agonyaunt | (no subject)

Dear Care and Feeding,

My 14-year-old son and six of his friends were at a sleepover when they decided to sneak out and meet up with a sleepover of three girls in an adjoining neighborhood. This group of ten 14-year-olds walked around the neighborhood from midnight to 2 a.m. Then they went back to their own hosts’ homes. Neither group had permission to leave. The next morning, doorbell camera footage outed all those involved, and the kids confessed to their parents. My son texted me letting me know what had happened.

My problem is not so much what happened, but how it was handled. I was upset with my son. He knew not to leave without permission. I thought he was incredibly rude to his hosts to put them in that position and had broken trust with me. He was very sorry, and we’ve had many good discussions since about peer pressure and communication. I took away his phone for the weekend and grounded him from social activities for two weeks.

The other parents of the boys think I am being completely ridiculous. They have no punishment for their sons at all. They are frustrated with me for “overreacting.” They have told me things like “this is just part of being in high school,” and “you just need to forgive and move on.” I have definitely forgiven my son! I agree that this is part of growing up, but actions have consequences, and I think sneaking out is serious. Nothing bad happened that night, but that doesn’t make sneaking out a harmless thing to do.

Meanwhile, all three girls have had significant punishments. One is grounded for the rest of the school year. All three have their phones confiscated indefinitely. Their parents are much, much angrier.

In text exchanges, my son’s friends’ parents have said things like “the parents of the girls have way more to worry about than we do,” and “what were those girls thinking, sneaking out with boys?!” This seems like a huge double standard to me. Why is the same infraction harmless when boys do it, but incredibly serious when girls do it?

I would really appreciate any help you could give me. I’ve never felt so out of place as a parent. Usually my views pretty much align with my parent friends. Everything is great right now between my son and I, but we both feel judged by his friends and their parents.

So, did I overreact in punishing my son? Is sneaking out normal for boys but horrible for girls?

— The One Mean Mom

Dear TOMM,

No, you did not overreact.

Yes, sneaking out is normal for boys (and girls).

No, it is no more “horrible” for girls than boys.

Yes, the patriarchy is the worst.

In my opinion, the consequences for your son (the punishment, the several heart-to-hearts, and your forgiveness) are perfectly proportional to the “crime.” Regardless of what I think, though, it is 100 percent not those other parents’ business.

Your parent friends seem to have a severe case of “boys will be boys, so girls better watch out” syndrome. If I were you, I would tell the other parents to mind their own business about both your parenting decisions and how the young women comport themselves. If you feel a bit like poking the proverbial bear, you might ask them why they think it’s OK for boys to sneak out and not girls. Depending on their answers, you can remind them that preventing harm to young women is the responsibility of both sexes, and that you are raising your son to recognize that his actions have consequences, especially where others’ wellbeing is concerned. Or, just forget this whole endeavor, because I’m not sure whether these parents will get the message.

I would also have a conversation with your son to create a game plan for if (and when) this happens again. Will he truly be able to stay back if the rest of his friends sneak out? Will it be social suicide if he does? Sorry to be hard on your and his peer groups, but if this is the response you are getting from the adults for what is a reasonable punishment, I worry that those kids will not hesitate to ostracize or ridicule your son for playing by the rules in the future.

https://slate.com/human-interest/2022/10/teens-sneak-out-advice.html

Threaded | Flat

1. Two weeks grounding is an entirely reasonable punishment for this sort of misbehavior, especially as it sounds like there was utterly no malicious intent.

2. Where the hell do these other parents get off criticizing LW for how she raises her son!?

3. The girls' punishments are entirely out of line, but I guess those people didn't ask for my advice so oh well.

4. Seriously, though, on all levels I am thorougly incensed by this letter and think LW needs to really stop talking to these other parents, because they're all infuriating.

Edited 2022-10-05 15:19 (UTC)

LW's son is the only one of the boys I would trust in the dating pool if my kid were interested in boys. Heck, I'm not sure I'd trust the girls in the dating pool here, either.

