Dear Blair,
An open letter to Blair from STFU Parents,
Blair,
I will respond to your comment since you attacked me for not responding. Then, please move on because I won’t give you anymore publicity.
Blair: Wow, you are so completely wrong about me. Did you actually do ANY research before you wrote this?
Me:Yes, I at the library now. Just went through the seven minute segment on the Today show. Pulling up microfiches of all your old posts. Blair, I wrote my opinion of your point of view. I find it to be vapid and vacuous of any sense or experience.
We get it. Some parents go overboard. You have a blog. You point it out. Don’t get all soft when people point out that it’s shallow and silly.
Next Slide.
BlairDid you read my site and watch my clips on Ricki Lake and The Today Show?
MeIf I had a nickel for every time someone established their credibility with “have you even watched my Ricki Lake clips” I would have… a nickel.
Blair:I love children, and at least half (if not more) of my “likes” and comments on Facebook are on my friends’ kids’ pictures or updates about their kids.
Me:Now Facebook liking is the barometer for judging a person’s point of view. Lookout, don’t tell the people at Bailey’s that I liked them only to get a buy one get one free coupon. Liking a Facebook photo is an absurd way to judge who you are.
Imagine if life worked like a facebook like.
Daughter in-law. Like
Cancer. Dislike
Jesus. Like
Firemen. Like
Sore throats and bug bites. Dislike
What does that prove? Eharmony has a more scientific system to determine personality through buttons. Facebook, not so much.
Bliar:
I write about OVERshare – like posting pictures of your C-section, your child’s diaper blowout, or complaining that the UPS man woke up your baby and you want to shoot him in the face. I don’t mind seeing pictures of my friends’ kids in my newsfeed; I actually anticipate them with joy.
Me:I wish you luck on your book coming out in 2013. Really. I do.
Obviously, you have a shtick. And as a parent, I think its stupid. I have the right to express my taste, you have the right to wear a Popeye tattoo on your arm. (Go Army, beat Navy… combat military wife, I am allowed)
Blair:You should go back and do some reading. All of that information can be found on my site in the About section, the FAQs, or just by reading my commentary. Unless you just prefer to complain with inaccuracy.
Me:Okay. Got me there. Usually if you need someone to do volumes of survey research on who you are as a person, the thing you have said or are saying probably were at best clumsy and at worse… stupid.
I said, you are not a mother. Check
I said, you may be a party girl. Check
I said, you have no idea what you are talking about. Check
I said, if you don’t want to see a c-section scar on a website, don’t look. Check
I also said, that you will meet a person someday soon and may decide to have a baby. At that moment you will love something so much more than yourself. You would literally die to bring it life. When they cry, you crumble. When they laugh, you want to empty your bank account.
And when they take a monster shit, you may, lost in the love you feel for that little one, want to post it on facebook. Who knows?
Then you will look back at this whole episode and realize how silly you sound now. Trust me, kiddo. We all go through it.
I hope you find that happiness someday. I really do.
I did not say, thank you btw. Thank you for reminding me that not only was RIcki Lake alive and well, but that she had a television show.
I always loved her.
9 Comments
Dee
Jealous much? Dislike the blog, but don’t lie about how she gets submissions. You truly sound bitter.
hannah
WHo is lying?
This was a funny response. I thought it was handled well and in humor.
Dee, (my sister is named Dee. She has lupus) its all good.
I love this discussion.
Dad and Buried
I get where you’re coming from, but I fundamentally disagree with this post.
I don’t think the issue here is that she doesn’t have kids; her blog could just as easily be about the over-sharing of political opinions or religious views. It’s primarily about the eroding of boundaries and the lack of tact many people have in this age of social media.
She just so happened to choose parents, because parents happen to DOMINATE Facebook. It makes sense.
Before I started my blog, and before I had a kid, I railed at the friends who were constantly sending me photos of their (essentially identical) babies. And who, in the blinding joy of parenthood, seemed to have lost all sense of perspective, all awareness of other people, and all memory of their previous pre-child lives.
I started my blog partially as a way to get away with the hypocrisy of suddenly experiencing that blinding joy, but also to help temper my worst tendencies when it comes to talking about my kid. I haven’t changed my tune towards parents and their behavior, despite totally loving my son. It CAN be done. At the very least it should be ATTEMPTED. And the parents she pokes fun at don’t seem to be trying in the slightest.
I was a jerk to many parents before I had my son, and I’m a jerk to many parents now. Because many parents are jerks themselves. Being a parent and hating the way many parents act are not mutually exclusive, so I don’t think she will end up eating her words or getting her “comeuppance” should she have a child. In fact, I think she’ll be a better person, and parent, if she DOESN’T succumb to the worst aspects of parenting that loving your child often provokes.
I do love this discussion though! As I wrote on my blog, I deal/struggle with many of these same issues.
http://www.dadandburied.com
Stephanie
Blair has way too much time on her hands and its a good thing the psycho doesn’t have kids!!
Cy
Wow. If somebody’s a “psycho” just for poking some fun at gratuitous images of infant fecal matter, then the whole world must just be one big insane asylum.
B. from STFU, Parents
Wow. You are SO crazy. I cannot believe you wrote this. I am not a party girl. You don’t know ANYTHING about me. I am actually a workaholic, and my boyfriend and I have been very happily dating for 10 years. You truly are insane for writing this. I can’t believe you are so comfortable talking about someone you don’t know as if you knew me. I don’t do that on my blog. I talk about what is presented, period. I don’t pretend to know anything about the person. I also don’t accuse people of being “drunks,” or “not being happy.” You’re just so rude, it’s beyond comprehension.
Betsy
Seriously? Clearly you don’t see the HUMOR in her site. She’s not mean, she’s funny. She’s saying out loud what 90% of the people on Facebook are thinking. If you have such a huge problem with it, just don’t visit the website. It’s the same logic you suggest for c-section scars. Except c-section scars are a little harder to avoid when you’re scrolling through Facebook on your lunch break.
Kiwipants
This just reeks of jealousy and bitterness. STFU Parents is about the OVERSHARING parents do. 10 years ago before Facebook existed we wouldn’t get pictures of our kids’ poops developed and pin them on our office cubicle to show to our co-workers, right? So why is it necessary on Facebook? I recently had to hide the posts of one of my best friends because she got married a year ago and ALL her updates are about her husband, what they’re doing, how much she loves him etc. So it’s not just parents that do this. If you think it’s acceptable to post human waste on a social networking site, then yes, you are right when you say Facebook liking is the barometer for peoples’ points of view. What a hypocrite.
To think you went to the library to research this girl and the work she has done, only to come out and say she “MAY” be a party girl, is two stops short of Asylum Town on the cuckoo train.
Bethy
Have you read the stfu sight? I am a new mother who is completely obsessed and over joyed with love for my son but I would never post on Facebook the crazy crap that the parents she poked fun at do.
Kids or no kids I don’t want to know about your kids poop and I guarantee I want tell you about my kids. Also stfu is on to something… She says the things many of us can’t say to our over sharing friends.
I read a post on stfu where a mother wrote that it was a slap in the face to invite her to something and not her child… I think it’s a slap in the face that I have to exist in the same world as such a stupid individual!
So if you have a problem with stfu then quit reading her blog…problem solved genius