I have been blogging for what seems like forever in the world of online blogging. Four years. My blog, she is an old and crippled thing already. I can no longer consider myself a newbie at this online writing gig.
But for as long as I’ve been blogging, I’ve been parenting longer. For almost thirteen years now. I’ve got four kids and a schwack of parenting experience under my belt.
Because of this, I rarely jump on any of the band wagon issues that continually make the rounds in the mommy blogosphere. It all seems old hat to me and I never feel like I have anything new or fresh or interesting to add to the conversation. Let the other’s speak for me because there is always someone out there who can say it better than I can.
But this latest mommy blog fever about how declaring oneself a bad mother is nothing but a trend, a social media ploy to sell books or get traffic has quite frankly incited my ire and fury, similar to when a 14 year old boy bullies my 12 year old daughter and bloodies her nose.
It pisses me off enough to make me want to jump on my soap box and break out my bullhorn.
So I am adding my voice to the discussion and breaking my own blog ethics by chiming in.
Where’s Black Hockey Jesus to compose a musical for bad mothering when you need him?
It’s time for a little redneck edumacation if you will.
Oh ya, I’m about to get all sanctimommy-ish and up in yer grill. Now would be the time to click the big red X if you’re not up for a little cussing.
You see, I have had a unique experience that most parents never have had the pleasure of enduring. For the last three plus years I have had my parenting and every parental decision I have ever made, put under a microscope to be dissected and analyzed by a plethora of ‘child raising experts.’
I know first hand just how damaging the social media construct of what a GOOD mother is and the consequences of bucking that trend by being an atypical mother, someone who is unabashedly ‘BAD’.
And I was being bad on my blog and real life before it became the hottest media trend. I was country when country wasn’t cool. (Sorry, couldn’t resist.)
It started the night Shalebug died and having to spending the next three months facing the firing squad with various Albertan coroners over why my son mysteriously and suddenly died and what did I do to cause it? Those f*ckers were determined to find neglectful or inept parenting as cause of death. In yer face you over-educated schmucks! (Ahem. I’m not bitter. Really. Okay, fack yes I am bitter still. It was a nightmare. Almost worse than having your kid drop dead on you in the first place.)
There is nothing quite like the rigorous investigation of an untimely death by authorities who have the power not only to take away your remaining children but to sentence you to be somebody’s bitch at the local prison while fighting over a bar of soap to strip down your parental beliefs and self-examine your definition of what ‘good’ parenting really is.
Having survived that festive period of time with more scars on me than a man sentenced to 20 lashes for stealing a loaf of bread, I figured I would publicly document my ‘bad parenting’ for the world to see and hence the birth of this blog.
Cuz what’s more fun than writing from the heart to document my experiences with my children and then to be indirectly criticized for “endlessly tapping the vein of faux self deprecation for shock value or cheap laughs or sympathy.”
For the record, there is nothing faux about my self deprecation. Ask my therapist.
Then, as if having my community, my family and myself examine and doubt my parenting skills wasn’t enough fun, my husband and I decided to jump through hoops of fire in a bid to adopt. Not only was my parenting and very inner core examined through this process but again last summer when I was falsely accused of being a baby beater.
For more years than I care to admit, I have had to do nothing but jump through hoops to prove I am not a ‘bad’ mother.
My kids have been questioned, analyzed and dissected and I’ve answered more personality diagnosis multiple choice questions than a crazy person tossed in the loony bin.
A child psychologist invaded my home and sat on my furniture to observe the effect of my parenting on my children’s precious psyches.
I’ve sat at a table of six judgmental professionals and defended my parenting style and choices over and over again.
They didn’t want to, (especially after they discovered my blog) but they HAD to stamp me a ‘good mom’ because according to them, and I quote, “despite Tanis’s unique parenting style, her children are well-adjusted, emotionally happy and highly functional children.”
DESPITE. Not ‘because of’, but despite my parenting. God I love parenting professionals.
What I have learned through all of this and ultimately, my point to this long winded diatribe, is that nothing matters as long as your children turn out to be happy, thriving, functional and well-adjusted adults. (‘Cept Jumby. He may not be functional in the tradional sense of the world but he’ll steal your heart with his smile and his amazingly well-adjusted personality.)
I choose to embrace ‘bad‘ mothering. It’s the only mothering I really know how to do. I am not archetypal mother who dons an apron and helicopters her children. My children happily roam free range, pee in pools and pick their noses.
I am the mother who rejects the dominant cultural narrative of what defines a ‘good’ mother. I am the mother who calls herself a bad mom with her tongue in cheek, not because I am employing a transparent, unimaginative marketing ploy but because I am okay with my imperfections as a parent which goes against the societal imperative for perfection.
It’s not that I’m reveling in ‘bad’ parenting, I’m simply acknowledging that society’s rigid dictates of what a ‘good’ mother is, is not for me. I am not calling myself bad in order to bait people into saying what a good mother I am, I am calling myself bad to share my insecurities and doubts with other mothers (and fathers) who have felt the same pressure to be the perfect parent and wonder why it’s not enough just to love and protect one’s child without having to live up to a definition of parenting that fits as well as a strait jacket.
I am not conforming to media labels, nor trying to influence the next generation of mothers to embrace neglectful parenting. I am neither trying to glamorize the definition of bad parenting nor bastardize the definition of good parenting. I am simply putting one foot forward each day, doing the best I can while maintaining what is suppose to be a humour blog.
If I offend your sensibilities by embracing my inner badness and the irony that accompanies that term, I won’t apologize. I am what I am as Popeye says and it works for my children and for me. I’m not trying to be defeatist nor passive aggressive by labeling myself ‘bad’. This blog isn’t about me being trendy or joining in to be one of the cool kids, it is simply about being me. In all my redneckkin’ bad glory.
