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Eurgh.
I love my dad - he is generally a cool dude - but he, like all people has blind spots where he does uncool things. And tonight, I made a remark about how he reacts differently to women being emotional on the news than he does to dudes who are being emotional. (I have several times heard him tell a woman speaking passionately about something on a news program to "calm down." I have never heard him say this to a man. I'm willing to believe that maybe he does sometimes, but he never has in my hearing.)
This unleashed an absolute storm of "How dare you accuse me of being sexist" bad feeling from my dad. I tried to explain that hey, I absolutely don't think you're a bad person - I just think that sometimes you do stuff that isn't great (just like I sometimes do things that aren't great), and yeah, it sucks when someone points that out but maybe yelling at me that you never want to hear me say anything like that again is not a productive reaction.
So now I have retreated to my room and he is out in his workshop and we are not talking.
The worst thing is that I have an almost overwhelming urge to apologize. I should have phrased things better, I should have used a different tone, I should have explained more, I should have chosen to let it slide the way that I have all the other times he's done or said something mildly sexist because I could have predicted that it would end like this. And that's all bullshit, obviously, but I've been taught all my life that it is my position to apologize to my parents and not theirs to apologize to me. (And also the anxious people pleaser "someone is upset and I have to fix it or terrible things will happen!" thing, but that's a separate issue.)
I apologized to my mom for her having to put up with both of us instead, to allay that urge. I am not going to apologize to dad, because I haven't done anything wrong, and I doubt he will apologize to me for yelling at me as though I'm a child. So this weekend is probably going to be a little tense.
Weirdly, I don't feel emotional right now. I tend to get angry or upset easily in confrontation, so the fact that I am actually feeling "I'm not mad, I'm just disappointed" right now is something of a surprise.
I love my dad - he is generally a cool dude - but he, like all people has blind spots where he does uncool things. And tonight, I made a remark about how he reacts differently to women being emotional on the news than he does to dudes who are being emotional. (I have several times heard him tell a woman speaking passionately about something on a news program to "calm down." I have never heard him say this to a man. I'm willing to believe that maybe he does sometimes, but he never has in my hearing.)
This unleashed an absolute storm of "How dare you accuse me of being sexist" bad feeling from my dad. I tried to explain that hey, I absolutely don't think you're a bad person - I just think that sometimes you do stuff that isn't great (just like I sometimes do things that aren't great), and yeah, it sucks when someone points that out but maybe yelling at me that you never want to hear me say anything like that again is not a productive reaction.
So now I have retreated to my room and he is out in his workshop and we are not talking.
The worst thing is that I have an almost overwhelming urge to apologize. I should have phrased things better, I should have used a different tone, I should have explained more, I should have chosen to let it slide the way that I have all the other times he's done or said something mildly sexist because I could have predicted that it would end like this. And that's all bullshit, obviously, but I've been taught all my life that it is my position to apologize to my parents and not theirs to apologize to me. (And also the anxious people pleaser "someone is upset and I have to fix it or terrible things will happen!" thing, but that's a separate issue.)
I apologized to my mom for her having to put up with both of us instead, to allay that urge. I am not going to apologize to dad, because I haven't done anything wrong, and I doubt he will apologize to me for yelling at me as though I'm a child. So this weekend is probably going to be a little tense.
Weirdly, I don't feel emotional right now. I tend to get angry or upset easily in confrontation, so the fact that I am actually feeling "I'm not mad, I'm just disappointed" right now is something of a surprise.