You’re Too Old To Be A Mean Girl

This past weekend, I got together with some really good friends for a girls night in. We had just come back from a wedding and we were all dolled up, but we just felt the need for girl talk, libations, and laughs. Somehow we got on a very heavy topic and the mention of Basketball Wives came up. As I sat there listening to my friends talk about different characters and the different situations that had occurred on the show, I had one question. How did anyone think this would be a good show to start? The show is about how mainly black women degrade each other, fight on television, lie on each other, cheat, and a slew of other messiness. Okay, every blue moon something positive happens, but for the majority is was all madness. What was the point of the show?

It’s hard to tell our teenage girls to be sweet when we have shows like Basketball Wives, Real Housewives, and Love & Hip Hop. It seems like the very thing we would teach them to make something of themselves would be undermined in the hour long shows. How can we say make friends if the shows are about be conniving? Even better, how can a woman teach her children to be great if she is the epitome of a mean girl? You know the ones who always have an attitude, always have something negative to say, and rolling their necks. The ones we try to avoid! And it’s not that we avoid them because we’re afraid, it’s because we simply don’t like all of that drama. It makes me wonder at what point do mean women realize they are too old to be behaving that way.

It was one thing to be a mean girl in middle school or high school. Our hormones were changing and everyone wanted to be this and that. It’s another thing if a woman is STILL acting the same way she did in 10th grade. When will she stop the full on attitude with any and everybody? Always ready to fight, needing to get bailed out of jail, always getting fired, always quitting when they don’t get their way. It’s just childish! The scary part is that a lot of these people are inadvertently raising their children to be the same way. Now we have to try not to slap little Susie because she acts just like her stank attitude mama! And heaven forbid these mean women get a leadership role in the professional field. The whole work flow is off and stress levels are through the roof.

The bad thing about mean girls turned mean women is that you can’t tell them nothing. They attribute it to others being weak or punks. They never understand that people actually avoid them because of the frustration they cause. If you do try to have that conversation with them, they either dismiss it or try to get confrontational. It’s a catch 22! I would never say that people can’t and won’t change, but I do believe it can be hard when no one tells a person they need to change. It’s a hard cookie to swallow if you’re reading this and YOU are indeed the mean woman. I think we just need to take a quick assessment of our actions and how people usually respond to us. Are you a mean woman? If you answered quickly, go back and ask yourself again. Be Sweet.