you don't have kids you don't understand

[PepperElf]

one of the posts at the main site got me thinking about this cos i had a coworker who tried to pull the "parent card" just about every chance she got. I'll call her PCM - parent card mom

basically the way PCM acted... if you had never been knocked up - or had never knocked someone up - then you were too stupid to say anything about a child.

the common sense gene? it didn't exist until you bred. at least in her world.



and when i say "every chance she got" i am not kidding. sometimes she pulled the Parent-card when it had nothing to do with kids.

When one of our mutual friends had a breakup gone weird (she asked the x if he still wanted to be friends... he responded with a lot of venom)... she was informed by PCM that "you don't have kids, you don't know"

as if being a parent somehow was related to - or even justified - his venomous reaction.


when i felt some chick at disbursing was being lazy - constantly running away for pms instead of making my id card... i was informed that .. since i haven't popped a baby out that i have no right to comment.

cos apparently, without even knowing the lazy worker, PCM decided that the worker had been through a bad pregnancy and that i was being unreasonable.


yep. in PCM's world if you weren't a parent you had no right to ever complain about another parent... no matter what the complaint.

[HYHYBT]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuckoo

[tropicsgoddess]

I'm no parent and won't be for a long shot, but there's people like me that know a thing or two on kids. I mean most of the stuff that you deal with when it comes to kids is common sense and experiences too. I have tons of little cousins, some nieces and nephews and I'm the oldest of 3 children (all daughters) in my family.

[anakhouri]

Your co-worker is a freak.

But I have to admit, since having a kid, a lot of what I thought before was wrong. It's true that until you are the humiliated person carrying a howling, flailing toddler through the mall while everyone glares at you, you really can't know what it's like (the howling toddler doesn't have to be your kid, but as long as everyone thinks it's your kid, you will understand).

But yeah, your co-worker is just bizarre. She must be one of those people who thinks reproducing somehow makes her better or wiser than everyone else, when only the majority of women in history have done the exact same thing.

[Lace Neil Singer]

Urgh. I hate that comment with the fury of a thousand imploding stars. I post on STFU Parents, and anyone who posts that in the comments will provoke a shitstorm. Even if a person is childfree, they've still BEEN a child, and have more than likely been around children, so the comment is bullshit.

Also, if people think that being a parent means that you automatically become an angel of goodness, they can look up people like Mary Beth Tinning and Rosemary West and educate themselves.

[Boozy]

I think its fair to say that someone wouldn't really know what its like to be a parent until they actually become a parent.

That's true of virtually everything in life. You have to experience something to really understand it.

But I gather from the OP that this woman is claiming herself an expert in situations that have fuck-all nothing to do with parenting or children. That's just annoying.

[DrFaroohk]

I wouldn't say having a child makes you know more about kids, but definitely I'd think that having experience around kids makes you know more about kids. Maybe it's a little brother you took care of, or a friend's kid, or something, but in general I'd take Kid Experience over No Kid Experience.

[Boozy]

There's a difference between "knowing about kids" and "knowing what it's like to be a parent", though.

[DrFaroohk]

Yeah, but there's different people who parent is what i mean. Just because someone might not actually "have" any kids, they might have raised their younger brother from a very young age and filled the role of parent for lack of anything else. That guy I feel can still chime in on a "parents only" conversation.

[PepperElf]

o obviously there's things i don't know about parenting.
but there's also things i can honestly say i think some parents do wrong
including PCM

- scolding middle child in public (and by public i mean public - right outside an amusement park in a large crowd) about her greasy hair. yeah that's what every kid's ego wants.
- proceeding to scold the older daughter about her acne. also in public, right after the hair-scolding

maybe it's me but that had always seemed more like she wanted to put the kids down, or pick a fight with them. i mean hell, less than 2-3 hours later she ended up picking a fight with a total stranger, so it's possible she was itching for confrontation.

(and for pcm i also feel she herself had some bad judgment in who was watching the kids while she was away, or rather how she handled that man... when the eldest girl reported the man was breaking into the bathroom while she showered, pcm had the girl sent away to a friend. the man was not kicked out. he then molested the remaining girl.... maybe it's me but my common sense says "man breaks in on teenage girl in bathroom just to yell at her over something small... may be trying to pull a power play on the girl, especially cos she's naked.... pcm never did understand why SHE had to attend a parenting class after that but i am thinking she never looked at it that way, that others may have seen it as setting the younger daughter up for molestation. .. but hey i'm not a parent what do i know? (*sarcasm*))

and hell look at some of the posts we read at CS. parents who expect store clerks to watch over the kids while mommy and daddy go shopping, or slip out to the bar.

or the abusers. i mean hell you don't have to be a parent to know that it's fucked up to abuse kids. but some parents do it still. and some think that no one else has a right to tell them no.


although being a parent normally makes you more aware of what a child needs and being protective of that child... it's not always 100% true or perfect

nor does it mean that non-parents are excluded from the "common sense" club.


now sure the parent-card parents will try telling you otherwise
but in my opinion a lot of those parent-card parents don't always have the best judgement out there.

[Eisa]

It always makes me laugh when my mother tries to pull this "she's an expert on kids" bit and tell me that I don't understand how to raise a child because I don't have any. Well, I know that slapping your kid in the face because you don't like the movie she's watching is wrong. I know making all of her problems all about YOU is wrong. I know that completely ignoring her when she asks you for help because she's self-injuring is wrong. I know that not supporting her, actively working against her, and disregarding any sort of emotional support is wrong. I also know that when your child tells you that your husband is touching her at night, you might wanna, you know, investigate that.

Heh, I have issues with my parents...

But I mean...a lot of things are common sense. And just because you've had a baby doesn't mean you SHOULD be a parent or that your IQ automatically increased 50 points or something...

Also about the molesting incident...I would have been hugely tempted to report that woman to CPS for leaving her child in a dangerous situation like that.

[Evandril]

The one revision of that phrase I will make is 'You don't know how you'd treat your kids until you have them', and then only in the broadest sense...but it tends to apply to most things, as you don't know how you'll react to something with 100% certainty until you're in the situation.

Being a parent changed me, I know...but I also know people without kids who honestly are 'better' at being a parent than I am. *shrugs* MOST people I know have become better around kids after having one of their own...but that's still not saying they became good, or knew much...just that they improved.

[LewisLegion]

The only part of 'parenting' I haven't experienced is physically giving birth.

I've changed diapers, taken infants to the doctor to have shots, kissed scraped knees, gotten up for midnight feedings, met with school officials, stayed up late worrying, picked up from school, taken to soccer matches, chaperoned field trips, took prom pictures, warned about prom dates, worried about the kind of loser friends they're hanging out with, helped with schoolwork and projects at last minute...you name any aspect of parenting, other than birth, and I've probably done it.

But because I didn't physically give birth (and these were two sisters) I can't 'know what it's like'. Sorry, some fairie doesn't wave magic parent dust over you the moment your kid pops out of a birth canal. If it did, people who adopt would also 'not know what it's like'.