To not find having cream squirted in my face funny?

[DrinkingWatermelon]

Visiting my Grandmother today for tea and cakes. A few other members of the family were there too.

My cousin who is 8 asked his dad if he would squirt cream in his mouth - which he did. My uncle then turned to me and said do you want some too Watermelon?

I said no and he still proceeded to shove it in my face so I turned my head away and then he decided to actually squirt it on my face and even some went in my hair. So it wasn't even a small little blob.

My uncle found it hilarious until he saw my face and he did apologise but I still felt I should have just laughed along.

My uncle is early 40s and I'm 24 - I wouldn't do that to another adult. Aibu and need to her a sense of humour?

For balance, I just asked my DH what he thought and he rolled his eys and said "why are you on MN? I thought your were booking a bloody holiday"
So no help there.

What a bullying arsehole!

I agree with the previous poster who said that threads like this are quite insulting to people who have genuinely been assaulted and also perpetuate the stereotype that women are hysterical, ott and over analyse everything

And the poster whose Dh said that he must fancy his niece to do that???? On the basis of this one incident?

Sometimes I will read my dh an AIBU and ask him to guess what the overwhelming response is. I read him the OP and his response was 'surely everyone is going to say she is being unreasonable and that it is a bit of an non event'

Analyse that

Ok. You need a man to validate your opinion. That do?

As for "genuinely been assaulted" - it isn't for you to decide what's a genuine assault or to minimise another woman's discomfort.

And I'd really like to know what you (ok, then - your DH) would think if the uncle had squirted cream at a young man - tell DH that the young man is trying to get away, but the uncle persists. Same response?

She still has a right to be upset about it. She has a right to find it not funny and not have to justify that to anyone. There is no obligation on her to stifle her own reaction in deference to whatever he might have intended. If he really is remorseful, that's his own problem to deal with, not hers.

For myself, the way forward would depend on the relationship history:

1. A baffling one-off from a much-loved and trusted relative? Very hard to imagine, but I would have to wonder at his mental health and I'd give him a wide berth until I saw he was acting normal again.

1. Yet another jokey assault from Uncle Jerk? I would absolutely ice him out. Life's too short.

Bullying like this usually goes on in a certain kind of matrix, too. It's also significant that there were presumably other people there. Why did no one tell him to knock it off? If a guest did that in my house he'd be asked to leave. Looks like, like a lot of the posters here, the OP's family like to normalise this kind of nonsense. I have a feeling that's why the OP felt she had to come here and try to get a perspective check.

Matilda : as I said earlier, for women who are being actually suffering from te horror of being assaulted of find insinuations that this incident is assault wholly ott and illogical.

I am saying that it is reactions like this perpetuate the idea that we women are hysterical. Calm down pet. It was a fucking joke gone wrong, not gross sexual misconduct.

I do not think this whacko behaviour, vilifying men over something so fucking trivial helps anyone/ wsspecially us women.

Do you realise you are lambasting a man you dont even know over something as silly as joke gone wrong. This is far more treacherous and offensive than his behaviour in my opinion.

As I said earlier, I am a feminist and I am very liberal- but all this 'assault' talk we see in the media etc is getting too much and isn't helping anyone- I'll say it again- this kind of reaction helps no one in the long wrong. So pipe the fuck down sweetie :)

I read this thread to my dog and he just licked his penis.
So there you go.

Matilda : as I said earlier, as a women who is actually suffering from the horror of being assaulted, I find insinuations that this incident is assault wholly ott and illogical.

Sorry for epic typo!

he sounds like a right bell-end.
i got squirted with a water pistol once at a kids party and i got exactly as pissed off as you were, and it was only a bloody water pistol.

i must put "sense of humour" on my christmas list, obviously.

