This 60 Minutes segment on Italian mammoni is from a few years ago, but they were hyping it on Yahoo! on Mother's Day and it is still very relevant. A classic!

Fixed link.

Michelle

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Gil,

Great link. My favourite mammoni was the one who sent his laundry on a 6hr bus ride home to his mother. ha ha ha

Darn, the volume is not working
I like the part of 'where are they now', where it says, '...is now 38 and still unmarried. He lives in his own apartment, but often visits mama. She asked "60 Minutes" to please persuade him to get married.'

Hilarious! And let that be a warning to all of us mamas and future mamas.

I also read about this in the Guardian newspaper.
Wow!Takes mamas boy to a whole new level!LOL

I can say my hubby is not that way at all!
His mama did an excellent job with all 7 children and the boys are in no doubt that they have to pull their weight around the home!
I have two boys myself and they are also learning from a young age!

ha. I remember seeing that segment.

I don't think it's big deal to live at home, esp. in this economy (in most non anglo cultures there isn't this big push to get you out at 18) but you shouldn't expect your mom to do everything.

Where are these Mammoni anyway? Are they not in Rome? I don't know a single one. Is this more of a Southern Italy thing?

My brother in law is one, and he admits it. My MIL also admits that she raised her kids like that and while she knows that it is not good, she likes it like this.
And we are in the north, so it is not just a southern thing.

I know a few here in Rome. I think they're all over the place. Weren't those guys on the 60 minutes show from the North?

I don't think the mums are doing those guys a service by making all those "sacrifici". Most young Italian women wouldn't put up with it from what I've seen.

I think that most of the younger generation would only put up with so much of it. I had mentioned one time to an italian friend of mine about a conversation that DH and I had had the other day about putting clothes away. After doing laundry, I had put away his socks in the wrong drawer and he jokingly got on my case about it (as a joke tho), and I had replied that he was lucky that I put them away at all since I was his wife and not his mother (also said as a joke). My friend looked at me however as if I was insane that I did not put away his clothes and look after his every need. I do look after DH, he is my husband. However he is also an adult who can put away his own clothes.

Whoah - that's scary, di. I hope this woman doesn't work full time as well. Sounds like she's continuing the mammone tradition at least in her household.

What gets me is when a group of women get together to whinge about their husbands and how they're useless and don't do anything around the house. If they don't like it why did they marry the guy? And why do they stay with someone that selfish? It almost seems like they enjoy the complaining. And if I say something like "my husband does more than his share of housework" then they're all going to hate me so I keep my mouth shut.

Oh and now that I'm about to have a baby a whole lot of women have come out of the woodwork to say how many "sacrifici" I'm going to make for my child. They always make a big sigh when they say this. In fact this seems to be a major topic of conversation for the women in my childbirth class, the majority of whom went on early maternity leave without (it appears) a valid medical reason.

I realise that when you have kids you get less sleep, have less time and have less money - but I really wanted a child and see them as a blessing.

I keep wondering if the mammone phenomenon has something to do with it. If you plan to still clean up after your "kid", do his washing and ironing, financially support him when he's 18 or 30 or 45 then maybe the task of childrearing can seem like a never ending sacrifice.

I think that she (my MIL) is happy with the way things are, and would love it if DH and I would let her do more for us. As it is she takes my son (just learning to run and is hell on wheels from 7am til 9pm) once a week for 3 or 4 hours, takes me grocery shopping once during the week, and washes some of our clothes for us(big problem with our washer). For me, this is WAY too much, but for her it is not enough. However she does understand that I have a hard time with it and she knows that I need for us to be more independent and that I expect DH to be the one to help out with raising our son and not her.

I still remember her face when I informed her that DH WOULD be changing diapers as well... it was something like this:
HA HA HA

Davide was cute!

I think these mothers are lovely and I know my mom would allow me (I'm a girl, though) to stay home for as long as I wished, HOWEVER I still am American and find this practice a bit weird! Especially the part about having another home and not living in it!

quote:

What gets me is when a group of women get together to whinge about their husbands and how they're useless and don't do anything around the house. If they don't like it why did they marry the guy? And why do they stay with someone that selfish?

Spot on.

Any Italian girl/woman willing to give an answer?

I think some sociologist should develop some mammone scale... like 10 being the most extreme and 1 being like the "recovered mammone". I must be honest though, many of the unmarried or uncommitted women I know mimic the same type of needy, infantile and dependent behavior with their mothers. I totally agree with the comment about wives whining about husbands that never do anything when they married them in that condition! At the same time, men are still fully responsible for not adapting to married life and pitching in, especially if there are kids to take care of on top of the rest of the housework, bills, etc...