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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Message to the mother in Starbucks in Derby , if you are a mnetter. Please don't call your child....

231 replies

AvenaLife · 26/08/2008 17:27

stupid or a weirdo. It's really not very nice and it made my son and I really sad to hear this. Also, please do't rush her when she's eating because you have things to do. Telling her to hurry up 7 times in 5 minutes is OTT. Would it have killed you to be patient? It was not as if she was eating slowly though was it? Then you moaned at her for getting chocolate under her fingernails.

Rant over.

OP posts:
2beornot2be · 27/08/2008 12:34

purpleduck Mayo sandwiches are the best Yum.

OP you shouldn't judge the Mother Children take forever to eat and can be annoying if u have a place to go sometimes its not convient to take food with u as kids tend to drop things or make a bigger mess.

As for the weirdo and stupid did you hear the whole conversation maybe the mother ment it as a joke and the child took it the wrong way. I have heard kids being called alot worse than stupid

ElfOnTheTopShelf · 27/08/2008 12:40

AvenaLife
One of your posts is "I don't know what had happened before though and I'm not trying to judge her"

You dont follow on the sentence with a "... but" but you could have done. This whole thread is about judging. Your OP was not asking for advice about whether you should have said anything / done anything / offered to help the parent in question. To be fair, hardly any of the threads started in this topic are along those lines, just judging, ranting and being (slightly) holier than thou.

I would be devastated if I were the mum in Starbucks to come onto this thread and read what people were posting on a snapshot of a life. We all have a moment of snapping in parenting, a time when we may lash out, snap at our children, say something in the heat of the moment. MOST parents then follow that up, apologise, explain, calm down, talk to the child.

If you're a mother who has never said anything or done anything wrong with respect to your child... well, I applaud you. Better woman than I.

mankymummy · 27/08/2008 12:42

i call my DS a wierdo. he thinks its hilarious.

i'd never call him stupid though.

Oblomov · 27/08/2008 12:51

I think YABU, a little bit.
You don't know how child has been behaving for the last few hours/days/weeks.
Mum could have been pushed to edge, and just fed up, with weeks of .... general misbehaving.
We don't know what has gone on.

Oblomov · 27/08/2008 12:55

I lost my rag with ds the other day in sainsburys. He has been misbehaving for weeks.
But you wouldn't know that if you saw me.
You would just see a woman shouting at a ds, " right , I have had enough, if you don't stop this right now...."

I am sure we can all be condemned at one time or another.

3andnomore · 27/08/2008 13:22

oblomov...that seems to be part of my daily vocabulary over this past week especially...since coming back from camping my 2 younger sons have been extremely bad...I mean, even worse then their normally bad behaviour...sigh....

Oblomov · 27/08/2008 13:30

sympathy 3andnomore.
Ds is generally no trouble. I mean minor.... nothing out of the ordinary. But for the last month ..........
WELLLLLLLLLLL
I tell you ......

Original poster
AvenaLife · 27/08/2008 13:46

Is there not a difference between telling your child they have been stupid if they have run into the road, shouted at them if they have been playing around all day and telling them they are weird and a stupid girl because they have chocolate under their fingernails? (this was the conversaton, the child said nothing)
If you call your child one of these names and the KNOW that you don't mean it and it's a joke which they find funny then it is alot different then saying this to them in a cafe full of people and making them feel ashamed and bad about themselves. I'm not judging her, I dislike what she said. It has nothing to do with her abilities as a parent, maybe she's a very good, caring mother but she was oblivious as to how upset she had made her child. 6 years old is too early to have anyone calling you weird or stupid, especially not your mother.

I really am shocked at those who think this is OK. Wether this mum had been having a bad time with her child or not, there really is no excuse for making her feel like shit. I was angry when I got home, I should have reworded the title better, I don't need shooting for it though. I'm not making excuses as to why she said this, on the whole it is inappropriate. It didn't sound as if it was a one off by the way she said it. I wasn't judging her, just upset for her child.

I did say I needed to let this out in the first thread.

OP posts:
Original poster
AvenaLife · 27/08/2008 13:53

By the way, I've been on here for months and this is the FIRST thread I've started because I have been upset by the actions of another parent. As far as I am aware I try to be supportive of other people when they post on here, I'm not a judge, just a concerned mother who saw the pain that someone had put their child through.

Maybe the world waould be a better place if we all showed a little compassion to other people's children. They are still children after all.

OP posts:
HonoriaGlossop · 27/08/2008 14:01

one incident IS abusive. You would feel abused if your partner in life looked you up and down and said "You are Fat. You are ugly". You wouldn't think "oh, well if he says that in a sustained way over a period of weeks or months I think I might feel unhappy about that".

Yes this is a site to support parents but over and above that as adults we need to protect children.

