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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Interested to see whether IABU or not - is this what happens in your family?

85 replies

goldenticket · 23/02/2011 18:21

I have two very good friends who each have 4 children. I and my children love spending time with them (normally separately as they don't really know each other) and we always have a good laugh. However, it's gradually dawned on me as our children get older that both these families have lots of "in" jokes about other people - nicknames etc - and they will laugh about them in a way that makes me feel a bit uncomfortable (and mortified that behind closed doors they might be doing the same about us!). I have to say it's not malicious (mostly) but it's very unfamiliar to me as my own family when I was young didn't do this at all.

What do you think? Do you do this with your kids?

More than happy to be told this is quite normal btw!

OP posts:
janiesmum · 23/02/2011 19:30

we have a mrs blobby a few doors along :)

GiddyPickle · 23/02/2011 19:35

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Edinburghlass · 23/02/2011 19:37

I think this is horrible! You're right to worry about your friends. I'd never sit down and create nicknames and poke fun at other people just out of badness. Fair enough if you have a comment to make eg "X said Y today, what do you think about that?" but not sitting down and creating nicknames and having a big laugh at their expense. If I thought for a moment that my niece and nephew were being encouraged to imitate me or poke fun at me, I'd be well hacked off.

Firawla · 23/02/2011 19:47

I don't think it sounds nice at all, nor is it particularly normal. I wouldn't want my kids doing this, and wouldnt do it myself.

CatHerder · 23/02/2011 19:50

GiddyPickle - I think that is why we make sure we only say things that we could say to their faces, too. BIL has a nickname based on a food that he is very fond of, and because ds2 got his name mixed up. But he knows it is done from affection for him and so it is ok.

I grew up in a household where it was ok to rip the piss out of each other, and there was no love behind it, so it was awful. We don't do it in our house, but I've only very recently had the revelation that my parents were wrong to do that to us. I always thought it was my fault that I couldn't handle having the mickey taken of me, that there was something wrong with my personality. Sorry, digression...

CaptainBarnacles · 23/02/2011 19:53

I know what you mean. A family I am very close to are just the same. I don't like it and would never do this sort of thing in front of kids - think it sends out all the wrong signals.

I think it is different if it is with your DH/P in private though.

HecateQueenOfWitches · 23/02/2011 19:57

I am reminded of my sister. Who called our mum's next door neighbour "Mrs Bucket" (for obvious reasons Grin ) her and my mum always referred to her as Mrs Bucket.

One day they were at mum's house, and mrs bucket was there.

My neice said, loudly "WHY do you call her Mrs Bucket?"

cue my mum and sister trying to shush her, while she continued to wail "But she doesn't LOOK like a bucket, WHY do you call her Mrs Bucket..."

Never, ever say anything in front of your kids!!

Original poster
goldenticket · 23/02/2011 21:02

Grin Hecate

Well I'm surprised at the balance of replies - I was fully expecting to be told iwbu!

Thanks all.

OP posts:
BulletWithAName · 23/02/2011 23:05

My mum calls my dad's sister and husband- 'The Cunt and Cuntess of Clayhall'. There's no love lost there! Grin

SpringchickenGoldBrass · 23/02/2011 23:12

Fucking hell there's some fragile flowers on here. Everyone is laughable in some way or other and everyone is entitled to slag off people in the privacy of their own homes.

privategodfrey · 23/02/2011 23:15

Lovely turn of phrase your Mum has there Bullet Confused

BulletWithAName · 23/02/2011 23:16

Isn't it just! Very apt too as they are total cunts.

