What do you think about this
this may be in the wrong section, but i just got into a fight with my mom regarding her making me a face book account after i specifically told her i don't want one. she started adding friends and things, and the defiance of it just really pisses me off, so told her this and she starts chewing my ass out about how I'm so weird and that everyone likes facebook, I'm such a loner ect ect... i wrote what she said on word as she was yelling, here are some highlight's. and this is word for word bits of the dialogue.
"Your uncaring not warm and don’t give a crap about other people"
" You can tell me that all you want but I think it’s just a case of you being scared." after me saying that i dont want to be part of it
" You’re not warm to anybody, all you want to do is tell them when they’re wrong"
"you can’t give the people the time of day to just smile and be nice." and she has mentioned on several occasions that i am selfish because of this.
"your so weird, everyone else has one, because they care about other people"
I put up with this type of argument virtually every time i see her. Do you think this is appropriate? it gets to me after a while how i am constantly being chewed out for how i act, am i being sensitive or what? maybe i just need to suck it up and get used to it, its been going on for years now already.
There are some articles floating around the internet that would disagree with your mother.
Basically the argument of a lot of anthropologists is that social media has made society more narcissistic. College kids today are less empathic and more narcissistic than college kids 20 years ago. The digitization of socialization has taken a needed human element out of social interactions, and most people care more about how much attention they get on facebook than other people on facebook.
Your mother on the other hand, as your mother, has an obligation to accept you as you are and to respect your wishes whether she agrees with them or not, and she has failed at this.
Nevertheless, she did point out some things you may want to work on to better yourself socially, even if you don't actually intend on socializing more, because it may make your life a little easier.
BillyJoe, if you're here, does that mean you have some kind of diagnosis? Does your Mom know about autism and that you have some basic differences? The first thing that might be helpful is making sure she understands that these are traits of many people on the spectrum, and that they are typically not about being uncaring, just about difficulty communicating caring. Maybe get some books out of the library that you think are appropriate and offer them to her.
I know that many parents (myself included, I have to say) fear having their child grow up alone, unhappy, and wishing they had friends (I suppose if my son really wants to be alone and unhappy, I'd resign myself to that, as long as I knew it was not just that he quit trying.) Sounds like your mother is trying to push you to make sure you gain some social skills to prevent this from happening, and she's using guilt to her best advantage.
You might try to meet her halfway. FB has one advantage over forums like this: generally, you know the people you "friend" and there's a possibility of a real-world connection - this may be why she's pushing it. I don't know how your Mom feels about WrongPlanet; maybe letting her know you post here would do it. If that doesn't satisfy her, is there something relatively social you could do that you could also limit the amount to something you're comfortable with? For instance, whatever your interest is - taking a weekly class or workshop? Volunteering? (maybe you like animals - the local animal shelters sometimes use volunteers; it's sort of social but you generally interact more with animals than people) Let her know you'd like to do this instead of Facebook, could you please now close the account.
Good luck.
I agree with Chronos - your mom is not respecting you, and that is not appropriate at all. But there may be some truth to what she's saying, at least in terms of how you appear to other people. Or do you only hear this from your mom?
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Sharing the spectrum with my awesome daughter.
If your mom is choosing your friends on facebook, she's crazy as a loon.
She needs to stop this. You could easily wind up linked to people who will give you a bad name. And potential employers look at facebook these days.
Heck she could set you up with some pedophile by accident or association.
Besides - whats the point of a facebook account if YOU never use it?
Tell facebook to delete the page.
Tell your mom that you'll use the internet in your own way.
Tell her that facebook does not contribute to social well being - it promotes insipid drama a la lindsay lohan.
And if she keeps it up, go mess with HER facebook site.
Mahini
Blue Jay
Joined: 5 Sep 2010
Age: 52
Gender: Female
Posts: 83
Location: Lost in a sea of lonley faces... (Australia)
I am only new to all this myself. but if you are old enough to look after yourself and make your own decissions, then she should be leaving you alone and letting you decide how you would like to live, yes as parents we all worry we all want what is best for our kids, at the moment my kids are young so i will make decissions for them to the best of my ability. I do not understand how someone can tell another what is best for them if they are of age? If you are happy in your way of life then you should be left alone, No one knows what its like to be you, not even your mother, delete the page...
Woah, way out of line. Your mum pretending to be her son and adding all her son's friends. That's creepy man.
I can sympathise a bit. My mum still urges me to be more social (hell, you'd swear she's prouder of me going to the pub than getting a degree) but there's no way she'd stoop to that level.
Delete the account, or set up another just to post once on the phoney account saying that it's not you (don't say it's your mum- that'll get you teased) and then log off forever.
Your mother has no right to make that sort of decision for you. Facebook is a very personal venue, not a family obligation. You have a right to your privacy, and she's ignoring all the real risks that come along with Facebook (which makes its money off of data-mining all it's members, after all, and encourages high school style cliques as part of that). I have a Facebook account and I really enjoy it, but I am well aware of the choices I make every time I click on something, and I completely understand why many people would prefer not to be involved with it as a medium for social exchange at all.
