Why are Mother-in-Law jokes/stories almost always about the groom’s mother?
Because wives are more likely to complain in general about family matters
Because grooms actually do have more trouble separating from their mothers
Because mothers have more difficulty separating from their sons
Because women aren’t actually expected to separate as fully from their mothers
Premise not True
Other
0voters
I’ve noticed that overwhelmingly complaints about Mothers-in-Law are about the groom’s mother. What causes this?
Okay, they’re also almost exclusively about mothers in law rather than fathers in law, but that strikes me as expected. On the day-to-day, down-and-gritty, get-into-the mess-and-dirty parenting is still overwhelming done by the women vs. men.
On the other hand, every bride has/had a mother just as much as every groom has/had, so why the imbalance?
Other: because marrying into a family is inevitably a source of conflict, and in many cultures, it’s the woman who is perceived to be marrying in rather than the man. For that reason, the conflict is between the bride and the woman who married in a generation ago, her mother-in-law.
I don’t think the husband/son has much to do with it, really.
In the UK, a comedian famous for his mother-in-law jokes was Les Dawson. His jokes were always about his wife’s mother. Most of these don’t stand the test of time or of 21st century sensibilities, but I quite like this one: The mother-in-law came round last week. It was absolutely pouring down. So I opened the door and I saw her there and I said, ‘Mother, don’t just stand there in the rain. Go home.’
The usual explanation I’ve encountered is that women are crueler to women than men are to men, in general.
So the groom’s mother may make life hell for the bride, but the bride’s mother doesn’t usually bother the groom too much. Chinese history and literature, for instance, is replete with examples of women making things hell for their son’s wives - having endured such bullying themselves decades earlier.
First of all, I don’t know whether the premise is true. I avoid mother-in-law jokes as much as I can.
Second of all, if it is true, I think it’s because the husband/son isn’t expected to have much to do with it. Sorting out family relationship problems is, at least in the sort of social milieu that produces mother-in-law jokes, supposed to be the woman’s job. Men aren’t supposed to be bothered with it.
I very much doubt that that has anything to do with women being crueler to women than men are to men. (Men murder each other relatively often, for instance.) It seems much more likely to have to do with the women being powerless to bother the men.
I just have to fight the hypothetical, I think the concept cuts both ways. All the way back in the age of mother-in-law jokes The Honeymooners played up the disapproving mother of the bride. It probably far more common then because almost all the comics were men and it was their mothers-in-law who formed the basis of jokes. But women doing comedy went heavily the other way, and as women they were allowed to be far more insulting to another woman than a man was.
There probably are more stories over a longer history that view a husband’s mother as more interfering, never approving of a daughter-in-law, never finding any woman good enough for their son. But in more recent history I don’t think there’s such a distinction to be made. Mothers-in-law are rarely discussed for their wonderful qualities, whether the mother of a man or a woman in a marriage the stories will be about interfering opinionated mothers.
As the joke goes, Behind every successful man stands a surprised mother-in-law.
I think that’s just because traditionally, the wife moves into the husband’s household, which means that wife and mother-in-law are very often living under the same roof. They come into conflict simply because they have ample opportunity to.
I think it has a lot more to do with the dynamic between parents and children and how marriage represents a transition where the parent is no longer the primary opposite-sex relationship in the child’s life.
Often there might be demands placed on the spouse-in-law based on cultural traditions that are no longer as relevant or significant.
If there are significant religious, race, or socioeconomic class differences, that can add additional stress as well.
I’m also not convinced by the premise (I first encountered mother-in-law humour through The Flintstones and Fred’s mother-in-law).
But if it were true, I would think that it might be more natural for a mother-in-law to think “I was a better wife to my husband than my daughter-in-law is to my son”.
It’s not the trope that we often see in TV (husband’s mother making life hell for wife), but I’ve known/heard of a lot of cases where the wife’s mother is a total pain in the ass to the husband.
I’d say it’s in-laws in general who are often intrusive into their children’s married lives - they have opinions and stuff, and sometimes hold things like inheritances hostage for their children toeing their line as far as stuff goes. It’s shitty, but it does happen.
It was men making jokes about their MIL in UK comedy in general in the 1970s and 1980s (though Les Dawson was - uh - pre-eminent). When I read the OP I just assumed a mistake or typo. I guess I’ve learned something. And I guess I say Premise not True.
In Pakistan where the wife usually moves into the husband’s family home in some kind of multigenerational housing arrangement the mother in law had a position of tremendous power over the wife. The wife’s mother is almost irrelevant to the husband’s life.
In societies where there are more nuclear families, I find the tension is more balanced. Both parents are liable to believe that the child-in-law is not treating their child as the prince/Princess they are. Also that whatever compromises the couple make on cooking, grooming, furnishings, socializing, etc. are different from how both sets of parents think of as “normal” and they naturally blame the child-in-law for leading their child astray.
None of this is from personal experience. If anything in our marriage I am much more appreciative/protective of my parents in law than my wife is, and my wife is more appreciative/protective of my parents.
After three hours the poll is at 63% Premise not True and 21% Other. Wow.
I see most of the stories from reading on the internet. From that sample I would conclude that all mothers are crazy and that weddings drive them over the edge. Not that anything on the internet is true.
I found the 2010 book What Do You Want From Me by British author Terri Apter (which I only read in review and promptly forgot) in which a survey showed that 60% of the women surveyed reported long term stress between them and their mother-in-law, as opposed to 15% of men.
This was a UK study, but as I remember the discussion of why this is was cogent.
As far as why there is a trope about men’s mothers-in-law and what a burden they are, I think one should look first at who gets to tell jokes, and who has to listen to them and laugh dutifully.
It seems like mother-in-law jokes were a staple of stand-up comedy and sitcoms in decades past, and in that era, most of the comedians, and most of the writers, were likely to be men.
I don’t know that there really are any current fresh MIL stories in US/Western culture.
Others have addressed why MIL stories from the 1800s to the ~ 1980s and from more patriarchical and sexist cultures would emphasize problems between wives & the husband’s mother vs the opposite. Likewise cultures with multiple generations living under one roof.
That would all apply equally to the inlaws of both spouses, though. The OP isn’t asking why there are in-law jokes in general; but why, in the OP’s opinion, they’re not equally about both mothers-in-law (I’ll add, though the OP didn’t, that they’re generally about mothers-in-law, not fathers-in-law.)
