give my father as a guarantor /reference. This was when only about 10 percent of school leavers went on to university, but well under 50 percent of those were women. At Oxbridge the male/female ratio was 10:1.

Girls who did the '11 plus' had marks deducted (older girls more heavily) to keep the sex ratio level in grammar schools, and something similar occurred with entry to medical school until the 1970s.

Re. the Oxbridge figure, I think that until the marriage bar etc. was abolished, parents and teachers saw little point in encouraging even very bright girls to study for careers which would either have to be abandoned or severely limited if the woman chose marriage and motherhood. Cruel times.

I have regular contact with a lady in her 70s who loves soccer and follows it religiously but can’t understand why they allow women pundits or commentators as ‘what would they know about football??’ She’s full of stuff like that, it’s both cringy and hilarious!

@speakout

Quorafun

Do some investigation into the Mother Wound.

You ask us to be kind to our mothers- they did our best etc.

Perpetuation of harmful attitudes causes harm- that's the problem.

"Our mothers did their best" is, when talking about mothers in general, not specific women, extremely unhelpful.

No, not all mothers did/do their best, any more than all fathers did/do. Mothers are simply women who have had a child, there are all sorts of mothers. There are plenty of accounts in this thread of mothers who were neglectful/abusive/sadistic. Plenty of accounts of mothers who were aware of their daughters being abused by the father (or by other men) and who stood by the perpetrators.

Yes, many women have been conditioned. They might be very dependent on men financially, etc. But adults almost always have SOME choices, even if not as many as they would like, whereas children have none. A child being abused within a family is defenceless. . . unless adults aware of that abuse choose to act in the child's defence.

My father was abusive to my siblings and to me as well as to our mother. Our mother consistently stood with him, lied about him to put him in a positive light, told professionals (doctors, psychiatrists, teachers) that I was lying about all this in order to hurt my father. That is NOT "doing your best." That is being a co-abuser. She was offered therapy, turned it down. ("The times they gave me weren't convenient" etc).

Women are not a homogenous group any more than men are. Abusive behaviour and complicit behaviour should ALWAYS be called out for what it is. To say "Oh, she was a victim too" and "She wouldn't have done X if it hadn't been for (the man)" presents adult women as children and there's nothing feminist about that.

@Babdoc

I’m 65. I was a radical feminist back in the 1970’s, and none of my contemporaries at uni would agree with the ghastly misogynistic views of PPs mothers and MILs! I was a hospital doctor for 36 years and raised my DDs on firm feminist principles. Please don’t condemn my whole generation - we fought some awesome fights for equal pay, refuges, access to male only jobs, paid maternity leave etc.

This is the crux of the matter. SOME women of your generation and older fought the fight for equal pay, paid maternity leave, etc. Some (many?) didn't.

My mother belonged to the anti-abortion group Life. Went on demonstrations. And, much worse, was a Life "counsellor" , i.e. took it on herself to cajole/pressure vulnerable women and young girls into not having an abortion. I remember as a teenager hearing the taped material that showed these "counsellors" how it should be done. In the case of teenagers, you were meant to tell them that abortion causes mental illness and infertility, also a higher rate of cancer. (All lies.) If a married woman was pregnant as a result of an affair she would be advised to "if at all possible, pretend that the baby is your husband's."

My mother also takes the view that men should be paid more than women "because they are supporting a family." She doesn't think that women with babies should work at all. And if she describes any woman as "confident" or "successful", this is almost always meant prejoratively.

I am very grateful to women in every generation who have fought the fight. And to men who fought the fight as allies. Those fights are of course in many cases not yet even won conclusively, what with non-progressives of both sexes continuing to try and turn the clock back.

@TurquoiseLemur

Hear hear! Women are not children in bigger form. A lot of these mothers sound like they infantilised themselves and are resentful of women who chose otherwise. Apparently it was easier when there were no choices! It probably suited many. Imagine age comes and the world no longer cares about your values! You would be defensive to the point of being incoherent

@speakout

Are some women victims? Or complicit?

My mother's advice to " be nice" and "try not to annoy" ended up me with me staying in a violent marriage, being raped and beaten several more times over another year than was necessary.

Who is the victim? My mother?

I'm so sorry. No, the victim was not your mother.

These posters berating anyone here who is angry at complicit behaviour are part of the problem. They are, in effect, minimising abuse. Telling us to keep quiet because it complicates the political narrative. Telling us, in not so many words, that no woman can ever be held even partially responsible. And that is not okay.

I had similar from my mother, not rants but comments about not arguing back or women need to stop being pushy.

Both my parents expected very different things from me and my brother. Something that was aggressive from me was assertive, or just normal, from him. I was 'pushy' or 'stroppy' when behaving in ways that were normal for him. I was a fishwife and outspoken. Again, never a problem for him. Sadly this socialisation is very common.

@speakout

TurquoiseLemur

Sounds siilar to my mother.
And she is deeply religious too- which further compounds the helpless female idea.

There are a lot of women like this, sadly :(

Yes, i think the religion aspect is very relevant. Helpless female who basically belongs at home or in church. And this is held up to be a positive virtue. My DM actually wears a halo about her awful opinions.
She is clearly very keen on getting approval from the priest (whoever the priest is, even if she despises him in other ways) and from the congregation. Looking after her children's wellbeing came much further down the list in her priorities.

I console myself that once her generation is gone, there will be far fewer women and men both who are active in the Catholic Church, at least in Europe and North America. Hoards of them have left, partly due to the sexism and if that wasn't enough on its own, because of all the child abuse and all the cover-ups.

Well this thread makes me feel very grateful for both my mother and MIL.

My DM is 84 and in no way believes women deserve abuse or are less capable (the opposite if anything). I have never ever heard her make a disparaging remark about another womans appearance.

She does have some old fashioned views but we have some great discussions. We both learn from them.