By Billy Gray
My husband spent New Year's Eve with underage prostitutes in Bangkok. At least, that's what hundreds of women told me he'd do when I announced his plans for a spontaneous Thai golf vacation on the YouBeMom message boards. "Yeah, he's going to eff young girls. So sorry," one compassionate poster told me. "I would divorce," opined another. There was gynecological advice: "For your sake, do not have sex with him when he returns. VERY dangerous."
Noted, except I don't have a husband. Nor was I ever a Park Avenue mother moving to Park Slope who asked if it was safe to drink Brooklyn tap water. Nor did my three water births produce a brood of indigo children. I'm a childless twenty-five-year-old man. And I'm a YouBeMom addict.
YouBeMom is a parenting message board. It spun off of UrbanBaby, a similar site that underwent a disastrous
design change last year. I discovered UrbanBaby two years
ago during a spell of unemployment. I can't say what initially
drew me in. It was interactive. It was utterly anonymous — no
screen names, no avatars, nothing. It moved quicker than any
website I'd seen. A schizophrenic's dream — Choose Your
Own Misadventure — the threads veered from one ridiculous
topic to another:
"Yes, I'd like to throttle Ayelet Waldman
too!"
"Hard to find formula in Turks and
Caiqos???"
"So is Anderson Cooper gay or WHAT?"
The more I read, the more transfixed I became. YouBeMom, like a
Tolkien novel, creates and sucks you into its own unique cosmos.
There is a lexicon to master. Your husband is your DH
("Darling Husband," as per the site's essential
glossary). The same pleasant descriptor applies to your darling son
("DS") and daughter ("DD"), but not, tellingly,
to your mother-in-law (plain old "MIL" if you're
forced to bring her up in an exasperated rant).
YBM'ers agree on a shorthand language and little
else.YBM'ers agree on a shorthand language and
little else. It's tough to choose the most contentious topic.
Clashes rage between stay-at-home moms (SAHMs) and
work-out-of-the-home moms (WOHMs); moms who exclusively breastfeed
(EBF) and formula feeders (FF); those who let their children cry it
out (CIO) and the others who succumb to the screeching. Every
subject is a battlefield. You think couscous is a grain?
"LISTEN b---- , IT'S A PASTA."
Not to mention the anxiety stemming from squabbles among the
site's inner-circle. The Old Guard complains that YBM has been
diluted, its witty, New York-centric charm befouled by flyover
country dolts who endorse French manicures and offer tater tot
casserole recipes. They give their children Wal-Mart names
(Hayden/Kayden/Jayden) and recommend Nicolas Sparks books for
something other than kindling.
Current events occasionally intrude on YBM's Bugaboo fisticuffs
and meta-battles. During the 2008 presidential primaries, an
alleged Hillary Clinton supporter known as Curb Mom (she'd been
"ahead of the curb" in supporting her gal) terrorized the
boards. Her posts were later attributed to conservative New
York Post columnist John Podhoretz. (He was also blamed for
Anti-Muslim Mom's hateful rants.)
Wall Street's implosion last fall widened the debt-ridden gap
between affluent moms and Bitter Poor Persons (BPPs), a rift
exposed all too often during the boards incessant household income
(HHI) polls. Nowadays, any perceived declaration of affluence
("Ugh, my nannies are fighting again"; "My
engagement ring is too big, hate it") is met with the dreaded
mark of the Veiled Brag Alert (VBA).
Read more here.