It doesn’t matter one hair on a cat’s ass what other people label my parenting or my reflection of it on my blog. Call it good, call it bad, call it redneck-tastic, but it’s all semantics no matter which side you flip this pancake. In the end the only thing that matters is my son is not rattling the bars of a prison cell with a tin can and my daughter isn’t spending her free time trying to self-medicate with sex in the back seat of some doofus’s car.
So, through my blog, if I encourage more parents to imitate my special brand of BAD PARENTING or feel less isolated because of their own parenting techniques, then I say HELL YA.
Cuz if my two children who are happy and well adjusted after the hell they went through when their brother died BECAUSE (not DESPITE) my parenting helped them, then more children could benefit. Plus the child welfare authorities gave me papers saying that I make bad parenting look good so I figure I’m not the worst role model out there.
*Jumps off her sanctimommy soap box and goes to pour a cup of coffee laced with Bailey’s Irish Cream. Cuz I drink first thing in the morning too. I iz da BAD mutha.*
mandy
I enjoyed this post. I have to admit, I’ve been taking a bit of a hiatus from the internet (reading and writing) lately b/c I couldn’t stand yet. another. frickin’. controversy.
Do you want to lay bets on the next hottest topic/trend/war to erupt? We should start a pool and take a $10 collection from everyone.
Redneck Mommy
@mandy, I’m not much on controversy myself which is why I rarely wade into debates.
That and cuz I can barely muster anything more coherent than ‘Fuck ya.’
Wink.
maggie may
I’m new to your page and this is all really good to know. In all honesty, I did have a small inclination to think that you were very much tongue and cheek with ‘bad’ mothering- I had no idea the history behind your title, your feelings or your point. I can’t imagine what you’ve been through with your boy dying and your family trudged through a microscope, but I do know what it feels like to be constantly scrutinized/critisized and even ostracized because of how you parent- as a long nursing mom, cosleeper, naked type family with an apparently shockingly weird mix of rocknroll/hippie/intellectual yearning type parenting, I’ve been openly and privately mocked and sneered at. DESPITE my bizarre parenting tactics, my kids are intelligent, emotionally astute beyond their years and actually fucking interesting people in their own rights and not zombified suburban brats.
Thanks for writing this.
Molly
I’m pretty sure this has already been covered, but… you are all sorts of awesome. I may have a girl crush.
Undomestic Diva
These are all the reasons you’re a fucking fantastic mother.
(And if we can’t laugh at ourselves, call ourselves good/bad/awful/fantastic and everything in between, then there’s something wrong with THAT.)
XOXOXO
heavensdevil99
Delurking for the very first time here…:) I am just learning about this bad mother trend going on. Still don’t know enough about to agree or disagree BUT I do know I love they way you write and voice what you believe in…:)
fancy
You tell ‘em, give them hell!
Irish Gumbo
“…ultimately…is that nothing matters as long as your children turn out to be happy, thriving, functional and well-adjusted adults.”
Bravo, madam. (saluting)
Corina
Hell yes. I don’t know what to call it. I don’t even know why in the hell it is a question, but I know that if you keep your kids in line, love them, feed them right, and protect them, what more is there. I am down to earth, semantics or no. I practice the “let’s get real” approach to parenting.
My kids step out of line, I let them know what is acceptable and what is not.
My kids succeed, I let them know am proud and rooting for them the whole way.
My kids need encouragement, I give it to them in spades.
I am not going to tell anyone that they have it wrong; the research says you should do it this way. I am not going to live up to some preordained concept of what the hell is “good” this week. And, I certainly am not going to lose myself completely, give up my own personality and way of doing things because someone thinks I could do it better.
I am my own woman. My kids are well adjusted, learning and happy.
So, hell yeah. What you said.
Motherhood Uncensored
There’s bad and then there’s BAD.
I don’t think that BAD is the new good. It’s more like a cathartic scream from legions of moms who are like “sweet, you mean I don’t actually have to make things from scratch for my kids to be well liked?”
Lock your kids in the car to go drinking is never good. Any bad (not BAD) mother knows that you sit in your car and DRINK IT. Hello.
And Avitable can be my bodyguard any day. Hot diggity dog.
Jane of Seagull Fountain
I think this whole discussion started bec. people were (rightly so) upset at what was entailed in the “Good Mother” label.
Tanis, your personal story breaks my heart. And if I weren’t afraid of offending you, I’d call you a Good Mother.
I find it a bit ironic, I guess, that the very women who resist society’s sanctimonious or unattainable or so-variable ideal of Good Motherhood then use odd images like “I am not archetypal mother who dons an apron and helicopters her children. My children happily roam free range, pee in pools and pick their noses” to differentiate between good mothers and bad mothers.
Are you kidding me? Is there one person on the planet (okay, in the western hemisphere) who thinks that this is the difference between good and bad parenting?
Dude, I pee in pools myself and my personal parenting style is much more free-range than helicopter.
But I refuse to say that makes me a Bad Mother.
I am a Good Mother.
(and so are you, even if that means I need to study my semantics more.)
Redneck Mommy
@Jane of Seagull Fountain, Jane, I have no disillusions of what a real BAD mother is.
A bad mother is a mother who doesn’t protect her child from violence or inflicts it herself.
A bad mother is a mother who leaves deep and lasting scars from years of emotional abuse.
A bad mother is a mother who uses crack during her pregnancy or drinks incessantly while gestating.
There are all together too many examples of what a truly bad mother is, in the tradional sense.
As there are too many unattainable examples of what defines a good mother.
I am neither a good mother, nor a bad mother.
I am simply a mother. But if you had to pigeon hole me and label me, I’d much prefer one didn’t attach the good mother label to my identity. Not because I don’t believe I’m a good mother. Contrary I know I’m the best damn mother I can be and every day I strive to improve.
I am good at being a bad mother.
And I don’t need or want any self-professed GOOD mommy to impose their rigid stereotype on me or my blog. Therefore, I will continue to profess myself a ‘bad’ mother with my tongue planted firmly in my cheek and celebrate the fact it doesn’t matter what anyone calls me, as long as my kids call me ‘Mother.’
