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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/FutureUpstairs2106 on 2023-09-09 00:16:12.
Hi and thanks in advance for reading this!
I’m 30M and White British, my wife Jaan is 29F and originally from Pakistan, but was brought up as an expat in a bunch of European countries. We have a 4 year old Peter who is, obviously, mixed race. She is good with languages because of her upbringing: Urdu is her mothertongue, and her English accent is better than mine. The language she is most comfortable with is German, as all the countries her parents worked in were German speaking.
Jaan was keen for us to have a “family language”. I was keen to learn Urdu, but we quickly find out I am terrible. She found it hilarious, and decided it would be less painful for us both if we switched to German - I did some at school, she taught me a lot, I attended some classes and am near fluent now.
Hence, Peter grew up trilingual. English (I speak to him), German (all 3 of us speak), and Urdu (she speaks to him). He’'s no Shakespeare, he’s 4, but speaks all 3 impressively.
My parents are proud of him, as are Jaan and I. But my SIL (also white Brit), who has a daughter Jenny 5F, is REALLY angry. She keeps telling me that we’re deprioritising English and that Peter will struggle when he starts school and speak with an accent.
I said that implies most ethnic kids in the UK are failures. And that Peter has a British father, and my side of the family are ALL white British - Peter’s not lacking in “Britishness”. I called her out on the accent thing - he doesn’t have one, but an accent is not a “fault”. I don’t know why she thought he’d have one btw, my wife sounds like a native speaker.
Cue a gathering last week. Peter was playing with Jenny, and pointed at something and said its name in all 3 languages. Jenny found that fun and kept asking him to name things in all 3, which he happily did.
I thought that was a very normal interaction, but my SIL called to say she will never bring Jenny over again if I let Peter “confuse” her with other languages and to not let him “show off” in family events. She said that it was setting Jenny back, and she does not want to be disadvantaged. She said Jenny copied some words in English in “Peter’s accent” except it’s not an accent, it’s just a slight lisp, many kids have it at that age.
I am refusing to “forbid” Peter - especially as Jenny ASKED him to do it. I never want him to think my wife’s language is “inferior” and meant to be hidden She doubled down, and accused me of sabotaging Jenny because “you two know Peter will be discriminated against so you want Jenny to face the same”. I said thats ridiculous: we ARE aware Peter will definitely face some discrimination, but that’ll be because of his RACE, not because he speaks German lol. My brother however, has joined her side, and refuses to bring Jenny over.
AITA? Should I have stopped Peter when I noticed the game, or tell him to not speak the other languages infront of my side of the family just to smooth things over? Was I disrespectful to her parenting style?
Edit: many of you pointed out that this is quite discriminatory/borderline racist, especially the accent thing. I had never considered that (because, as I said, my parents are so supportive that I assumed SIL and brother were also that unprejudiced). But it does make a lot of sense, especially because one of the more bizzare reasons for SIL disliking Peter speaking Urdu specifically is “Peter looks pretty white so he would get unwanted questions about why he can speak Urdu.”
Which is a ridiculous take on hindsight: yes Peter is somewhat white passing, but most White/South Asian mixed race people are vaguely white passing, especially when young. So him speaking Urdu in public wouldn’t look “weird” because W/SA relationships are relatively common in the UK so people would just assume he’s mixed race. I also do think it’s kind of fucked up and skull measure-y of her to look at a four year old and establish his racialised features…