Why are girls so horrible

[Janinebutcher79]

Dd10 is in a small class and some of the girls are just so bloody horrible and nasty. I get frustrated as I want my dd10 to stick up for herself but she wants to take the higher ground, which is lovely I know but I worry about her being taken advantage off!

No-one said all girls.

You are not being sexist!

I have daughters and a son. The friendships between girls are far more tricky and ALL my friends and mums I know say the same.

OP: If this has been going in for years,, is it the same girls or different girls? If you're convinced it's a generic "girl" thing, then it's very likely that "girls" will be horrible in secondary school.

You will never stop kids from being horrible. They're much better at getting away with it nowadays. A wise thing would be to consider whether your DD has always been a target. If this is indeed the case, you might want to take steps to mitigate this. How does she interact with other children? Is she bossy, snippy, impatient, patronising? Does she listen, or talk about herself at every opportunity? Is she fond of correcting mistakes? Is there something about her that is abrasive? I'm not asking if she is a good person. Just does she have a way about her that riles others. If so, can she do something about it?

Also, how does she compare academically to the bullies?

My niece 12 is currently being bullied by other girls.Videoing her and setting up a WhatsApp group to share nasty things about her etc.
Vile behaviour.

My daughter is only in Y1, so maybe to young to experience this... but no in my experience girls are not horrible! She's got an absolutely lovely little group of friends, they're just lovely together!

The "queen bee" / most popular girl in DD's year is interesting as she's actually quite nice. She isn't originating mean behaviour as far as I can tell, but she's surrounded by a cohort who jostle to be in her group. Some girls seem to be in and out of it, when they're in they turn on their other friends, then they're out and come back to their other friends. I can never keep up with it.

I am socially awkward and was a loner at school, with just a few friends who I mainly saw out of school. I'm still like that in fact. So maybe it's because I'm not good with this stuff, but I can't understand "popularity" and why one person is the bees knees and how that happens. This girl is nice and very confident and outgoing, but what makes her the top dog? DD doesn't know either!

They're all lovely in year 1! Come back when she's in year 5/6/7 😂

Nobody's saying boys don't behave terribly but that's not what the thread's about. It's specifically about girls being catty and backstabbing.

Out of the girls who've bullied my DDs, all have stable well to do 2-parent families, but mums who'd stand around bitching and sniggering in the playground 🤷‍♀️ I don't really care why they do it tbh, I'd just rather spend my time with dd having interesting conversations instead of wiping tears and giving pep talks on how to ignore catty girls.

Kevin turkey - the implication is all girls, swap the gender for a race or ethnicity, it wouldn't be acceptable

Speaking as a grandparent here with equal amount of grandchildren. When my own girls were young one daughter in particular had horrendous trouble with bitchy girls. The same with grand daughter, constantly struggling to stay in a group but the girls delighting in leaving her or someone else out.

Totally different with grandsons. Never once has any of them had bitching and being excluded the same way as the girls had. The boys were more down to earth itms.....There's a huge difference imo.

Brefugee · Today 10:51

When a post about men being, say, rapists, ceases to get NAMALTs all over the thread, I'll stop saying "don't tar all girls with the same brush"

As long as you do for both and not only choose to defend the innocent of one sex and not the other.

Yeah, blokes are just as bad but it gets dismissed as banter’ instead of bitchiness!

I’m going to have to NC after this it might be outing (in a nice way!) but I hope I’ve instilled in my boys how damaging it can be to be bullied, it’s not in their nature anyway, and my eldest son is big into human rights and women’s rights now, soon to be doing a Masters in African Studies. I’ve always said to them both that my experiences should never be experienced by anyone else, they understood that from an early age. So at least something good came out of it!

Boys and girls. Some lovely ones, but many nasty ones, who have no empathy. DD17 was soooooo lucky with her friendship group that I moved mountains to help nurture their friendships. They still have each other’s backs today. Lovely girls. I agree though, OP. Unfortunately it’s often our patriarchal society and competing over attention or boys that causes them to be like that. Well, that and useless weak, spoiling, enabling parenting.