Tina@SendChocolate
@Redneck Mommy, Yes, but do you have farting contests and teach your son how to burp? Cause that’s really bad.
(and yes, have been known to do that here..though I am not bad. I am good-enough/mediocre, I have decided.
T.
Jane of Seagull Fountain
@Redneck Mommy, Wow. I don’t know if we’re having the same conversation here. I wasn’t stereotyping. I was quoting your stereotyping.
And why revile me for calling myself a good mother? If you ask me to call you what you prefer (a Bad Mother), won’t you extend the same courtesy to me? (and respect the label I choose to wear?)
Or do you get to define what I mean by good and also what you mean by bad? Seems a bit unfair.
Redneck Mommy
@Jane of Seagull Fountain, Jane, you are mistaken if you think I revile you personally for calling yourself a good mother. Call yourself anything you want.
My point was I just want the freedom to be able to do the same thing. It’s all semantics, just with a different point of view.
Your opinion is of no greater value than mine or anyone elses, as is the same with my opinion.
Like my husband says, everyone has an opinion, they’re just like assholes.
Wink.
Jane of Seagull Fountain
@Redneck Mommy,
My mistake. Somehow “And I don’t need or want any self-professed GOOD mommy to impose their rigid stereotype on me or my blog” sounded just a bit derogatory towards me.
And I don’t know about you, but what comes out of my bum smells like roses.
Wink.
angi
@Redneck Mommy,
Because after all this…all that’s left to be said to THAT response is…
FUCK YEAH!
Mr Lady
@Jane of Seagull Fountain, That list of bad mom things isn’t the concern. “bad” is being used tongue n cheek, sarcastically, and has been for generations of women. Who hasn’t slapped their knee and said, “Damn I’m a terrible mother”? The issue is that these women chose to not label themselves as “good” mother because “good” mothers tend to make list themselves of what defines one.
Tanis would rather be lumped in with a group who cites nose oicking and pool peeing as examples of the things their group does by definition as “bad” rather than a group who considers “good” by definition giving up caffeine, breastfeeding, staying home, banning tv, or teaching their children to read and write and swim and philosophize.
I don’t think those things make the difference between good and bad parenting, either.
Jane of Seagull Fountain
@Mr Lady, I definitely agree that those examples I gave do not differentiate good and bad mothering. I meant them mostly humorously (witness that I drank gallons of Mountain Dew w/ subsequent pregnancies, and also that I turned on the TV on the ninth night).
My whole point was that we can choose not to be bound and repressed by this “social media construct” of good mothering. I think I understand why you (lovely? can I say that?) mothers are rejecting the whole term. I don’t aspire to a Donna Reed-ish type mother, either.
(Seriously. I lived in the Middle East for two years. We are so free here in the West. How is adopting the term that was once stigmatizing freeing? It’s like African Americans using the “N” word. I just don’t understand the appeal.)
But I don’t know why we can’t make the term “good” our own. Can’t we decide for ourselves? Can’t each woman determine what makes a good mother and then strive for that?
Can’t I say: “I feel better about myself if I think of myself as a Good Mother”? Or is that feeling of mine invalid? I want good things out of life. I want to define them for myself. I allow every person to define that for themselves.
Why am I the bad guy (tongue in cheek) for arguing that “good” can be “good”?
I don’t even believe that daily affirmation crap, but almost maybe I do. Does that make me an idiot?
Also. So, what you’re saying is that Bad Mothers are bad because they allow pool peeing and nose picking? Really? Is that what this is all about? THAT’s what makes a bad mother?
Why is it so wrong to want to be good? Why does it feel better to you to relinquish that term and take up the other?
Mr Lady
@Jane of Seagull Fountain, I am not saying anything. I don’t profess to call myself a “bad” mother. This isn’t my battle, and I honestly don’t think it should be a battle at all.
Just as your list was meant to be humourous, these women’s blogs are meant to be humourous, at least in pointing the finger at themselves. That is the difference I see. This whole (God, wrong word here) movement to rally around or embrace the “bad” mother in ourselves is meant exactly that way, to look inside ourselves and celebrate the flaws that make us human. It is about pointing the finger in, not out.
For many of us, the “good” mothers spend a whole lot of time pointing the fingers out.
You aren’t being made the bad guy for arguing that good can be good (I am good, I call myself good, I get that) but what is happening is that you are telling others that they are wrong for not identifying with a label or a group that you do, and it is hurtful. When you describe people who chose to relay a small snippet of a window of their lives online in the context of imperfection or as bad as having, “weakness of personality that looks to others for approval”, that is hurtful. That is pointing the finger out. I assure you, these women have no weakness of personality, nor do they need the approval of the masses. They would, however, prefer to not be accused of inciting young women to shoot heroin while they’re pregnant and for single-handedly undoing everything the feminist movement has done.
Some people need to laugh more than others. Some people need to laugh at themselves so they don’t cry their eyes out. Maybe you don’t need to, and I am happy for you for that, but maybe Tanis does. Maybe Catherine does. Maybe any number of people do. God knows I do.
My point about the nose picking, et al, was just that what is good to you maybe isn’t good to someone else, and what is bad to you isn’t always bad to someone else. I jumped on that because your point was the irony of her statement, when the entire premise of this argument is that they WRITE IRONIC BLOGS. They refer to themselves as bad and continuously post about their struggles to be better, to be good. Basically, I said it because you started it and I am 5. Neener neener.
I honestly don’t know why I jumped in here. As I said, it’s not my battle. I just think that if someone wants to call themselves something Michael Jackson did on an 80′s pop album, more power to’em. I just get sick of listening to people create and fester these ridiculous arguments that do nothing more than shove someone up against the wall to defend themselves when there are actual, serious things going on in the world that we could all be devoting our time to, and I’m sick of being Switzerland.
Though the chocolate is great.
