Ask Lemmy

No.

I'd say your mom has zero value offered to my life; therefore, while my value to her is zero, the reverse is also true so I don't have to care what she thinks.

Obviously, it's different for you.

I would share a story I often share with people who have to deal with difficult people. It's a parable, so it doesn't have to be true to make its point. You can dress up the story however much you want, but the essence of it is "I was walking with my father out of the grocery store when a homeless man asked him for money. My father gave him $20 (or whatever local currency is a couple hours' wage, buys a couple meals, or a big bottle of cheap booze) and I said, 'Dad, you know he's just going to use that to buy drugs or alcohol, right?' and he said to me, 'Well son, that says more about him than it does about me.'" We do what we do because of who we are, not because of who someone else is (to say that $20 would have gone better to a battered women's shelter or something like that). In this case the father just wanted to help somebody. So to apply that to your mom, I would say those people who don't have value to her don't need her approval to go on living. They're going to do what they do because of who they are, and who she is determines what she will do. If that makes any sense.

As for the depression thing, well, that's just incorrect. It's like saying any disease or illness is an excuse for something or representative of a certain group of people. It's as unreasonable and lazy-minded as calling AIDS "the gay cancer." Because yes, there is some correlation there (that is to say, AIDS can be transmitted through unsafe sex, and in the 1980s, when that slogan was popular, the gay culture was very promiscuous; likewise, depression does seem to present as laziness, to the untrained observer), but it's not a very educated thing to say and only makes the person look mean, and/or uneducated.

So for a "quick & dirty" answer, I would tell her that expressing those opinions in public could make her look bad. If you come from a conservative Asian background (assuming from the username — apologies if I'm wrong) you could also add that it brings shame to you and others, and in either case remind her that sometimes it is better to be assumed a fool than to speak and remove all doubt. Despite this long message, which I tried to make well-thought out and cover all bases, IRL I don't speak much. We open ourselves to criticism and doubt when we speak, so I listen, and observe, choose my words carefully. ;)

"Fuck you mom!"

Then walk out and never speak to her again.

Sounds a lot like "how you feel doesn't matter, your right to exist depends on being useful to me."

Which calls for acquiring leverage and using it to set boundaries, more than it calls for a rational rebuttal. Just gotta systematically remove the power such people have over you, and then they won't be able to talk to you that way anymore.

Nazi.

One word is enough.

She is obviously mentally ill. She lacks the ability to empathize with others so she very well may be a psychopath or have a cluster b personality disorder. My advice is that she should see a therapist and if she doesn’t you should minimize contact or cut her off because she’s obviously very toxic

Ask whose values and why others should adhere to them?

Have you ever tried to coordinate 5 people to do something well? Do you know how hard that is? And you think thousands of well educated professionals, all over the world, are somehow working together to confabulate lies like "depression" just to justify laziness?

That would be my argument.

What does value mean and how do we get value? It seems more like she's saying that she doesn't value some people, and that we should have the same values as her.

But she doesn't get to determine value, the whole community collectively assigns value. We've all hade times in our life where we were less and more productive to give up on someone during a low point isn't just laughably evil but also a bad investment.

It costs basically nothing to be nice to someone and that could turn around their depression (there's tons of anecdotal examples of this).

Are there any people or things that are valuable to your mother solely because they bring joy? Are friendships purely transactional, are you supposed to win friendships and extract more joy than the other party? Dunno just feels like she hasn't thought very deeply about this.

Don't take the bait of arguing with them through this batshit rhetorical frame that they are presenting. Stay focused on what it is that you want to say.

Have you seen a therapist?

Don't worry about it. You'll save a ton of cash later, if you catch my drift.

Define "value".

By the way your mom describes depression, it’s obvious she doesn’t understand what it actually is. She likely thinks depressed people simply sleep all day and feel sad. I would start by asking her to define the terms she’s using, have her define depression and value, then ask what she believes laziness means. The way she frames this suggests she’s repeating something she heard rather than expressing a considered worldview. It probably isn’t her own position; she’s just agreeing with it. Ask her what she actually believes, assuming she has a coherent position at all. Finally, close the discussion by asking whether she has actually read the Bible from front to back. That question usually ends the conversation.

Can't ban chemtrails but you can reduce contrails which play a weirdly large part in warming up the planet irrespective of fuel consumed.

Just putting the word out for an underrated climate thingy.

Your mom is clearly part of The Organization.

Value is a loaded term here.

If, as I assume, she means "economic" value — in a twisted, Judeo-Christian, colonialist, capitalist, explotative system — then, sure, value is assigned to money and only the top 0.001% of earners "have value". Bully to the 99.999% of people on Earth who spend their lives delivering that value to the top. I hazard the guess your mom is one of those people.

Also, loaded into that term, if she has among her moral values those the western, chauvinistic, Biblical moral set, I might be inclined to question whether she lives up to her own values of charity, humility, and acceptance.

What everyone has is an "intrinsic" value; a unique set of experiences and gifts that has never existed before in the universe and never will again. We are here to delight in each other's presence and potential. This doesn't do much for the bottom line... until it does.

Collaboration on shared goals, building sustainable practices, and ensuring plenty for all are among humanity's highest intrinsic, economic, and moral functions. Previously, I said that the values system your mom probably considers correct is twisted; that's because in this system the highest functions are immense power, immediate profit, and absolute exploitation. These are ignored or invisible to most.

Your mom's blindness and/or ignorance is what makes her tragically wrong.

I'm sorry your parents were so hard on you, it wasn't your fault and didn't deserve it.

I would read up on Albert Ellis' , concept of Acceptance, both for your own schema, and for dealing with your mother.

Undertanding and working on your acceptances can be life changing.

BTW, Ellis is a hugely influential psychologist, one of the founders of behavioral cognitive therapies, so no new age pop psychology here.

Your mom doesn't have enough value worth your time. You don't change hearts and minds like these. These kinds of people don't change until shit personally affects them, because your mom is an asshole.

She's probably an idiot and subscribes to Netflix.