It’s interesting that the mums of girls here know every little detail of the falling outs between friends, I think that tends to be what happens and families get dragged into things which only fuel the fire for the bullies. Boys are far less dramatic, done, dusted, get on with things, don’t involve their mums etc. In general, of course.

Momicrone · Today 11:18

Kevin turkey - the implication is all girls, swap the gender for a race or ethnicity, it wouldn't be acceptable

It makes a difference if someone from the group makes the sweeping criticism.

A man can say, 'why are men such dicks' but if a woman says it it comes across as far more aggressive and prejudiced. It's accepted that the one making the point doesn't really mean all men. He's generalising for effect.

The exception would be those tiresome male feminists who really believe all men are awful except them (and even themselves for the really masochist 'recovering man' type) and pander to the worst generalities (some) women use against men as a class.

Boys are also less likely to tell you what is going on in their personal or emotional life - some boys that is!

YANBU. Boys tend to be upfront about who they don’t like. Girls are more likely to bitch about people behind their backs and, if in a group of 3 or more, single one girl out. This person rotates so no one is safe.

Nomorefuckstogive · Today 11:26

Unfortunately it’s often our patriarchal society and competing over attention or boys that causes them to be like that. Well, that and useless weak, spoiling, enabling parenting.

Do you honestly believe that? You don't think any girls would be horrible little bitches in a feminist utopia?

Have you ever considered that it is human to compete and seek attention regardless of what society you live in?

So if it was boys, you would have said kids @Momicrone you leapt on OP when she said if it was boys TOO. As in she would have used kids to cover both sexes which is perfectly reasonable (though some will go off on the no goats thing).

Sorry OP that your DD is having to handle this. It's great she is talking to you about it though.

"Why are girls so horrible?" - YABVU
"Why are these specific girls being horrible to my dd?" YANBU and you have my sympathies.

People called out your thread title for being sexist because it is. I've been a teacher for 25 years. But you don't have to be a teacher to know that some girls are horrible bullies and some boys are horrible bullies. Or that most girls aren't bullies and most boys aren't bullies.

As long as you do for both and not only choose to defend the innocent of one sex and not the other.

you can't tell me what to do - you're not my real dad.

The point is if you write a bullshit thread title like "girls are bitchy" you can bet your bottom dollar you're going to be called on it.

In my experience, yes, girls and women can be bitchy. So can men. But it is by far not all of them and not a majority of them. And yes, the conversation is about a particular instance, and plenty of people have said "sorry for your daughter, speak to school".

But conversations move on and spread out. So it is perfectly legitimate to say that we might want to examine why people feel comfortable saying "why do you think it is that we call girls bitchy"

It's like calling them bossy when boys would be assertive, IMO, it is bullshit.

Totally agree. My dad once lightheartedly said to me tell the teacher, ignore them and if all else fails give them a kick. Much to his surprise at about 15 I took this advice after being picked on constantly by a girl in my friend group. Kicked her in the ankle after she kept picking me for every thing possible. The bitch never picked on me again!

I found the same, my DDs life was a misery and at 10 she threatened suicide rather than go into school and face them. It was the boys in her class who got her through.

@Janinebutcher79 the sad news is that your daughter might not escape bullying by moving to secondary school. Bullying happens everywhere and what you seem not to know is that both sexes do it. The ringleader of the bullies at my mixed secondary school was a boy. He and his gang of acolytes made my life a misery for a couple of years before I learned how to deal with them all - boys and girls. My mum and my sister advised me how. I had a small group of friends who stuck up for me at school too and they were all girls. Another thing to remember is that boys can be just as bitchy as girls - Richard, my persecutor, never laid a finger on me but was adept with the insults: fat, witch, lesbian, slut, council house, don't talk to her etc. Luckily I learned that not all boys and men were like him. And not all girls are bullies either - but you know that right? You and your daughter are female and you're all right, aren't you? You'd never say stupid things like: "why are girls so horrible?" You'd know that might make your daughter wary of making female friends and lead her to trust boys she shouldn't.