My wife and I went to my sister’s house today to visit our niblings, aged 6-16. We can’t have kids, and we adore these children, and they love us to bits.
My sister and her husband are Mormon, but I haven’t gone to church in years. The kids all attend church except for the 16yo boy, who has renounced the faith and doesn’t go anymore, much to their chagrin. You see, their Dad used to be the bishop (spiritual leader of the congregation). So they would see this as a kind of failure.
Mormons have a lot of rules. One of them is that they’re discouraged from using foul language. Not entirely uncommon in many households with children, but it’s impressed more severely upon Mormons than other faiths save perhaps Southern Baptists, or certain weird Christian Fundamentalist sects.
Today, the precocious 6yo (who runs the house) was eating some baby carrots at the kitchen counter and dipping them in a tub of **Bitchin Sauce**, which you can buy at most big box retail stores like Target, CostCo, Walmart, etc.
I’m standing there and I see this, so I ask her to read the lid, knowing full well there is a mild swear word on it. (If you watch *Stranger Things*, it becomes one of Eleven’s catchphrases). I thought this would be mildly amusing to the rest of the house and generate some giggles. The oldest teens are already well versed in swearing, and the middle child is nearly 12 and probably going to start soon.
Mom is about 30 feet away in the living room on the couch talking to her daughter and my wife when this happens.
No sooner than the word "Bit… chin" leaves the little girl’s mouth than Mom’s smile drops and she turns toward the kitchen and starts chiding her kid about not using that word, and loudly reminds the whole house that it’s a bad word. My wife was a bit out of earshot and asked what the commotion was, and so my sister proceeds to say "it’s Bitchin Sauce and we buy it a lot because it’s really good … and my favorite."
The teenage boy has an outburst: "Mom, why are you saying that out loud and buying the sauce when you complain about my laptop having stickers with swear words on them?"
In the end, I’m the one who gets shit for encouraging a child to say a fairly innocent swear word and I have to apologize to the girl.
AITA Uncle?
(edit: couldn’t my sister just put some painter’s tape over the lid, or maybe transfer it to another blank container?)
YTA – you wanted to stir the pot and you did. Nasty to drag a little kid into your childish games. Keep doing it and you’ll lose access to the children you “adore.”
YTA. You were intentionally doing an asshole thing just to get a rise out of everyone.
YTA
You encouraged a child to say a word that you knew it would start drama.
YTA.
Look, I’m with you, I think Mormons are weird too. But you can’t intentionally poke at your sister’s religious faith and then be shocked Pikachu that she didn’t appreciate it, and you’re also not fooling anyone into thinking you made an innocent mistake or whatever. You wanted to stir the pot; congratulations, you did.
I’m not sure what point you’re trying to prove by pointing out that your sister still buys it. Literally so what? She’s right, it’s delicious. Just because her children may encounter swear words in life (all but inevitable, even without the Bitchin’ Sauce) does not mean your sister doesn’t get to teach them not to swear.
YTA
This didn’t need to have a whole sermon about them being Mormon, but you’re so focused on feeling morally superior to your sister that it’s the main focus of the post.
Also, none of the kids seem to have even noticed the name until you made a big deal out of it.
YTA, because you knew what the result would be, you knew the parents would be upset with the kid, and you set her up for some immature giggles and to prove some sort of unnecessary point to the parents.
There’s a lot of dumb behavior from adults acting like children, but I’ll go with YTA since you knowingly started the commotion for your amusement and set a 6 year old up to get scolded
YTA because not only did know she shouldn’t be saying that per her parents, her parents there to hear it. Did you really expect giggles knowing full well they do not want them talking like that or was this a power play to see if they would do anything which resulted in a child being reprimanded for your actions? I curse around my kids but only when I knew they would understand and never in front of others kids unless I know them well enough.
YTA…. Like obviously?
YTA. You knew it when you did it and you knew when you wrote in.
YTA. You intentionally got a kid in trouble.
YTA
This may have been just a moment for your amusement but ultimately you disrespected your sister’s beliefs/values. She can’t control what the name of a sauce she likes is but she can control what her children say and you blatantly disregarded that. It’s not your place to challenge that by way of her kids. If you wanted to have that conversation with her, you should’ve done it privately. I say this as someone who grew up heavily religious, left said church, and no longer believes in “church”.
As a parent, if my sister did this to me, I would absolutely be fuming. If your niece just happened to say it and you didn’t say anything about it, that’s one thing. It’s the encouraging the “bad” act that makes you wrong
YTA. You encouraged a SIX-year-old girl to swear. She’s SIX. She shouldn’t be swearing. And you got her in trouble. You know, it’s hard enough raising kids without this kind of thing.
If you have a beef with your sister, take it up with her and leave the kids out of it.
YTA it’s very obvious you are a self righteous asshole. If I was your family you would no longer be welcome in my home.