Mom has a message for fellow parents after daughter was bullied over Stanley cup knock-off

Stanley cup madness hit an absolute fever pitch last week when a limited-edition winter pink Starbucks version went on sale at Target, causing chaos at stores nationwide. And while the trendy tumbler has been all over TikTok feeds and tween/teen wish lists for a while, it seems kids are now actually being bullied for not having one, as one mom on TikTok explained.

Dayna Motycka purchased a (quite adorable) colorful cheetah print insulated tumbler from Walmart as a Christmas gift for her 9-year-old daughter. On the second day back from winter break, Motycka shares that her daughter came home “upset” after girls in her grade “made sure to let her know” that she wasn’t carrying a “real” Stanley cup, and that hers was “fake” and “not as cool.”

In an effort to help their daughter “fit in” and prevent her from getting made fun of, Motycka and her husband ended up purchasing a Stanley for her, sharing the inherent privilege required for them to even buy such a pricey, hot-ticket item. She’s also got a message for parents who aren’t nipping this bullying behavior in the bud beforehand.

“Do I think that a nine-year-old needs a Stanley? No. Do I have one? Yes, I have one,” she says. “I don’t have 50 Stanleys in all different colors. I’m not going to Target and fighting other women or moms to try and get the new Valentine’s Day Stanley. I have one.”

“Can we afford to buy her a Stanley? Yes. Did I think that she needed one? No,” she continues. “Apparently I’ve been proven wrong by the children in our school that are making fun of her for not having a real name-brand Stanley. But this doesn’t start with the kids. This starts with us. This starts with parents — with moms. What are we teaching our kids? You better believe that if our nine-year-old daughter came home and somehow we found out that she made fun of another girl at school for not having something name-brand, whether it’s a Stanley, Lululemon, Uggs, etc. We would be calling the family. We would be making her write a note to apologize. We would make her apologize in person because that’s not what we do in this household. And that’s what we need to be teaching our kids.”

Motycka explains that she grew up without “name-brand things,” and she was similarly bullied for it, recalling when her mom found her a Limited Too bathing suit at Goodwill. “I felt so good to have that name-brand clothing,” she says. “I know now as an adult that that shouldn’t have meant something. But it did, because it made me feel like I fit in.”

Acknowledging that she might be judged by fellow parents for buying the name-brand Stanley cup to help her daughter fit in, she hopes other parents can hammer home the message that material items say nothing about your value or worth, especially since not all parents can afford to buy them.

“We have got to teach our kids to not make other kids feel inferior for not having the things that they have. That’s it. That’s where it starts and it starts with us as parents,” she concluded.

Other parents shared their own experiences growing up without “cool” name-brand items like Ugg boots and Coach bags, or Aeropostale clothes instead of Abercrombie clothes. Plenty agreed with Motycka’s take, with one person noting that “these moments are so teachable,” adding, “for example, discussing bullying, being a role model to others, materialism, and sustainability. It’s okay to not ‘fit in.’” Another said: “Teach your children to be kind but to also be confident in themselves to not have the ‘things’ to fit in.”

Being bullied over a silly cup is genuinely heartbreaking, so here’s hoping parents can remind their kids that they are so much more important than whatever labels are on the items they own (or don’t own). 

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