Jane of Seagull Fountain
@Mr Lady, I actually found the chocolate in Switzerland to generally be not dark enough. (Just kidding, I don’t HAVE to argue about everything).
I get your points. And if Bad was in a Michael-Jackson-80s sense, well hell. Am I ever with you there.
I definitely need to laugh so I don’t cry. And I get that much of the content on here and HBM is ironic, but Catherine’s post was a manifesto (she said mostly NOT tongue in cheek — unless that itself was ironic, in which case I’m too dumb to follow the twists), and I know (I think) that she cares deeply about this issue bec. she feels women are hurt by the bad label or by not getting the good label or something.
(I’m actually kind of confused about that even. I don’t get why or how HBM got so disenfranchised and so enslaved to Babywise — see her references to Dr. Sears and Weisbluth (actually, she’s edited her post to now not mention them. I don’t know when that happened).
While I have often felt within myself that I wish I did some things mothering-wise better, I have never felt so powerless that others can label me. Perhaps I should just be down on my knees grateful that (who, my mom?) raised me to feel that my own judgement of myself was the only one that mattered. I guess it’s hard for me to really wrap my head around the fact that Catherine honestly feels so marginalized, repressed, disenfranchised by the “establishment” that this is her best recourse.
After reading about Tanis’ unfathomable harassments by authority, I certainly (CERTAINLY) understand her issues with the word, though I still think accepting “bad” as a label concedes some victory to those who wanted to bestow that label in the first place.
I apologize if saying that these women were looking for approval from others is hurtful, but Catherine’s original post specifically said it was a manifesto against what “others” (Dr Sears, Weissbluth,”community edicts”) say. If she weren’t concerned with the approval (or lack thereof) of outsiders, she wouldn’t have anything to react against.
Mr Lady
@Jane of Seagull Fountain, well, what I am not going to do is attack you OR Catherine. But I just want to point out that calling someone enslaved to something, that inferring someone’s mother did a poor job raising them is still HURTFUL. We all get it that you don’t like Catherine, but slinging insults at her isn’t proving your point.
Many of us are disenfranchised by “the establishment”. We are sick of being told when and how to feed our children, how to reprimand them, the right way to get them to sleep at night. I’ve only had kids for 11 years, but in those 11 years I have been scorned, mocked, put down, shunned and humiliated for stupid things like not making my own baby food or going back to work or NOT going back to work or scolding my child in public for acting like a fool in public. The nurse in the hospital yelled at me for nursing my baby too long. My best friend when I was a new mother disowned me because I didn’t serve organic baby food. I didn’t get invited out with the other moms at the playground because I have a small, plain tattoo on one arm. And yes, it was because of that.
I have fought for 11 years to raise my children the way I see fit. I have never shoved any parenting advice down anyone’s throat unprompted. I would never dare belittle someone for believing in a way of raising their children, even if I vehemently was opposed to it (I am talking within reason here, say athiest v christian, not the extreme), because WHO AM I TO JUDGE YOU? Or Catherine, or any blogger, or any mother? I don’t know everything, I just know my kids and I know what works for us, and it works amazingly well although I would be considered way the fuck out of the mainstream with parenting.
And yet, I have been dismissed and ridiculed and judged by my own family, my friends and my peers. I was beaten, raped and tortured because Dr Sears, a pediatrician and someone’s construct of God said that was the “good” way to parent.
Sufficed to say, I have an issue with self-proclaimed “good” moms. Having that history, I also have an issue with the cool-to-be-genuinely-bad moms, too. In real life. I couldn’t give a flying fuck what someone blogs about. I don’t like it? CLICK. But Cath and Tanis are neither of those. Cath isn’t writing about fucking her husband while her kids ride on her back or doing drugs while they’re packing their own sack lunches, she’s writing about being a vulnerable human who is just getting the hang of parenting. And she calls that “bad”, because Her Imperfect Mother doesn’t have as nice a ring to it.
And people can relate to it. People can be less afraid, less alone, less inclined to majorly fuck up if they just know there is someone out there who has been there and is getting through it intact. That someone else can look in the mirror and feel like they’re doing a lousy job of this parenting thing but then splash some water on their face, go back out there and try it again. There weren’t mom blogs when my boys were babies, and I’ll tell you what….I could have used a Catherine.
So rather than trashing her and mocking her, maybe it’s not the worst idea ever to realize that what she is doing is helpful and it’s uplifting and it’s humanizing. And if it isn’t your cup of tea, move on. But don’t discredit the fact that it is someone else’s saving grace, please.
That is hurtful.
St
@Mr Lady, Best comment on this whole thread, for real.
Jane of Seagull Fountain
@Mr Lady,
I didn’t mean to imply that others were raised poorly — I was trying to give my own mother some credit. My mother married at 17 and had me at 19. I need to ask her how she feels, because since she never went to college (as I got to do), I wonder if she often felt more pressure to conform to what “experts” say. I’ve always felt that the single most important thing I learned in school was to be suspicious and critical of experts. And I thought other mothers were also.
I don’t subscribe to many of the “natural family living”-type principles, but many of those mothers seem to be very suspicious of “authority” and I think they’re less subject to the feeling that society’s definition of Good Mother is even relevant. (What do they know that we don’t? Maybe we could learn something.)
I can totally see how re-appropriating the hurtful term would feel empowering, I guess. I mean, it’s defiant, it feels strong, I guess it just still feels reactionary to me, instead of proactive.
I also didn’t mean to imply that Catherine is a Bad Mother. My whole point all along is — why can’t she (they, you, ANYONE) just say screw you to the “experts” and say they ARE a Good Mother?
But if it feels better to say they’re Bad Mothers instead, I can’t argue with that feeling, though I disagree with the logic. To me it still seems similar to African-Americans calling themselves the “n” word.
Which means that I just don’t understand, and I’ll shut up now.
