“Kids That Suck Have Parents That Suck” — Mom Defends Daughter Bullying Classmate’s T.J. Maxx Clothes

At what age do you just let your kids work out their own problems with each other? Do you force them to problem-solve and fight their own battles from the get-go?

Obviously, if your kid is being a bully or engaging in behavior you don't want them to exhibit, then you correct the way that they're acting.

But it seems like there's one mom who thinks that these two phenomena aren't mutually exclusive. In a recent social media post that's received over 2,000 upvotes on Reddit's r/S---MomGroupsSay sub, this mother believes that a girl bullied by her daughter for wearing TJ Maxx should basically "suck it up buttercup."

A lot of Redditors said that the woman may have involuntarily outed herself online as somewhat of a bully herself. That's because her exhortation about kids needing to fend for themselves and solve their own problems seem to be rooted in her own attitudes towards the type of clothing folks can afford or choose to wear.

The mom writes in the post: "So, I recently had an 'interesting' encounter at a school function. Another mom approached me and let me know that her daughter has been 'bullied' by my daughter."

Right out the gate, it seems that the mom in question wasn't really taking the bullying or accusations all that seriously since she placed quotation marks over these key words.

The mom continued, "She seemed pretty worked up about it, but honestly, they're in 11th grade. Shouldn't they be working this out themselves? I mean, at this point, they're practically adults."

She went on, "If her daughter doesn't like something someone says now, what's going to happen when she's at work? Is her mom going to show up there too?"

While there may be a lot of folks who can understand this sentiment, it was the next part of the post that got Redditors judging mom hardcore.

"And let's be real for a second — if you send your kid to school in T.J. Maxx clothes with no care for her appearance, you can't expect her to be treated like a queen. I'm not saying my daughter's behavior is perfect, but I think there's a bigger picture here. You've got to teach kids how to handle the real world, not shelter them from every hard conversation."

It would seem that the hard conversation in question is this mom and her daughter being sat down and told that they need to learn how to clap back at people making fun of them for wearing clothes purchased at T.J. Maxx. Because if they do shop at T.J. Maxx, someone making fun of them for the clothes they're wearing is a scenario they need to prepare themselves for.

She capped off her message by writing: "Anyway, just my two cents. Maybe we need to stop hovering and let these girls grow up, because no one's showing up to 'fight their battles' when they're 25 and out in the real world."

Several folks who responded to the Redditor's post said that this was a prime example of kids being ruined by their parents' child-rearing style. "Parenting has taught me that a lot of kids that suck have parents that suck, too," one said.

Another person echoed this sentiment, and shared their own anecdotal experiences with the matter: "As soon as my mom met the father of my middle school bully she knew exactly why his daughter had turned out like that."

Whereas someone else thinks this is just a classic case of a parent being too lazy to teach their children not to be scummy: "Mom doesn’t want to parent because it’s too hard. Once your kid is a junior, if you haven’t parented or put effort in your kid isn’t going to listen to you. It’s easier to say “they are in 11th grade” than actually teach your kid not to be a jerk."

Seeing other comments penned by other users on the app seems to solidify just how big of an issue bad parents have become: "I can’t stand these parents who don’t parent. I was at my kid's open house and one parent asked the teacher to tell her son that he needs to do his homework when he gets home because he doesn’t listen to her or her husband. Our kids are in 1st grade. If you can’t handle him now, what are you gonna do when he’s a teen? Also her kid has been a bully since preschool, he’s a real jerk who since the first day of preschool has pushed my daughter down on the first day of school. He now calls it their tradition. I told my daughter next year she has to push him down before he pushes her. He also thinks it’s funny to trip the kid with a broken leg."

Others just thought that this was a clear cut and sad case of a woman who never got past her teenage yearsd. "Mom pretty clearly peaked in high school and never moved on."