AbbeyA · 27/08/2008 14:02

You are very kind,AvenaLife, I would be judging her. Having a bad day isn't an excuse to be horrible to your DC. I would try not to because maybe she apologised to her DC later-however you can only go on what you saw and it was enough to upset you.

swiftyknickers · 27/08/2008 14:03

do they have mumsnet in Derby?

Original poster
AvenaLife · 27/08/2008 14:07

I know I'm far from perfect. I don't know everything as being a parent is a learning process. I'd never purposly judge someone because I know my own faults, I just felt so sad for this child, I needed to vent and AIBU was the first thread I clicked on.

I think there's things you should never say to anyone Honoria, never that they are fat/ugly/useless/you hate them/they are stupid. I don't see the need, things like this can really harm a person, especially a child.

I really hope she apologised. I did give her a few glary looks and smiled to the little girl (tried to anyway, she just looked so sad).

OP posts:
Original poster
AvenaLife · 27/08/2008 14:08

Derby is supposto be a city swifty. We get all the mod cons! And broadband.

OP posts:
combustiblelemon · 27/08/2008 14:21

And hot and cold running EMO's outside HMV.

LittleMyDancing · 27/08/2008 14:44

I can understand you needing to let off steam AvenaLife - it's more the thread's holier than thou tone I've had a problem with.

I can understand feeling sad about seeing it happen, and hoping it was an isolated incident, but the flaming torches and pikes on this thread have made me very sad, and even sadder if the mother in question is reading this.

And people are far too ready to scream the word abuse these days, it has some very serious connotations, and imvho, I don't think one incident of calling your child stupid is up there with hitting them, or mistreating them sexually, or starving them.

if a mother called their child stupid once, but all of the rest of their life treated them with kindness and respect and love and never did it again, I doubt anyone would say they'd been emotionally abused.

but if she called them stupid every day, and took every opportunity of belittling them, and never praised anything they did - now in my book, that's emotional abuse.

big difference, and all to do with context.

HonoriaGlossop · 27/08/2008 14:47

well if you'll allow me to say so littlemydancing it is that attitude "people are far too ready to scream abuse" which means that much abuse goes unchallenged.

Withdrawing your consent to a child being treated abusively does not mean you've never said anything you regret or been short tempered; As I said, I don't get that extrapolation, it's not logical. It just means you've not been abusive.

LittleMyDancing · 27/08/2008 14:57

so this mother should have been reported to social services for one incident of being mean to her child? or does 'withdrawing your consent' not mean taking action, just discussing it on the internet ad infinitum?

if AvenaLife was her neighbour and heard her talking to her child like this day in day out, I would be wholeheartedly in favour of taking action.

I'm leaving this thread now as I think I've said my piece, but I stand by my assertion:

one instance of calling your child stupid is not abuse.

OldLadyKnowsNothing · 27/08/2008 15:04

I'm so tempted to claim to be the Bad Mother in Starbucks and act all outraged.

But I'm not, so I won't.

I do wonder though, whether it matters if anyone judges or not. It's not as if it impacts on the judged in any way.

NinaInCognito · 27/08/2008 15:05

AvenaLife - welcome to my world. I am the one that started the whole "sneery look in a supermarket" thread mentioned before that got quite ugly.

I really understand your OP, it's something you saw that made you upset so you thought you would come on and post about it to get it out of your system. At least you didn't try to make it funny like mine, apparently according to one poster it was like a 'wet fart in a spacesuit', and yes it probably was.

I can see other peoples point about the whole hurrying her along thing and god have I done that to my ds a few times, but calmly calling your child stupid is not something I would personally do. Especially if you can see that it makes them upset, I think most children wear their emotions quite well on their face - iykwim - and if they are almost on the point of tears because of your name calling, then that is quite rubbish really.

Anyway good on you for sticking to your guns - I didn't and flounced off, not a good look really

HonoriaGlossop · 27/08/2008 15:14

I think some people are too hung up on abusive as a formal, SS term. Speaking to a child like that is abusive of the child full stop; acknowledging that doesn't mean that I am saying the OP should have phoned SS for this. In practice we know no social worker is going to steam in for this comment in a coffee shop but that does not mean it wasn't an abusive comment.

swiftyknickers · 27/08/2008 15:17

What there is broadband north of the watford gap??are your toilets inside too?

swiftyknickers · 27/08/2008 15:22

just read this actually and reckon OP is getting bit of a hard time. Stop jumping on the bandwagon you lot and leave her alone!!

The other day I was out with DS who was being a pain in the arse and trying to hurry him along with lunch, ended up saying you are driving me friggin crackers!!! but would NEVER call Ds stupid..fact...end

SueW · 27/08/2008 15:37

switfy we got hot running water here recently. It makes such a change not to have to heat up vessels of water on the coal range to fill the tin bath

swiftyknickers · 27/08/2008 15:44

do you have electricity too then?? if this is the case i may vist the north again