St
@Jane of Seagull Fountain, I don’t think the comparison to the N-word is really appropriate. African Americans did not say, “If that’s what N means, then I AM N!” They took that word’s power by making it mean something else.
Here, the “Good” parents of the world had already redefined what “bad parent” means by saying, “bad, bad, bad” to the rest of us (for bottle-feeding or kids not wearing shoes, OMG or like when Chris’ kids were pictured without helmets) and we said, “If that’s bad then, hell YA I’M BAD!!”
It’s very different.
Mr Lady
@Jane of Seagull Fountain, and when the conversation turns to a bunch of white women piggy-backing 300 years of torture and oppression to make a point about motherhood, I shut up too. That’s a conversation I’ll never have.
Somedayphd
@Mr Lady, Absolutely. To it all. None of us gets to escape Foucault.
Her Bad Mother
@Jane of Seagull Fountain, What I don’t get is why you’re so passionate about characterizing my arguments – which reduce, very simply, to rejecting judgment and labels and TO EACH HER OWN – as terrible, sad markers of a disconsolately oppressed woman. And all just because of a WORD? Clearly, I’m doing something right in deploying it to my own purposes if it’s got you so riled up – and so eager to put me in my place – and so many others cheering and thanking me.
I had a wonderful childhood, being raised by a mom who was wonderfully, conventionally good (cookie-baking, Sunday School teaching, Girl Guide leading) and also wonderfully, unconventionally, unabashedly BAD – in the nudge-wink, let-the-church-matrons-scowl-at-us kind of way. Which as I keep insisting, is also an unironic kind of bad, inasmuch as SO MANY OTHERS out there would call it bad. It’s that tension that I play with in my own use of the term, and that I want to seize and take control of and celebrate. It’s a maternal legacy that I’m proud of. Why you need to twist it into a pathology, I do not know.
As I said in my last comment to you on my own blog, if this just comes down to a disagreement over semantics, then so be it. Not every one can be Foucauldian. But in continuing to insult me for my choices, you undermine your own arguments and lend credence to my own, and that just keeps us running in circles and honestly, I’m getting a little tired of it.
Also, Shannon? I LOVE YOU.
That is all.
Jane of Seagull Fountain
@Her Bad Mother,
It probably just boils down to the fact that I’m frantically scrambling, trying to figure out if by Foucauldian you mean Foucault (was he the French philosopher guy who “massaged” his wife’s windpipe and accidentally killed her?).
You guys are all obviously way too smart for me. (btw — I’m getting email notifications of these comments, and not for the ones on your blog, which is why I hadn’t see your comment on yours.)
I think the argument started out being about semantics — I think we agree (?) that words are powerful, especially labels, especially if they make people, especially vulnerable, postpartum women feel badly about themselves.
If having the term Bad Mother applied to someone has been so damaging, so hurtful, in the past, that she feels called to make a Bad Mother Manifesto, I don’t see how it follows that adopting “Bad” is the answer.
What about media stereotypes of beauty? If my daughter is called ugly at school, do I tell her to change the meaning of the word ugly and claim to be an Ugly Girl, with pride? (I don’t.)
Or do I tell her that the media stereotype of beauty is not only wrong, it’s stupid? And that she IS beautiful!
—
I’m sorry (truly, deeply) if I’ve insulted you. I meant to insult (though I hoped to call it “disagree with”) your argument.
Natasha
@Her Bad Mother, I don’t see the insults. No one is trashing you, as Mr. Lady said.
I’m sure that there are people who read what you wrote and it resonated with them for real, BUT, I think you know as well as I do that had you written a post about how moms need to not take things personally and need to take charge of their own self-confidence, etc. (the point I made in my post) then everyone would have been RAH RAH RAH THIS IS THE BEST POST EVER YOU ARE SO AWESOME I LOVE YOU.
OH yes.
To deny that would be to deny a dynamic that has existed since probably the beginning of time but certainly since junior high.
And it’s not Shannon/Jane who keeps hammering on this. She is replying to you. You wrote a follow up post. Tanis felt the need to write a post. You keep commenting and arguing back when you’re mostly restating what you’ve already said. She knows what you’ve already said. She’s saying she disagrees with it. Why not just say, “Huh. Okay, well, I can see your perspective but I view this differently.” Instead, you keep arguing back acting like you’re not understood when we do understand we just think it’s a weak point where other people think it’s a strong point and why are our feelings any less valid than your feelings about The Establishment? Because you are targeting a nameless group whereas we’re targeting your argument? That’s blogging, yo. I don’t see any personal attacks. I see some passionate discussion. Why the need to shout at the universe to shut up?
If you’re really this passionate about reframing things and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that every time someone ironically calls themselves a “bad mother” that it references your BRAND, then great. Whatever. If it’s not AT ALL motivated by marketing to call this a MANIFESTO for goodness sakes, and ask moms to UNITE, then great. You feel strongly about something I don’t feel strongly about one whit because I have NEVER FELT JUDGED IN MY PARENTING because I DON’T PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT OTHER PEOPLE THINK OF ME. (I’m not yelling that, I’m emphasizing.) You probably like steak or something, too, and I don’t. Tomato tomahto.
For me, the fervor, THE FERVOR, over trying to take back the word Nigger, is a little hard to believe for someone like me who doesn’t care what other people think of her. Dude, I just wrote a coming out of the closet post that could have alienated Mormons and non-Mormons alike for totally different reasons, nevermind freak out my friend and my mother. Like Jane said, I care what God thinks of me and what my constituents think of me and that’s it. So, because it’s so extremely difficult for me to relate to your pain and anger, I had a hard time seeing this whole bad mother branding thing being a coincidence. Isn’t that logical of me? It can he hurtful if you make it so or you could say, “Ya, I could see how you’d think that. It’s not true but I can see how you’d think it.”
