As you may have suspected from the title, when I was a child I was a boy. Boys have a very straightforward way of dealing with interpersonal issues. They understand that the cause of strife is insufficient empathy. If the other person appreciated the pain they were causing, they would stop. The typical boy generously shares the pain with his harrasser by whaling on him until he (the harrasser) cries “uncle” (or until separated by an adult, whichever comes first). Depending on the pain threshold of the participants this may take more or less sharing (I once achieved empathy with a single punch, but it typically took a bit more than that.) As long as an empathetic balance is maintained boys generally get along just fine.
Girls, on the other hand! Emotional sabotage, double-dealing, sneaking, snitching, silent treatments, cliques, just plain meanness, etc.
Some of the things I’ve heard recently:
“You’re only my second best friend now.”
“Oh, you touched her pencil, now you’ll have to wash your hands.”
“Can I play with someone else now?” (Said to parent, with friend sitting right there.)
I tend to feel that this is the result of being told that a straight forward, no-nonsense, logical approch to things is un-ladylike, un-romantic, and generally non-desireable.
Actually, there are several books on this very subject. One, called “Queen bees and Wannabes” is a sort of parenting manual. it tells you how to tell if your daughter is a)mean b)a target and what you can do about it.
The other is more a reflection on the whole question “Why are girls so dang mean?” and is called “Odd Girl Out.” She interviews grown women as wel as teenagers. In one interesting case, she discusses a Mean Popular Girl whose friends turn on her and make her the outcast. She interviews girls who were mean when they were younger. its all very interesting, but in many ways leaves you with as many questions as it addresses.
A bit of a summary of that book: the author calls what girls do “alternative aggression.” She calls it that because there is a strong social norm for girls to be “nice.” Because they are supposed to be “nice” all the time, they don’t voice their conflict in a straight up way. Girls are afraid to lose their relationships. They are afraid if they tell their friends they are upset with them (that they haven’t been Nice) then they will lose their friends. To be alone and isolated is probably the worst thing a girl can imagine at the age of 13.
OP: *Girls, on the other hand! Emotional sabotage, double-dealing, sneaking, snitching, silent treatments, cliques, just plain meanness, etc. *
Well, I’ve seen boys do all of the above as well. I think anyone who thinks that “boys get along just fine” if they’re only allowed to do a little punching now and then is really romanticizing boyhood.
< Henry Higgins >
Women are irrational, that’s all there is to that!
Their heads are full of cotton, hay, and rags!
They’re nothing but exasperating, irritating vacillating, calculating, agitating, maddening and infuriating hats!
Why can’t a woman be more like a man?
Men are so honest, so thoroughly square;
Eternally noble, historic’ly fair;
Who, when you win, will always give your back a pat.
Why can’t a woman be like that?
Why does ev’ryone do what the others do?
Can’t a woman learn to use her head?
Why do they do ev’rything their mothers do?
Why don’t they grow up like their father instead?
Why can’t a woman take after a man?
Men are so pleasant, so easy to please;
Whenever you’re with them, you’re always at ease.
Would you be slighted if I didn’t speak for hours?
Would you be livid if I had a drink or two?
Would you be wounded if I never sent you flowers?
Why can’t a woman be like you?
One man in a million may shout a bit.
Now and then there’s one with slight defects;
One, perhaps, whose truthfulness you doubt a bit.
But by and large we are a marvelous sex!
…etc
< /Henry Higgins >
This musical moment was brought to you by a grant from The Fenris Corperation[sup]tm[/sup]
Damn, damn, damn.
I’ve grown accustomed to double-posting.
They almost make the day begin!
But I’m so used to posts that say “Good morning” “Good Morning” ev’ry day.
The joys, the woes,
the highs, the Lowes[sup]*[/sup],
Are second nature to me now;
Like breathing out and breathing in.
I’ve grown accustomed to the boards,
Accustomed to double posts
For me as a parent, this sets off alarm bells. No kid I know is so concerned with personal hygiene that they will feel the need to wash their hands just because they touched someone else’s pencil. In fact, kids will touch the most disgusting things you can imagine and then come to dinner without washing their hands if you let them. (Thread idea!)
What this comment means is that the victim is today’s pariah. As punishment for being not in the clique they get treated as toxic waste and no one will touch them or anything associated with them. In some versions of this “game” you rub the cooties off on someone else and say “Happy Birthday”, and then they’re contaminated. This is the evilest “game” I know of. They all know it’s evil (they hide it from their teacher at school because they know they’d get in trouble if they were caught), and it reduces them to tears when they’re the victims, but they still do it to each other.
hello again: I’m not sure I buy the “girls are socialized to be nice” bit. These girls know they’re not being nice. And I (pre-emptively) don’t buy the “girls aren’t socialized to be physical” bit either. I’ve seen them in Basketball games. They’d as soon plant an elbow as look at you.
I might buy that this is how girls are socialized to be more emotionally alert…daily practice in psychological warfare.
