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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To be pissed off after neighbour's son called DD "a dirty bitch mongrel?"

185 replies

user1482840083 · 28/12/2016 07:36

My late father was Afro-Caribbean and my mother is a Latina originally from the Dominican Republic. DH is also mixed (half black/half Chinese), so my two children (DS is 24 – DD is 14) are made up of a diverse background. My daughter is good friends with the girl next door – she’s also 14. DD’s friend has as a 16 yr old brother. Yesterday she went over to the neighbour’s house. Like her older brother who is now works as a videogame programmer, DD loves videogames. She played her friend’s brother on “FIFA” and beat him. He called her a “dirty bitch mongrel” in response to the loss.

To DD’s credit, she told me she just laughed at the boy’s frustration (she’s that kind of girl – finds humour in the face of adversity). Fortunately, DD’s friend’s mother was within earshot and reprimanded the boy. And she forced him to come to our house and apologise. I and DH accepted the apology as we know children do silly and sometimes unthoughtful things. But when I woke up this morning I was absolutely seething – angrier than I first was when I heard what happened.

OP posts:
KnittedBlanketHoles · 28/12/2016 15:09

Schools do extensive work with this type of language. Racist language would mean an expulsion.

I sincerely doubt it. The two girls and one 14 boy who called my daughter a bigger everyday until I took her out of the school, were excuses when I complained as "they wouldn't understand it was rude, they live in the countryside". So bollox do schools do extensive work around racism. In my experience they cover it up.

At middle school when I typed two active children and one bystander for beating my daughter up whilst calling her a Pakistani, I took the information you the school are the police had investigated, found our account to be true and made the children apologise with community resolutions, the headmaster said he wouldn't do anything as it happened outside of school (on their way home)

DixieNormas · 28/12/2016 15:11

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

C8H10N4O2 · 28/12/2016 15:24

Op Apologies I had it in my head that your DS was 14 not 24 Blush. He may well be able to help her find gaming communities which will be at least less hostile and perhaps get recommendations from female colleagues.

Regarding programming - if she has the aptitude I would strongly encourage her to develop some skills as a supporting skill to her main objective. It can be useful to have a grasp of the other skills in your domain and you never know - if embedded in a more female friendly atmosphere she may find it much more fun than she anticipates, I've seen this happen many times!

Katy07 · 28/12/2016 15:38

I've always seen mongrel as being a dog of dubious or unidentifiable parentage so to me applying it to a human would be implying that the person's parents were at best unmarried but more likely that the mother had been promiscuous and the person's father could be one of several / many. Adding dirty bitch to it and I'd assume that the person being insulted (and it would obviously be intended in my books as an insult) was youngish, female and had the same sexual reputation as her mother. Race wouldn't come in to it.
I'd actually be more concerned at the boy's attitude to the female sex (though I'm sure he'd be equally complimentary if he'd been beaten by a boy, just with a different choice of insults)

DixieNormas · 28/12/2016 15:41

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Bitofacow · 28/12/2016 16:17

I am genuinely shocked some schools don't cover this.

I work with schools and with young people, we take it very seriously. The students I work with be outraged if someone said this. There would be a fight if this was said, girls or boys.

All the schools I know would come down on this like a ton of bricks. I work in a big multi cultural city, I don't know if that makes a difference.

BertrandRussell · 28/12/2016 16:34

I have been involved in exclusions for similar. And this is a rural, overwhelmingly white English speaking population.

Mumzypopz · 28/12/2016 17:52

BertrandRussell. "all the 16 year olds on here seem to think it is"....That doesn't make it so though does it. Mine didn't, someone elses on this thread didn't either....Quite a few posters other than me have also said it's clearly not a nice comment, but they thought it meant something else. We will never know if he did. Some 16 yr olds are horrid, just as some are thick as bricks.....Doesn't make it right, the insult he used was horrid, but I'm not sure he truly meant it as a racist comment....

Bitofacow · 28/12/2016 17:58

Where I'm from thems fighting words. Definitely racist.

Mumzypopz · 28/12/2016 18:03

Bitofacow..But this boy might not be from where you are from. He may not have the same understanding. Not used to the phrase "fighting words" ,are all "fighting words" racist?

AwadebumboMk2 · 28/12/2016 18:22

Mum upon trust me as a person of colour when someone uses racists language to insult me I don't give a fuck that they might not have known it was racists which in 99.9% is a bullshit excuse anyway that's get trotted out when the racist realises that racist shit is not going to fly.

Whatsername17 · 28/12/2016 18:33

I'm a teacher and head of year- we absolutely do teach this stuff. There are guidelines for what all schools should be doing and every school should have a policy. Really shocked to hear that a school excused the use of the n word. That is disgraceful. Last year, a yr 7 was excluded for a racist incident because he called a boy of Pakistani origin 'as stupid as the shit on his face'. The victim look it that he was being racist because he was likening the colour of his face to shit. The kid and his parents argued that he was 'just' insulting him, no racism intended. The guidelines are clear though - if it is recieved as a racist insult it is racist and we excluded. Zero tolerance.

december10th · 28/12/2016 19:03

Teenage friends often call each other the worst things they can think of as banter, boys punch each other as a male bonding type of thing.Your daughter laughed-she gets it!
You are MASSIVELY overreacting.If your DD had been upset it would have been one thing, but I bet you have totally mortified her

Bitofacow · 28/12/2016 20:12

I work with teenagers when I say "thems fighting words" I mean I would scream for security and try to stop the fight.
Any teenager I know would recognise the insult and the intent. Between white kids this might pass as banter ( none that I know) but in a mixed group - trouble for definite.