What you said on my blog about it being good in theory but impossible or difficult in practice to not allow other people to dictate your feelings is not true for me at all. I’ve worked very hard to be this way, to be at a place where I don’t take things personally and there are some fundamental understandings behind that ability that anyone could adopt if they wanted to. I have had a lifetime of abuse and neglect and hurt that made me exceedingly sensitive to criticism. But I changed it. Now, I don’t let myself dwell for more than a few minutes on hurt feelings. I don’t ignore them. I choose to reach into myself for my own beliefs about myself and view those as truth and opinion as opinion and BOOM– the offense vanishes.
Anyway. It’s just a back and forth sharing of opinions.
Her Bad Mother
@Natasha,
The insulting aspect is twofold: the suggestion that a) if I’m passionate about this, there must have been some deficiency in my upbringing (Jane’s suggestion) or that I have – sadly, pathetically – chosen to be marginalized and oppressed by something that really isn’t worth fussing over (why on earth would someone let Sears vs. Weissbluth fuel their anxiety? How SAD!) and b) OBVIOUSLY there must be some marketing angle to my post, and isn’t that what this is all about, at least in part? The first is an age-old method of shaming (‘I just feel sorry for her, poor thing with her pain and her anger, tsk’), the second is new, but both carry a sting.
It’s great that you have achieved total mastery over your feelings. If you could bottle that – or market it – you’d probably get your spot on Oprah like *that*, because most human beings react to shaming and judgment. I’m not talking about my reactions to criticism about my post, I’m talking about the argument within the post, that women, mothers, PEOPLE are vulnerable to and can be hurt by the judgments of others. You’ve never felt judged as a parent? Great! But many, many women have, and that have been hurt by it. That may not be true for you, but it’s true for many, if not most. In which case, why not walk away and remind yourself that it’s not for you? To say that because stuff doesn’t hurt you, it shouldn’t hurt others, well, that smacks a bit of callousness (and is a convenient excuse for bullies, isn’t it? ‘she should have been able to take it! I could take it, so why shouldn’t she?’ Not that you’re a bully – but insisting that those who are hurt by the words or actions of others are weak is just a bit cold, in my opinion.)
I’ve said repeatedly – to Jane, especially – that there’s clearly a disagreement about semantics and why not let’s leave it at that? But the reply keeps coming back, “I just don’t get why you say this, make this argument.” So I’ve kept explaining, although not as much as you make out – one comment prior to this one here, one at Jane’s, one at yours – you know, DIALOGUE. (The tweet about shouting at the universe? Had nothing to do with this. I do have a life beyond this stuff, hard as it might be to believe.)
So I’d be more than happy to leave this as a disagreement over semantics, but it’s not sticking. Because it’s also a disagreement about a whole host of other things, apparently – moral values, faith, psychology and politics, to name a few. And – in part because I spent over fifteen years wrestling with these very issues as a student of political philosophy – I have a hard time not returning to my arguments and shaking them around like a dog with a bone. But end of the day, I’ve been very clear about my support of any mother to define GOOD however she wants to define it and claim it however she wants to claim it etc etc and MORE POWER TO EVERYBODY – if you want to celebrate good motherhood as Good Motherhood for yourself, then GREAT, whatever empowers you – while not receiving the same courtesy in return. Which, fine – you can be fully and totally against anyone calling themselves ‘bad’, ever, but when you state or imply that there’s something wrong with me for doing so, or that it’s wrong of me to do so, well, we’re right back at the root of the problem, aren’t we?
Still, yes, all opinion, so.
Natasha
@Her Bad Mother, I never caught that implication by Jane that you weren’t raised well. Don’t know what you’re referring to. I did see her say that her mom raised her to think X and Y but the obvious conclusion is NOT that she’s insinuating that your mom didn’t do the same. She could very well be placing full blame upon you for not seeing that no one can MAKE you feel a certain way.
I don’t need to bottle anything because this philosophy that I embrace is already out there in full force. In her very first issue of O, Oprah published a portion of Don Miguel Ruiz’s book The Four Agreements. She has talked about the book quite a bit. One of the agreements is on how to not take things personally, how to not be offended. Oprah has had people on her show talk about this plenty. Then there’s Byron Katie. And there’s my church leaders who talk about not being easily offended and looking to God’s opinion of yourself to know how you should feel.
So, if I am being cold, then so is Oprah and so is Ruiz and so is Byron Katie and so is my church and so are many other people before me who have taught passionately about this philosophy.
This concept is out there in large force and for ME, it’s a huge, obvious part of my world so that should explain some of my disbelief over the fervor you and other people feel about fighting against judgment. I believe the battle starts and ends within.
(It was two comments on Jane’s post, by the way.)
Yes, I’m saying that not taking responsibility for one’s own feelings is a flaw. And I’m not saying it because I want to criticize you or any one individual. I’m saying it because there’s this loud voice saying that we need to fight against judgment and labels of what’s good and bad so that we can feel good about ourselves and I believe this is a weak position instead of a strong one and that it’s actually fundamentally incorrect for two reasons, which I outlined in my blog post. And I say this because I believe in my philosophy and cause as much as you do in yours. IT JUST SO HAPPENS that the loud voice is yours. I’m not raising concern BECAUSE it is yours. Therefore, I’m not attacking you, (whom I actually like quite a bit– can I just say that?– and love you like I do most people, and I think you’re quite lovely– that probably needs to be said, though I thought it was known) I’m attacking an idea which you just so happen to espouse, asking all moms to unite and espouse with you.
I believe that your idea is spiritually immature and because of that it will not lead to the change which you seek. I’m sorry. I know those are strong words and they could hurt. But, only if you agree with them or give them any weight. If you think I’m wrong, then dismiss them out of hand and call it my opinion that does not have to define any part of you.
The power you seek is within you and you are giving it away to words and to what other people say.
I strongly believe in sharing truth. It’s why I started my blog.
Of course, truth can be a largely subjective idea. Which is why you write about yours and I will write about mine and that might include a comment upon something you’ve said that I believe is wrong and could actually be detrimental.
