You might want to reconsider the finger to lips gesture if you’re in the middle of cleaning up dog vomit.
I told a co-worker’s dog to shut up once. His mother-in-law threatened to kick my ass with a spatula.
I am confused, when did shut up become such a bad phrase. Many of you are treating it like a racial epithet or curse word.
I have occasionally said shut up to my son when he is having a crying fit. I guess I am an unfit father.
I understand you don’t want to say shut up to your child but Grandma should be pitted for this should she?
Jim
I’m not sure, but it’s been this way for at least 15 years now. I got in trouble for saying it once when I was in grade primary.
I think a lot of this has to do with the dynamics in this living situation, ones that are different than what we consider to be “normal” in our society. Please excuse the stereotypes and generalizations below; some (many) assumptions have been made and may not be applicable to your particular situation.
You (Harborwolf) were probably the nominal breadwinner. Alias, I don’t know if you were previously employed, but you were probably the principal caregiver. Harborkid completes the nuclear family.
You are now in a situation where your breadwinning skills are put to the test by credit woes. This might force Alias into the workplace, spending less time as a caregiver, and pushing those responsibilities onto mom. Financial worries are potential landmines for relationships; the breadwinner can start to feel that he is not living up to his responsibilities, and it can result in a downward spiral.
Likewise, if the caregiver enters the workplace and turns those responsibilities over to another, that has its own recipe of resentment and frustration.
By moving into her house, you are re-opening the previous son/mother relationship. Any previously unresolved issues are still there. In any husband/wife relationship, the wife will inevitably have to come to terms with the mother. Even in an amicable relationship, the wife will have draw a line to make it clear that the man is now a husband first. Not hard when you are financially secure and in your own home, but you have blurred that line by moving into her house and by relying on her financial support. It is only human nature that she will revert to her previously maternal role, with whatever else is associated therewith.
Another (not inconsiderable) issue here is your sex-life. Not exactly easy for a son to ask his mom to leave her own home so that you can both get a little nookie. A certain amount of tension must be building there.
In her defense, parents (in general) are happy when their children are grown because grandparents have a much nicer role. They indulge, ignore misbehaving, and go home at the end of the day. She doesn’t have that option now. And (this might be hard for a son to hear, but…), she might want to get you all out of her house every so often for her own… personal… life.
My guess is that there is a lot more here than a “Shut up”.
It’s not racial, nor is it cussing, but it’s still rude and disrespectful. It’s about on the level of calling someone a bitch or giving them the finger. OK, maybe a shade less rude.
Oh, and you may not be an unfit father, but IMHO you shouldn’t be telling your kid to shut up. It indicates a lack of tact and caring on your part.
No, I really don’t think we are. (on preview: except tdn.) Many people have posted that it’s a rude thing to say. I would add, “especially to a family member.” I’m relatively young (24), and I was raised not to say “shut up.” On the other hand, many people have also pointed out that Grandma was cleaning dog vomit, and people sometimes say things they don’t mean when they’re feeling frustrated or put-upon. And for the record, Grandma wasn’t pitted. Alias started her thread in MPSIMS, which is a good place for annoyances and blowing off a little steam. This thread was started in the Pit because Harborwolf expected people to viciously attack him and his family like they did in the other thread. Personally, I’d avoid attacking a vicious carnivore and a secret agent, but that’s just me.
Except me? I just explained how I didn’t think it was racial or a curse. Almost on the level of rudeness of “bitch” or the finger, but without the cursing aspect.
Sorry, I was skimming and I guess I missed the first sentence somehow. But doesn’t saying it’s close to “bitch” or the finger pretty much put it on par with a curse word? In my estimation, “bitch” is one of the worst curse words, second only to “fuck” and derevations thereof. And the finger, where I grew up, was just a stand-in for “fuck you.” So “about on the level of calling someone a bitch or giving them the finger” sounds to me like it’s close to “damn” or “ass” or some other lesser curse word.
I accept the lack of tact as legit but not the lack of caring. That is definitely unfair based on the fact I did now grow up in a house and age where it was such a horrible thing. I was the youngest and definitely had at least older siblings if not my father tell me to shut up. What makes “shut up” so semantically different from “be quiet”?
Jim the tactless.
Well, they do say bitch on TV, but not fuck.
Giving someone the finger is rude in two ways. For one, it symbolizes “fuck you.” For another, it’s a disrespectful affront. One finger, two components. Take away the obscene component, and you’re still left with the disrespectful one. And that, to me, is about what shut up is. Maybe slightly less offensive, but not much.
OK, on a scale of 1 to 10, ignoring someone with a dismissive “uh huh” is a 1. Saying “fuck you” is an 8, saying “fuck you, nigger” tops the meter at a 10. “Shut up” is about a 2.5.
Like I said earlier, it probably has different levels of offensiveness from region to region and maybe even from household to household. Much in the same way that cunt and wanker are very different in the US compared to Great Britland. It would be interesting to do a survey on it and see if there’s any correlation to demographics.
