To wish it was the cultural norm not to comment on things you don’t have experience in

[Peaplant20]

I think about this quite frequently. So many times I’ve had one opinion on something, then when I’ve experience it first hand, I’ve completely changed my mind. But yet as a culture we constantly comment our opinions on things we don’t have experience in (including myself)). Some examples:

• I met someone today who had a friend who’d had a baby arrive 4 weeks early. My baby was also early. The other person said “it’s quite nice when they’re like that isn’t it, because they don’t really cry.” For me personally, there was nothing nice about having a baby arrive prematurely. It was scary and traumatic.
• commenting on people’s pregnancy bodies. I’ve definitely said things like “wow your bump is so big!” to other pregnant women before. It wasn’t until I was pregnant and I became part of a Facebook group with lots of pregnant women that I realised people don’t usually like being told this! My own bump was small and people used to comment on that all the time and I didn’t like that either. I made a vow only to ever say “you look well/ healthy” etc to pregnant women in future.
• as a teacher I find people comment ALOT about how much “holiday” teachers get without any real understanding of teacher workload today (very different to when most adults attended school themselves).

just a rant really 😂 not meant to be a debate about those specific examples but more of why we do this. Any other examples? Times when you’ve had one opinion on something and then changed your mind when you experienced it yourself?

I'm a very quiet person and this is why! You never know what will upset people. I just don't bother anymore

I think its the human condition to sometimes not say the right thing even if its about something which you have experienced yourself. When I was widowed, other women who had lost their husbands said things to me that were meant kindly but made me want to kill them. Baseline Op I think you are overthinking.

I think sometimes it's when people offer x perspectives without actual knowledge to back up the perspectives,

But then it would help if people lead the conversation with e.g. I don't know much about x but what do you think or know about x,

I was widowed young too, after 5 years together. I hate it when people bleat on looking for extra sympathy because they had 40 years together and aren’t used to being alone. Would never say so, and I make the appropriate noises.

Everyone’s experience is unique and playing top trumps with tragedy (or anything really) is infuriating.

No, I think people should be able to comment on things they know nothing about in principle, because if they couldn't how would anyone ever learn anything? So if someone says 'teachers have too many holidays' you can reply with whatever your counter argument to that is, and then they know.
I think commenting on someone's appearance, whether pregnant or not, is best avoided though.

It never really bothered me when people commented on the size of my pregnancy bump, but that's just me.

What culture is it where people don’t make comments? I’m from one culture, DH from another and we live in a third one (UK) all three enjoy commenting on things and my native culture in particular I find have a lot to say about pregnancy/ babies etc.

Would that mean we can't comment on how the country is run?

It's what people do. Best not to take random comments too seriously.

Agreed! Had some really insensitive comments said to me after my miscarriage, including one from a Mind counsellor!! Sorry for your losses x

I was going to contribute to this discussion but - on reflection - I don't think I'm qualified.