Parents and Spreading the Habit of Drama

[momo3bur]

I decided to put this in the Personal Effectiveness Subforum because I feel it is detrimental in growth and avoidance of so many issues we deal with as a society, especially (it seems) in America concerning bullying, "drama", etc. I believe this is a matter of habit and one that takes work to overcome. I also don't think it's a problem only among people we would consider rude, socially snobby, etc. I think this is something even parents and people with the best of intentions towards others do without even thinking.

My daughter, who is seven, came to me upset today because two of her best friends told her that another little girl she plays with occasionally told the friends that she didn't like my daughter. My daughter was very upset and doesn't understand why someone doesn't like her because she is generally kind to everyone and has never had an enemy among her school mates or other family friends.

Now I know this child's mother. This woman seems to constantly comment about her "frienemies" or other dramatic references to people. She complains about how she wishes all of this highschool behavior would stay where it belongs...in highschool.

So I find it strangely ironic that HER DAUGHTER is the one speaking negatively of my daughter even though they barely know one another. It also just so happens that my daughter is best friends with her daughter's best friends (the little girls who told her about what the girl said). I am also best friends with this woman's best friend (the little girls' mother) and no matter how hard I try, the woman refuses to be friends with me. I find it silly, but oh well. LOL.

We as parents and future parents really need to pay attention to the type of behavior we show in front of our children. If they hear us speaking negatively of other parents and expressing dislike over petty things, they will mimic this behavior and spread it into their social front.

This is one factor in peer bullying, especially among girls (from what I can tell). If you have the mother who is always talking bad about another person because they're clothes are not nice or they are a little different from other people, that mother is teaching her child that it is ok to judge others without really knowing them personally.

I know this seems incredibly simple, but I really believe we teach our children these things without even realizing what we are doing. When we comment about how silly someone's dress looks or how dirty their shoes are or how ratty a little girl's hair is, our children are listening. When we comment on how we just don't like to be around someone socially because they are kind of "weird," our children are listening.

Then they take these behaviors they learn and apply them accordingly to their own social circle. Then it turns into things like, "EWWWW, Macy's dress is homemade! Her mommy makes her clothes because she can't afford to buy them!" Where would a child this age even gain the knowledge of difference between the price of homemade clothes and store bought? Parents. Why would they think this is a negative thing in the first place? PARENTS.

One day, my daughter came home upset because a little girl (who I have to mention is actually very chubby) called her fat and told her she was ugly. This was in KINDERGARTEN when my daughter was 5 years old. This broke my heart because all of the protection I've tried to apply to her self-esteem concerning physical appearance was almost shattered at that point. My daughter is not fat, if we must use that word to describe someone. She is also very, very beautiful and I'm not only saying that because she's my daugher. She's is incredibly beautiful.

I told her she is beautiful and healthy and that this little girl was also beautiful, but apparently someone must have taught her to be ugly about weight. So Emma should tell her she is beautiful and maybe she won't call others names anymore.

It didn't work, this little girl is a regular bully at home because her parents obviously either bully her in the same way or regularly negatively comment on peoples' weight in front of her.

Please, please just think before you say things to your children about other people. Even though you may never speak negatively to your children about them or yourself, if you do it about other people it helps form their process of judgement. We all do it, I know, but I think this is something we really need to become more aware of if we want to stop this cycle of cruelty and ridiculousness amongst each other that has become so bad in schools it's causing children to KILL themselves.

If we want things to change in the future, this is just one of the small things we need to work on and the only way to really execute this problem is to spread it through teaching our children who are the next generation. I believe this very simple thing will create a return of loving, accepting, and unjudgemental people. We need that in order to do much bigger things for this world that are needed desperately.

[pianoperformer]

This is why I really want to homeschool. There's way too much going on in public schools that hurt children, especially those who don't follow the norm. I know you can't protect them forever, but I just don't know if a five-year-old has a stable enough self-esteem to not take it personally when someone calls them fat. Something like that can stick with them for years if not for the rest of their life.