I believe that this conversation is a part of a pervasive idea that few things are wrong and few things are right and as a Mormon, you might know I believe that is completely false and an insidious deception. I don’t believe that there are sweeping rights and wrongs at every turn of parenting. Of course not. Every family is different. But we need to be careful with trying to tell The Establishment to stop telling us what’s appropriate and what isn’t. There are general rights and wrongs and it’s up to us to use our insight and instincts to know if they apply to US right now.
It’s like all the ex-Mormons who leave the church because they freak out and can’t handle all the commandments and admonitions, not recognizing that it’s fully expected that they’ll apply what they can and set the rest aside. If you can’t handle the admonitions, don’t blame the whole church and all those leaders for daring to speak out about what’s right and what’s wrong. Blame yourself for not keeping it all in perspective.
There IS right and there IS wrong and there IS good and bad and these rules and messages need to be out there. That doesn’t mean they are all FOR YOU AT THIS TIME. Instead of trying to change anyone else’s actions, why not ask what YOU can do yourself to take control of your own life and feelings?
COME ON, Catherine. That’s a damn good point.
Her Bad Mother
@Natasha,
For what it’s worth, I actually do believe that there is wrong and right and good and bad. I just don’t believe that dominant western narratives/ideas about what’s ‘good’ in motherhood are reflective of true goods. And so I resist them.
And my cri de coeur cum manifesto was not the lament of an unhappy mom – it was the rallying cry of an empowered mom, of a woman who has found an outlook that works for her, that makes her happy, and who wants to champion it. I’m not oppressed, because the path I’ve chosen, and the outlook that I embrace, rejects the narratives of oppression that I dislike.
I actually live a pretty spiritually rich life – I was raised in a devout household, and I’ve spent the better part of my life studying religion and philosophy and reflecting upon my own spirituality. Sometimes that reflection is uncertain, as it must be, but it is always rich and always rewarding. So perhaps that’s the thing that irks here – the assumption that I must be spiritually bereft, that I must be lacking, that I must be unhappy if I would say these things, when in fact the opposite is true, and the point of my manifesto was to share something that *has* worked for me, that *does* work for me, with other women. That it doesn’t resonate with you is fine – but the fact that it doesn’t resonate doesn’t de facto make it wrong. I have found my goods in this – this life, this perspective, this mode of parenting – and I am happy with it. And that is, I think, something to celebrate.
Natasha
@Her Bad Mother, Oh, sweetie, I do not think you’re spiritually bereft! I’m happy to see your Beliefnet blog and I have gathered that you respect spiritual endeavours.
I also don’t think that you’re unhappy and didn’t mean to suggest so. Unhappy WITH something, really. And that’s fine. We’re all unhappy with stuff. I just don’t relate and yadda, yadda, everything I said before.
(And that sweetie was not patronising. It was with love. I’m all gushy with love right now, believe it or not. ;-D)
Thanks for the discussion.
Somedayphd
@Natasha,
If this is addressed later in the comments, I apologize, but I had to stop here for a minute.
It bothers me to read over and over that this is just “semantics” or for it to be insinuated that responding to, or resisting the cultural constructions of language somehow means that a person is contrary and should learn how NOT to be offended.
While I admit there are spaces in which society has become to reactionary, these kinds of arguments mask the fact that LANGUAGE MATTERS!
How we use words like good/bad/”bad” (using ” for slang) shapes the way we think about ourselves and the world around us. The pressure of this usage and the narratives that usage create about individual are real.
Reacting to them, speaking out, and/or being offended is necessary in order to change the world around us.
When anyone says, “Oh, well. This is just semantics.” It is an attempt to diffuse the situation which leads to a further masking of the problem.
Sometimes it is necessary and important to be offended.
**My use of all caps at points is not to yell. I just don’t know how to italicize in the comment.
Natasha
@Somedayphd, *sigh and smile*
Imagine if we put our two ideas together!
Mom101
The reality is, actual “bad mothers” are not the types who know they are bad mothers. I think the fact that you and Catherine and so on are willing to play with the word, to use it to own the declaration before others can attribute it to you, pretty much says to me that you have a handle on it.
The opposite of love isn’t hate – it’s apathy. And so is the opposite of good, I think.
Also “I am okay with my imperfections as a parent which goes against the societal imperative for perfection?”
I like that.
Heh.
(And I love you.)
Redneck Mommy
@Mom101, I kinda figured you might.
Snort.
Big smooches to you darling. You know I love ya.
Beth
Hey Tanis!!!!
FUCK EM IF THEY CAN’T TAKE A JOKE!
I TOTALLY LOVE YOUR PARENTING AND WISH MY MOM WOULD HAVE BEEN HALF AS “BAD” AS YOU ARE!!!
Alyssa S.
@Beth,
My favorite response to a situation I have no control over! I don’t hear it very much anymore, so it made me smile to see it today!
Beth
@Alyssa S., It serves the purpose on many different levels.
I love Tanis like she’s a family member and these so called “authorities” need to pull those great big sticks outa their butts and realize she’s a fantastic mom!
Shawna
We all live in our own realities and all I take from the “bad mother” discussion is this: stop judging. We all have different styles, values, ideas, etc. none more right than the other…and BECAUSE of those things look at the shocking number of well adjusted children in the world.
You have earned your soapbox. May you continue to use it for good (and laughs) not evil (and whatever the opposite of funny is!)
PS Frac is going to be a heartbreaker with or without his glasses, break out your shotgun now.
MommaSunshine
*raising my mug of dark roast coffee and Bailey’s while I kick a bag of cheetos in my kid’s direction*
Cheers!