If another mother told me she had just done that for her child, I'd be stunned. I'd be tactful, but I'd definitely have the agenda of persuading her she done the wrong wrong thing. I cannot imagine doing that to my child. I'm just ... stunned, that any parent could consider it appropriate.
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Mom to an amazing young adult AS son, plus an also amazing non-AS daughter. Most likely part of the "Broader Autism Phenotype" (some traits).
I went back to your original post, and re-read some of the others, and I guess the thing that really strikes me is WHY would this be so important to her?
Your quotes:
"Your uncaring not warm and don’t give a crap about other people"
Ask her why she thinks a Facebook account will improve that.
" You can tell me that all you want but I think it’s just a case of you being scared." after me saying that i dont want to be part of it
In this case there is something to be scared of: data mining. Loss of privacy to Big Brother. The pervasive invasion of privacy that the programmers of Facebook go through is well known and well documented. Yes, one can fiddle with privacy and security settings to keep a lid on it, but not all the things they do are obvious. I don't even mention my children's names on my PRIVATE page, because Facebook will sometimes post something from my page onto a friend's page, which may or may not have the same privacy settings I do. Fear can be a good thing, at times - it warns us of danger.
" You’re not warm to anybody, all you want to do is tell them when they’re wrong"
Perhaps you approached this issue with your mom wrong? Always start with questions, get them to see their errors through their own answers.
"you can’t give the people the time of day to just smile and be nice." and she has mentioned on several occasions that i am selfish because of this.
Separate issue. Do work on that; it shouldn't be that hard to sometimes say, "hello, how are you?" and exchange one or two sentences of polite conversation, even if you couldn't really give a hoot about the answers. It's just a funny little thing that will eventually lift some barriers for you.
"your so weird, everyone else has one, because they care about other people"
A Facebook account isn't caring about other people. Its about convenience, at least in the mom parts of the world. Instead of calling 20 people and letting them know what we're up to in our lives, we post on Facebook, and now they all know! I didn't even have to call them! It's great for keeping in touch with that former gradeschool friend now living across the country, and so on. And, it does actually help keep the family in touch.
Now, that last one ... this is probably where the real problem comes in. Your mom knows when cousin billy gets a flat tire on his car, but doesn't know what you are doing and thinking. What she really wants is the later, and is assuming that Facebook is a way to get it. What you need to do is address this hole she is feeling in her life, in her connection with you, in some other viable way. Us moms like to feel connected to our kids, and like to feel like they care about what WE want and think. We have, after all, gone through a lot of #&@!*(@& to have and raise our kids and, as much as we know intellectually the job is about giving kids wings so they can fly away ... we still want something back for all of it. We want our kids to love us, and we want them to show that they love us. My own mother is over 80 and still dealing with the sense that we slight her when we just simply get too busy to remember her the way she wants to be remembered. It is a little thing we can all do for our mothers: try to make them feel valued, and try to respond to them in a way that makes sense to them. If you do that, you won't need Facebook.
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Mom to an amazing young adult AS son, plus an also amazing non-AS daughter. Most likely part of the "Broader Autism Phenotype" (some traits).
CockneyRebel
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Joined: 17 Jul 2004
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i went ahead and disabled it, just as soon as i figured out what my password was! most of the friends she added were people i actually knew, to be fair. I'm 19, and I have told her that i think i have aspergers, she wont believe it, i have no diagnosis. she is kind of crazy, lets just say she isnt much like other parents i have seen or been around. i hate to disrespect my mother, but she acts like a total b***h and its apparent to anyone that's ever been around her, people comment about it.
I understand she wants something back for her efforts as a mother, but she is constantly complaining about me not ever giving her anything to enjoy, or that i am a disappointment, its just rude imo. for example, she wants me to do sports, have a girlfriend, make more friends, get a job ect... and when i don't she complains how hard it is on her.
I think it is time to have a heart to heart talk with your mom about Asperger's. If she really wants to get closer to you ,then she needs to understand where you are coming from. From a mom's point of view, yes it is hard at times to accept that my son is different, but I still love him unconditionally. I just want him to be happy. I don't care what other people think about what he should be doing.
leejosepho
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Joined: 14 Sep 2009
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Posts: 9,011
Location: 200 miles south of Little Rock
Kudos to you, DW.
It is not really that she wants something *back*, but just that she wants *something*. Understand? It is not that you really "owe" her anything, but just that she is a human being who also has needs just like you or me or anyone else. So, the challenge here is for you to find your own willingness to *freely* give to her whatever you truly can in consideration of the simple fact ...
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I began looking for someone like me when I was five ...
My search ended at 59 ... right here on WrongPlanet.
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Hmmm - I don't know that I want anything back for my efforts other than my son being the best he's able to be. I am guessing that your mother just doesn't understand, and maybe has some old-fashioned ideas about what it means to be different.
My own parents, both of whom must be on the spectrum and refuse to discuss differences, are absolutely not accepting of me and my choices (keeping in mind, none of my choices are unusual in any way; I'm a housewife and like it) it has lead to a very difficult relationship, but I've come to realize that it is now my job to set boundaries and decide what is and is not acceptable in our relationship.