Banter is bollocks. When adults support this and pretend to get the teenage joke it's pathetic.

conserveisposhforjam · 28/12/2016 20:21

And that anyone who says it isn't a racial slur is probably a racist. Or stupid. Or both.

^^ this. Can your ds join mn Bertrand? I'd like to to hear more Grin

1horatio · 28/12/2016 20:32

Bito

I don't disagree. But when I read your statements about fighting words I first thought you were talking about something like 'I want a nice, clean fight. Are you ready? Are you ready? Go!' 😂

BertrandRussell · 28/12/2016 21:01

"Your daughter laughed-she gets it!"

Yes she does. She gets that girls have to smile and laugh when boys "banter". And put up with sexist crap because that's how to be acceptable.

AwadebumboMk2 · 28/12/2016 21:53

Don't forget that people of colour also have to laugh of racism Bertrand.

C8H10N4O2 · 28/12/2016 22:15

Girls are trained to laugh off sexist and abusive behaviour for their own safety. Just as BME people have to grit their teeth through racism, gay people through homophobia and the disabled through every attack on their disability. Every attack is first and foremost our own fault, not the fault of the perpetrator.

Because its all just 'banter innit'? When we allow that banter to go unchallenged we support the sentiment.

For example this is what many of us will remember doing with gritted teeth to 'stay safe' because whatever happens is obviously our fault as women:

medium.com/@mshannabrooks/why-women-smile-at-men-who-sexually-harass-us-cf4eeb90ed30#.uycrazcoe

And the difficulties of tackling it even among friends and family:
www.washingtonpost.com/news/parenting/wp/2016/09/14/its-not-enough-to-teach-our-teen-sons-about-consent/?utm_campaign=buffer&utm_content=buffere0ee3&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_term=.11e7809fe803

Similar stories can be found describing the experience of racism, homophobia and other forms of discrimination.

TaraCarter · 28/12/2016 22:27

Schools are as variable as the people who staff them, so some schools will probably have very poor policies on racism. I am v. good friends with a teacher who once had a bit of a mini-rant to me about SLT accepting a teen's insistence that he didn't know what a swastika meant, honest...

BertrandRussell · 28/12/2016 23:00

"Don't forget that people of colour also have to laugh of racism Bertrand"

Sorry, yes. I was thinking that all the "oh it's not racist" posters were also ignoring the sexism as well....

JustWoman · 28/12/2016 23:11

Well if we're polling our children then my very into gaming dd12 yr old said " what a horrible thing to say to another person, mongrel refers to dogs with oarents from different breeds, and if said to a human id think someone is saying it in way that's saying they are different breed to themselves, but that a boy or man who thinks its ok to call girls a dirty bitch probably actually thinks they are superior skint colour wise too."

Even giving the boy the benefit of the doubt and say he didn't mean to be racist, he absolutely meant to be sexist and misogonistic, unless someone can think of an innocent way to interpret a male calling a girl a dirty bitch in anger.

C8H - I agree with much of what you have written. Regarding DD not being allowed to play online, I hate it. I hate it so much. She can play games in offline mode but not online - not after I heard what happens in online gaming. It's beyond appalling.

My brother was asking the other day if I allowed my dd to play games online, and seemed very shocked when I said and she had been for a while, he asked if she "played as a girl". She 99 per cent on,y plays with people known in real life but as sometimes it's unknown people she has a gender neutral name and tag and doesn't use her voice at all, only typing. She's not had any negative experiences yet but we've talked about what she coukd come across. She recently played Mario Kart at school fair, she was the only girl and got a bit of "get ready to lose" "girls can't play games" type stuff but when she beat every single boy in her class and they took it on the chin.

My db thinks I shouldn't be letting her play at all, he plays FIFA and wwe mainly and says the men and boys are often either speak to the girls/women sexually and chat them up etc, or insult them and be aggressive as the don't like girls playing.. That he could score an awesome goal in FIFA and get loads of well for, nice skill type comments, whereas a know female will be told she does well as she's having sex with everyone etc. He thinks it's disgusting but never challenges it.
I'm a gamer myself and didn't need mansplaining to by him, his 10 year old plays games and said he won't be letting DD play any, she thinks it's unfair. I've asked him if he's telling his son about girls being just as good and better players and it not being ok etc he hasn't. I said maybe he should, he's gonna come across it and if he sees his dad playing with such males and doing nothing, and not being told it's wrong himself, he could think it ok.

I've waffled again, but I understand why you don't let your dd play online, I just think it's so sad that in this day and age and with how far women's rights have improved, girls are still adjusting their behaviour and being prevented from some activities because of the actions of some males.

december10th · 29/12/2016 00:47

Girls are trained to laugh off sexist and abusive behaviour for their own safety
So the oP'S dd frightened of her friends brother.She thought he was going to attack her with her parents and sister in the house? that is what you are saying?

nichito · 29/12/2016 01:37

Don't be so ridiculously obtuse, @december10th.

It is possible to embarrassed/intimidated without fearing for one's physical safety.

That you would even partially condone that kind of "banter" doesn't say much for you as a human being, to be frank.

nichito · 29/12/2016 01:39

For starters, do you not think that it says something fairly damning about the lad that the "worst thing he could think of" to fling and highlight was that the recipient of his comment was non-white and female?

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