MrsFinn
@MommaSunshine, You actually take the time to kick the Cheetos at them? heh…. I just figure mine knows where the cupboard/fridge is!! lol
MommaSunshine
@MrsFinn, Well, they’re only 4 and 6, after all. In another year, though, I’ll just toss them some money and have them go to the store to buy their own (and pick me up some Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups while they’re there).
heh
Melinda
I KNOW I have a girl crush on you, honey you rock my world i wish the words could come out of my mouth as well as yours do parenting is HARD and you do it with your own style that makes you you.i bet your kids do not realize it now but one day they will know they had a very special mom (and Dad) i believe in karma and you are and will get it ten fold as will the a** holes out there that always have negative things to say.
Mary
The world would be a much better place is ALL mothers were as bad as you, Tanis.
sam {temptingmama}
I just love you, that’s all. xoxox
Trish/astrogirl426
Yeh, see all this crap is why I tend to stay out of the “latest” debate within the blogosphere. It’s also why I tend to read people like you, and Backpacking Dad, and Whit, and Mir, and others who don’t really pay attention to that shit.
I’m sure various people in my life have thought of me as a “bad” mother; maybe when I had a c-section instead of pushing the kid(‘s huge head) out of my vajayjay, or when I breastfed until he was 2, or maybe even because he still climbs into our bed every night around 2am. Shit, my sister-in-law thinks I’m a bad mom because I didn’t attend the kid’s student assembly where he got some award (dudes, he’s in KINDERGARTEN, what the fuck could he be getting?).
Whatever. I do know some things, though:
1. I do the best I can. I don’t abuse or neglect my kid; I do my best to make him a good person and teach him and make his life a good one.
2. Most of the time that results in a well-adjusted, happy, smart, well-behaved Bunker Monkey. The other times are his dad’s fault.
3. Anyone wanna tell me I’m a bad mom? I dare you to say it to my face. I’ll even give you a 30-second head start after you do .
Water off a duck’s back, babe. Fuck ‘em, it ain’t their life.
Redneck Mommy
@Trish/astrogirl426, After this damn debacle, I’m keeping my nose out of all future debates.
I knew I should never have broken my own blog code. LOL.
However, at the very least, it’s been amusing and educational to stretch my brain and embrace another’s opinion which is vastly different than my own.
jenni williams
I have tried to stay out of this whole “bad mommy” thing. The phrase gets my panties in a wad. Unless you abuse, neglect, or cause lasting damage to your child you are not a bad mother. The “perfect” mother is a bull shit myth. My goal as a mother is to have healthy and happy kids. Its not always easy, and there are days I suck at it. I totally get what you are saying Tanis. And its freaking insane you have had to defend your status as a mother so much. I just dont care for the whole “bad mother” trend.
Redneck Mommy
@jenni williams, I avoid getting my panties in a wad by simply going commando. I highly recommend it.
Wink.
jenni williams
@Redneck Mommy, Actually, I do too. It was more of a figurative wad. heh
You still rock.
AG
@jenni williams, I just want to say that until you have been *accused* of abusing, neglecting, or permanently damaging your children by people who have the power to take them away, you really don’t even begin to know … these are not people you just say “screw you and your opinions” to, people.
I’ve had Child Protective Services land on my doorstep thanks to a false report and had to defend my every move and PROVE that I was not abusing, neglecting or permanently damaging my children. I have lived in fear while they stared accusingly and made their silent judgements and tried to make every move I made seem like a horor because it did not conform to “good” parenting. There are people here saying nothing would shake their belief in their “goodness” … ya’ll, try a visit from government officials out for size and then come back and say how right you felt the whole time.
If you havent been there, and can’t understand, then just shrug it off and say “not my thing, I don’t get this” but do NOT behave self-righteous about your “goodness” and the firmness of YOUR convictions if you have never been in that position.
jenni williams
@AG, UHH What the hell are you talking about? I just dont like the term. I am pretty sure I said it was crap that Tanis has gone through, was wrong. I just think we are all good mothers. As for defending your parenting to others, you don’t know me. I have not had to deal with child services, but I have a special needs son and I have to battle with doctors, teachers, and everyone else with a goddamn opinion about how I parent him. Whether or not I drug him ect. So YES I do know what its like to defend my parenting and I am FAR from a perfect mother. If you look down further I posted again about this… If you feel taking the term and turning the meaning empowers you go for it. I don’t think I made any judgments in what I had to say, but obviously I offended you somehow.
AG
@jenni williams, The entirety of the post was not directed specifically at you (sorry to give the impression), and yes, I did see later where you changed your mind a bit. I was making specific reference to your “Unless you abuse, neglect, or cause lasting damage to your child you are not a bad mother”. My point was, it sounds easy to say “never doubt you are a good parent if you dont do these things” if you have never been in a position where you were accused of exactly those things, and by people whose opinion not only MATTERS, but is ESSENTIAL to continuing to parent said children.
Some people *have* to turn around that accusation and mock it (which is, in the end, all Tanis and others are doing, is MOCKING the judgement) in order to keep it from truly injuring their heart. Not everyone is like that, and both ways are okay.
jenni williams
@AG, AHH ok I was a little confused, thought you were referring to what I said alone.
I can understand the theory behind mocking the term, isn’t this the same argument black pop culture has used for years about the n-word? Take away the power of the word/or phrase and change the meaning. And don’t think that I am not terrified that I am a bad mother ALL the time. Arent we all? And having assholes butt into our lives and minds to undermine us further doesn’t help the cause. This is nothing new. Mothers have faced self doubt and judgment since the beginning of time. The internet/blogging gives us all a voice. How we choice to vent out frustrations, insecurities, or whatever is a matter of personal choice.
Hope this make sense, its almost 1 am and I am awake hopped up on carrot cake.
harmzie
This would be much easier if we could just spell it differently, like “Phat”
I like to think I get the difference. As a kid, I sat outside the bar *waiting* (not often, but enough to remember it). As an adult, I’ve fed my kids jellybeans for breakfast and said “do NOT come upstairs for TWENTY minutes” [hint hint] (also, not often)
Both “bad”, but which would you look back on and say “oh you crazy parents, you!” or “WTF was that about?”