Cathycat · 23/02/2011 23:16

We don't tend to do this either (except perhaps me and dh call the family up the street "the fat family with the thin dad" - whoops, so we do ...). I always remember my little sister (incorrectly) calling my future sil Nora Battey, as my dad used to secretly call her that .... and she kept repeating it. Embarassing!

privategodfrey · 23/02/2011 23:19

BulletWithAName Wed 23-Feb-11 23:16:55
Isn't it just! Very apt too as they are total cunts

lol

just thinking I'd be horrified if my mum used the word 'cunt' (not least because she died last year)

BulletWithAName · 23/02/2011 23:23

My mum is very out-spoken and loud, I'm used to it from her. She has a whole bunch of hilarious names for my dad's family (who really do deserve it as they have excluded my dad for years). Sorry to hear about your mum private Sad

fifi25 · 23/02/2011 23:24

my mam and dad had names for the neighbours, hippy hopper who kept a motorbike in his bath, billberry (had a red face), quack quack and meep meep eh???

GwendolineMaryLacey · 23/02/2011 23:27

So I take it none of you were on the nicknames for your neighbours thread then...

Joolyjoolyjoo · 23/02/2011 23:30

Well, DH and I bitch about our neighbours a bit- but never in front of the kids- that would be social suicide, as one of them would be bound to drop us in it.

We talk about our friends behind their backs- not in a nasty way, but again never in front of anyone else. More "what did you think she meant when she said that"

We have nicknames for people we don't really know- yet again outwith the children's hearing. I don't think we are ever particularly nasty (although DH christened an acquaintance Shrek once Blush Blush. And I did laugh, because the person really did have a look of Shrek about them)

fifi25 · 23/02/2011 23:30

i would think we probably were if they were as immature as us

crashingwaves · 23/02/2011 23:32

I think I understand the sort of thing you mean, OP - my dad and I sometimes do it about my brother.

However, and it's difficult knowing how to phrase this, I don't thinnk children have the sophistication to distinguish between affectionate teasing/mimicry and the sort that's just disrespectful. I'm always VERY careful what I say in front of DS because I think it's so easy to unintentionally communicate an attitude that disrespects others and that's just not appropriate for very young children.

For instance, we know someone who is a thoroughly nasty piece of work and is also quite huge - if DS heard me talk about her he might get the idea it's okay to be mean about big people which is not an attitude I want him to have, but he wouldn't understand that difference.

I make sense to me :)

onceamai · 24/02/2011 07:53

No, we don't do that. My family didn't, DH's mother did but not his father who was much nicer. I know some people do it but I don't think it's nice and I would bet that a lot of school bullies come from families where this goes on because they don't know where to draw the line about what is and isn't hurtful.

Decorhate · 24/02/2011 08:05

It's interesting because I know a family where the parents appear to be lovely, kind, etc but all their children have quite a "mean" element in the way they treat other children & it has made me a bit more cautious about the parents now tbh as I am starting to wonder if the children are copying attitudes picked up from the parents...

Original poster
goldenticket · 24/02/2011 08:05

I suppose there's a few things that make me uncomfortable:

  • I was taught it's unkind to laugh at people behind their backs
  • I wonder about children's ability to distinguish, as others have said
  • maybe Aunt is already a little self-conscious about how she laughs and if she knew her nieces and nephews (and their parents) were laughing about it in private, she wouldn't laugh so much any more Sad
  • it feels a little bit like they feel they're superior (not sure if this last bit makes sense)

I know my DD would be absolutely mortified if she knew the way she talked had been analysed and laughed about. But some of you would argue that she wouldn't find out because it's behind closed doors but I guess this is where involving children becomes a problem because IME they can be very leaky sieves, as various posters have testified!

FWIW, my family when I was a child laughed a lot but iirc we tended to tease or poke fun at people who were actually there i.e. each other - does that make sense?

OP posts:
Callisto · 24/02/2011 08:09

I would be very unhappy if DD was taking the piss out of her friends. It is unkind and unnecessary. My mother regularly bitched about people in private, even her 'best' friend. I always hated it and will never do it.

eden263 · 24/02/2011 08:24

No, it sounds horrible and hypocritical to joke about 'friends' and 'loved' ones behind their backs.

YANBU