I Do Not Want My Daughter to Be ‘Nice’

[dana_b]

I really like this article and probably because it is very close to how my daughter and I act so differently. I grew up as the "nice girl with the big smile" even though there were times I wanted to tell people to f-off. My daughter is NOT like that at all. She doesn't smile indiscriminately nor does she put up with people she does not care for.

I remember when she was only 6 y.o. and we were waiting in line at the pharmacy. There was an older woman behind us who kept telling her that she needed to smile because she was such a "pretty girl". My daughter looked at me like "wtf?" and it wasn't until this woman started getting a little more pushy about my daughter smiling (she even grabbed my daughter by the shoulder) that I spoke up and asked her to please let it go. I regret not telling the woman to mind her own business in a more direct and less kind way. This woman was pushy and frankly rude. There was no reason for my kid to smile if she didn't feel like it and I was so programmed from my own childhood that I didn't take a stronger stance. Now, however, I have changed. It's not that I'm not a good person or that I can't be nice, it's that I don't feel that I have to be nice to everyone even at my own expense or when I really don't feel like it. I have to say that my daughter has been a bigger influence on me in this way than I have been on her.


I Do Not Want My Daughter to Be ‘Nice’
By CATHERINE NEWMAN

My 10-year-old daughter, Birdy, is not nice, not exactly. She is deeply kind, profoundly compassionate and, probably, the most ethical person I know — but she will not smile at you unless either she is genuinely glad to see you or you’re telling her a joke that has something scatological for a punch line.

This makes her different from me. Sure, I spent the first half of the ’90s wearing a thrifted suede jacket that I had accessorized with a neon-green sticker across the back, expressing a somewhat negative attitude regarding the patriarchy (let’s just say it’s unprintable here). But even then, I smiled at everyone. Because I wanted everyone to like me. Everyone!

I am a radical, card-carrying feminist, and still I put out smiles indiscriminately, hoping to please not only friends and family but also my son’s orthodontist, the barista who rolls his eyes while I fumble apologetically through my wallet, and the ex-boyfriend who cheated on me. If I had all that energy back — all the hours and neurochemicals and facial musculature I have expended in my wanton pursuit of likedness — I could propel myself to Mars and back. Or, at the very least, write the book “Mars and Back: Gendered Constraints and Wasted Smiling.”


http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/31/i-do-not-want-my-daughter-to-be-nice/?smid=fb-share&_r=0

[libodem]

1. Absolutely

I really like this. We were programed in the 60' s to be nice, compliant, submissive, and demure. It makes you a doormat for abuse. I like the idea of forming a foundation on competence and good self esteem.

I was talking to a girlfriend on the phone this weekend and she told me about her first day of Catholic school. The nun started right in about heaven and Hell and they were all instructed to get out of their seats and kneel on the floor by their desks, have their hands folded in prayer, heads down, and not to look up, when the priest entered the class room. The indoctrination into submitting to male dominance and authority started very early for a lot of us from that era.


I'm glad the mom in this story is helping make it different.

[Common Sense Party]

2. I don't want my daughters to be 'nice.' I want them to be nice.

I want my son to be nice as well, not 'nice.'

The world needs MORE nice, not less.

We need more smiles, not fewer.

We need MORE kindness, not less.

[dana_b]

3. oh, I agree

I want that niceness to be genuine, not forced

I want my daughter to WANT to be kind, not kind because it's what is expected of her

smiles are a great thing - when someone is not hiding behind them

[DevonRex]

4. I'm one of the nice ones. It makes me happy.

Yeah, I was raised to be that way. But it's also just me. I left almost everything behind from how I was raised - racism, fundamentalism, politics, left the South. But not that. I still enjoy smiling and seeing someone smile back. Helping someone who dropped their packages because they don't look like they can bend down.

As a woman who was in the military and law enforcement, I learned that the quality of my work got me where I wanted to go. Yes, it had to be better than everyone else's. I made sure it was.

As far as adversaries go, it's always better to be underestimated. If a coworker saw me as a sweet girl who couldn't possibly compete for that promotion, he was a fool. I never competed with another woman. There weren't any.

The same thing applies to physical confrontations. Women are always underestimated because of size. And if they're pretty for some reason. That's good. I used it to my advantage.

What I'm saying is that I didn't have to change who I was. I just had to make who I was work for me and for the careers I chose. I like people who are different from me. I just can't be them and they can't be like me.