Odaat, I'm sorry you disagree with the law. I haven't actually drafted the statutes. Please do contact your MP and ask that the definition of assault be revised in a way that makes you feel more comfortable. It's obviously something you feel passionate about, so go ahead and launch a campaign!

yanbu

The law isn't my issue, your grossly exaggerated claims are :)

No, it's not an exaggeration to state that, technically, going over to someone and putting food in their face in order to humiliate them is an assault. That's because it is assault. It's not "Gross Sexual Misconduct," as I think you cited but it's assault. You're welcome to go and read the statutes. Again, I'm sorry you don't like it.

I'd like to take this opportunity to state that I am a man and my opinions can be read above.

Whilst I am in no way condoning the actions of the uncle - they were unfunny and uncalled for - they simply don't merit the intensity of vitriol here on the thread and it seems the baying crowd is self-fuelling a rise to ever greater depths of over-analysis.

I don't know where you guys are, but where I live I see the whole cross section of society, some people are idiots, some are not, some are kind, some are not, some are unthinking, some are not, and the majority can be all of the above within the space of a day - me included. I guess I've simply come to accept that it's unreasonable to expect all people to share my personal perspective on the world.

As a parallel example, on my 40th birthday we had a few friends over to celebrate, one of whom bought me an expensive bottle of wine as a present. Later in the evening one of the guests fired a party popper into my face, burning my eye, because I asked that they don't open the expensive wine which I was hoping to keep, and besides there was plenty of other wine there. Five minutes over the sink with an eye bath later, all's well, but the justification used for the poppering was that I was a 'controlling bastard'.

Was I a 'controlling bastard'?, was I assaulted? Was her action inappropriate? Was it a simple demonstration of justifiable female empowerment? Would throwing a glass of wine over her have been an appropriate response? If I had thrown wine, would it simply have completed a circle of stupidity?

My point is that you can't possibly know the answer to any of these questions without a more detailed description from me and attempting to read further into them is probably you yourself looking for the bits of the story that support the viewpoint that you came into the conversation with.

I would finish the post with a kind of 'calm down dear' comment, but poking tigers and all that.....

Go look up "mansplaining" and you'll get an idea of why you're so often ignored.

Don't be letting the dog kiss you or lick your face now, will you, Pag?

I am a feminist and I am very liberal- but all this 'assault' talk we see in the media etc is getting too much and isn't helping anyone- I'll say it again- this kind of reaction helps no one in the long wrong. So pipe the fuck down sweetie

Look, we already have men (lo, there is one, right there!) telling us to grow up and be nicey-nicey and calm down - and not to misinterpret a bit of laddish behaviour or the odd application of custard pie on our pretty faces.

We don't need pretendy feminists telling us what to feel and how we should react.

Would he have done this to a man? Please? Anyone?

It doesn't really matter if people think that OP should/shouldn't have found it funny, has overreacted.

SHE SAID NO & HE STILL DID IT!

Probably not, BabyBoomersRock

Matilda it is not assault, all PC aside, it ain't assault! The op would probably even agree with me there. It wasn't on, but to be deemed assault is ott- and yes I know you are saying the law says blah blah, but he would not et done for assault over this whether it would be deemed assault in some bloody book or not.

Stop being so obtuse and hiding behind the law vitriol xxx

Sorry for the kisses, its a habit! Hope this doesn't patronise you or go against you feminist beliefs.

Baby boom how the hell do you know if I am a pretend feminist you arrogant ignoramus! And yes, I know plenty who would of don't it to a man luv!

You are stuck in the victem mentality! Get a life! We women are strong! Stop making us out to be victems and grow up

Ha matilda I knew someone would say that. I was just referencing it as a contrast to the weird reaction of someone else's dh that the uncle must have some sort of sexual attraction to his niece.

As I said before, the uncle sounds like a knob in this instance but I find the some of accusations on this thread quite sinister.

Good point CuntyBunty

Here's another joke:

news.sky.com/story/876476/man-charged-over-clegg-blue-paint-attack

Ok, I left the thread for a while and I see that people have taken great offence that I discussed this thread with my husband.

As I said above, it was to give a contrasting opinion to that of another's posters dh who said that he thought that the op's uncle fancied her and was flirting with her (funnily enough no one seemed to have an issue with that poster discussing it with her dh).