As to why “shut up” is inherently offensive? I have no clue. I guess it’s just the power that the culture brings to it.
You know, I never curse at my kids or give them the finger. (In fact I save that only for the occasional fellow driver) I have said “shut up” to my son who gets into ridiculous crying fits where I cannot reason with him. I would be very upset if someone called my kids a B_tch. I really am not seeing the equivalence here.
Harborwolf none of this is directed at you except that you do unfortunately have to put up with the under their roof, under their rules. Explain to her you really don’t like this. Your only leverage is what I once used with my parents. If you really can’t allow this, I will need to move out into a crappy apartment.
My issue involved having my girlfriend stay the night when I was 22. Very different but my mother and I had a calm talk, I understood where she was coming from and how she wasn’t comfortable. I ended up almost never having my Girlfriend stay over but spent 3 nights a week at her apartment.
Of course this took so long for me to complete with other things, I see **TDN ** reply on preview.
Jim
You can tell your dog anything you want. I brought that up because I have noticed recently that many pet owners treat their pets as if they were their own children. My point was that noone should be told to “shut up”–even “be quiet” can be really rude, depending on tone of voice and body language.
I don’t understand the protests and defense of an elderly lady telling a child to shut up. And people say manners and civility have eroded over the past few years! Sounds to me like Grandma is setting a fairly low standard for common courtesy.
If kid was being bothersome, it takes just as long to say, “not right now, Jr. (whatver kids’ name is).” or “now’s not a good time to ask me anything.”
I don’t think I have ever told any of my kids to shut up. I have told them it is not their turn to talk (pre-school) or “don’t interrupt, X is talking.” If kid is obviously upset and in a rage–that is another issue. I still wouldn’t say shut up-kid is out of control and needs either limits set and adhered to or some kind of attention. Why not deal with the problem? What problems are solved with “shut up?”.
YMMV.
Seriously, could ya’ll be a little meaner? This things gonna wind up getting moved into mpsims and things get mean in there. :eek:
With regards to “shut up,” it’s not that we consider it to be a swear word or anything. It’s just something we’d prefer she not say. Alias and I don’t say it because we find it to be disrespectful. We know that this is a matter of personal choice. We don’t look down on anyone for saying it (but really, a parakeet?). We certainly don’t think it makes someone a bad parent for saying it to their child.
Plynck, the whole nuclear family concept is not something that we’ve ever thought about. Alias and I have both worked and share caregiver duties. We’ve always been the primary and continue to be so. We don’t even ask my mother to babysit. Personal lives are had by all.
Fuck you with a shovel, you irresponsible freeloading loser.
Actually, I just came in here because people keep referring to the snark boards, and since I can never find them, I wanted someone to email the URLs to me.
No, seriously. I love snark.
When I was a kid, some forty years back, my parents never, ever told us to shut up, although they frequently requested our silence in other ways. My mother in particular felt it to be an extremely rude expression, and to this day, I have never heard her use the term. I know that she considered it far worse than minor profanity, I assume because almost its entire point is to be rude.
Why is “shut up” rude, and “be quiet” isn’t? Well, why is “fuck” a curse word, while “copulate” isn’t? The fact that the basic content is the same is irrelevant. Words often have emotional freighting that has nothing to do with the actual meaning of the word - a subtext, if you will. Perhaps not everyone was raised this way, and it may indeed be regional or socio-economic, but in the world in which I was raised, there were miles and miles between “be quiet” and “shut up.” When you tell someone to shut up, you are expressing more than a desire for that person’s silence, again, at least in the culture in which I was raised. You don’t say it when you really only mean “Please, don’t speak just now - perhaps later.” It’s kind of like the difference between “Get the hell away from me!” vs. “Would you please excuse me? I need to be alone.”
Not everyone has a firm iron grip on their emotions 24/7. Sometimes, people just have to let off steam, and they can’t always process what’s best for the kiddies. People are human beings, and human beings can be impulsive, we’re not all perfect by-the-book child rearers. Basically, the thing that made me the most mad about the original post is that someone was valuing the “hurt feelings” (which weren’t even that, kids are resilient as long as nobody makes a big deal about anything) of a child over the very real stress and pain of another person. It’s like if I were crying, and someone yelled at me because my crying made them upset. Well, sorry, but fuck (that hypothetical) you. If I’m crying it’s because I have a damn good reason to be, and I don’t have time to process how my crying will affect everyone else in the room. If I could process this, then chances are I wouldn’t be crying. Grandma didn’t carefully think out her reaction, but guess what, she’s human. Humans lash out. And if A and H think she lashed out so horribly, then they should try to emotionally support her more so that she won’t be stressed so much and won’t be compelled to lash out. Because from what I see, she was in way more pain than the kid.
Also, what is a snark board? I’ve seen references to that here a couple of times and I’m a little curious.