I want to smash the faces
Of those beautiful boys
Those Christian boys
So you can make me cum
That doesn't make you Jesus

I remember
In my peach party dress
No one dared
No one cared
To tell me
Where the pretty girls are
Those demigods
With their nine inch nails
And little fascist panties
Tucked inside the heart
Of every nice girl

I think two weeks is a little strong, but he's not my kid and that's your decision.

I do think *some* consequence is a good idea, so I thpt at the other boys' parents.

Sneaking out in general isn't a huge deal, it's not worse for a girl than a boy, and it's not like one needs to fritz out about it. But if one is going to impose a consequence, then it should be imposed equally.

C&F (Allison, I guess) is spot on in terms of patriarchy and such. In the *general sense* this is how The Double Standard is nurtured in this society, and it suuuuucks. I think *telling* your fellow parents this couldn't hurt, once or twice. Don't hammer it too much, because they'll get tired of it, but definitely bring it up. You might be the cause of thought in other people! Gosh.

(Whose fault is it if a girl/woman/person is raped?

The rapist's.

And yet, that message is like, nowhere.)

Edited 2022-10-05 15:46 (UTC)

I think the consequences LW's son is facing are reasonable. I think holding the kids to different gender-based standards is a huge problem. I also (not, of course, knowing any of these kids as individuals) think a group of seven boys and three girls could very quickly and very easily get out of control in a way that could have longer-term harmful effects (or differently harmful effects) on the girls than on the boys. Maybe more likely than a group of three boys and seven girls? I don't know, maybe I'm theoretically overreacting as well. I am not the parent of a young woman. But I am the parent of a little boy who will, all being well, grow up to be a young man, and we're bringing him up to be the guy who says "dude, she said no," but are we doing it well enough that it will hold when it's Lord of the Flies?

I had a train of thought and it is gone now. I think it was a lot to do with judging the parents of the other boys in LW's son's friend group, because "the parents of the girls have way more to worry about than we do" is a bullshit thing to say when it's your sons they're worried about their daughters' sneaking out with. (If any one of them is taking the position "my son would never," then what's the source of the worry for someone else's daughter?) But the whole thought isn't quite coming together. Hmm.

Sneaking out is part of being in high school, but so is being grounded!

One argument for much MILDER consequences for sneaking out:

it is highly likely they will sneak out again. And if/when they do sneak out again, if they find themselves in an unsafe situation, do you want them to call a parent for help, or do you want them to think "If I call for help I'll be punished, I'll just ignore my instincts that are telling me that this is an unsafe situation" ?

Because the harsh punishments on the girls? May well lead to them hesitating to call their parents for help next time. And that might be VERY dangerous for them.

I do think it's possible that all the kids had a great time just walking around in the middle of the night yakking, and it was something of a bonding experience. Which still wouldn't make it the right thing to have done, nor without risk, but should factor into how to talk to them about it.

HOLY SHIT. I had to go away and come back to this before I could form a coherent answer through the incandescent rage.

Good job parenting, LW. Your son's friends parents and people with attitudes like theirs are at least a big part of the reason parents of girls have more to worry about. Or, put another way, if parents of sons raised them to care about the safety and happiness of their friends*, regardless of gender, as opposed to the "boys will be boys" vibe I'm getting from your son's friends' parents, parents of girls would not have appreciably more to worry about than parents of boys, not least because even if some of the boys in a given group got rapey or even just harassy, some of the others would be likely to upstand instead of bystand. (I'm reminded of William Pollack's Real Boys here--- "protect your friends from harm" is or used to be a very normal "traditionally masculine" value for boys to internalize, and while it also traditionally came with horrible baggage, keeping the "help your friends be safe" part without the misogyny might be something to consider. "Friends don't let friend commit acquaintance rape" is another value to be teaching young men, along the lines of "you don't want to be that dude, and I know I sure as hell don't want the reputation of being a guy who thinks it's okay to be that dude, because girls talk to each other and warn each other about that dude", but I digress.)

*I mean, caring about the safety and happiness of friends is a good value for anyone to learn young, regardless of gender, but women do seem to get a lot more of the socialization around caring about how other people feel, whether the people in their group are enjoying themselves at a party, etc. And as for safety, when I've had jobs or other activities with late hours as an adult, it was automatic among the women in the group to walk each other to cars and make sure everyone's car started before we went our separate ways, just as one example.