Snowflake alert - AIBU?

[onalongsabbatical]

My first thread (well apart from some rubbish I posted about duvet covers that no-one responded to). I need a quick vent and an AIBU. My DP has just returned from visiting his son in Portugal. Son and partner have a five year old boy. Lovely boy but being brought up to be a bit snowflakey IMHO. So, in the course of conversation about the trip, DP says that son was fixing lock on little boy’s door in new house, and then said, he needs a lock on his door because when other kids visit he doesn’t like them having all his toys. AIBU to think the lock isn’t the solution, and boy should be being encouraged and socialised into reasonable sharing of toys with his mates, especially at five?

Thanks why, it is at least good to know that I'm not the only one who thinks it's weird and possibly not a great way to handle the issue of toy-sharing.

It all sounds a bit unusual but to be “worried” is OTT. For the sake of good relations just let them get on with it.

That is indeed not a solution.

I don't think children should have to share all their toys if they don't want to.

Things like craft stuff - so pens, paper, paint, colouring stuff is fine, but I think if a child has some toys they want to play with alone, that should be okay.

Adults aren't forced into sharing their stuff, so I don't understand why we make children do it. I certainly wouldn't loan my laptop out to someone who came over for coffee, or lend people anything I cared about, so I don't expect a child to want to do so either.

Maybe the kid has had his stuff ruined by his friends, or the parents are fed up of his things getting broken or borrowed and not returned. I don't see the problem.

I have no intention of trying to interfere, just posted to get perspective in the context of wider worries? I often wonder whether to actually discuss my worries with my DP or just shut up about it. That's the reason I'm posting - AIBU to be worried or should I try and shrug my shoulders a bit more and keep shtum.

Bizarre because you are puzzled enough to take to an anonymous board, through a language barrier, something you haven’t directly witnessed or heard, the parenting peccadillos of your partners grandchild in a different country.

Bedroom door lock = spidey senses locking the child in.

"verbally upstaged"? 😂

Anyway, forced sharing is an entirely pointless exercise IMO. If not done willingly it just fosters resentment which long term is likely to make them more possessive of things.

I'd always just say that a certain place was off limits and anything that can't be played with goes there... anything else is fair game. Adults don't necessarily want to share all their belongings either.

Sloe no, no language barrier, as I said, they're all Brits who moved about three years ago. DP was there for the fixing on of the lock, so I have no reason to think it didn't happen or it's being misinterpreted. Not puzzled so much as concerned that they are making a child into someone who has an inflated sense of their own importance/rights, i.e. not being encouraged to share and taught boundaries, just allowed to lock their stuff away rather than dealing with issues as they arise.
And, again, they are really, really, really not the kind of people to be locking the child in. Unless I have completely misjudged them for the last ten years of knowing DP's son.

until they realised that toys should be shared.

why should they be shared? Communal toys in playgroups or nurseries are there to be shared, private toys are not. If you invite friends around, you have to be nice with them, and you play together, but I can't see anything wrong in putting some boundaries. Everybody plays downstairs, and the bedroom door is locked if someone tries to sneak in. Snatching all the toys from somebody's hand is wrong, not sharing everything is fine.

My friends don't walk into my bedroom to try on my shoes and my make-up. My kids know that their friends are absolutely banned from my bedroom!

I can't see anything wrong in putting some boundaries. Nor can I. I'm just questioning whether a lock is a helpful method, or whether it's part of a wider pattern of encouraging him to think he can have all the control he likes, rather than learning to negotiate, give and take.

But maybe I'm reading too much into it.

Why is snowflake an insult.? They're beautiful

If you are a snowflake, you think you are special, and you melt easily.

It's an insult used by the kind of people who think that anyone offended by racist or sexist or homophobic talk/behaviour should just "toughen up" and "grow a pair".

I used it wrongly, then, because that's not what I meant. I completely think that any talk like that's wrong.

I don't think you used it completely wrongly, because you did mean "overly sensitive" and "wants to be treated like they are super special".

But it's used by such nasty people in such nasty ways that you probably don't want to use it about your sort-of step-grandchild.

YABU for calling him a snowflake.

It's the typical insult of a Daily Mail reader when they want to feel so superior of the younger generation, because of course they had it soooooo much harder.

I know they're British, but I'll share a conversation I had with a German friend who had her children in the UK.

She said she really noticed the difference in attitudes to sharing among young children.

Scenario - toddler group. Billy has a toy. Ben wants it.

UK mum - oh darling, Ben would like that, why don't you let him have a turn (often resulting in Ben losing the toy)

German mum - hi Ben, Billy is playing with that already, you can have if when he is finished. Would you like this instead?

I don't think forced sharing makes you more able to share in life.

My rule was always - if it's out, anyone can play with it. If it's special, put it away before your friend comes. My daughter shares well now - but she's allowed her own stuff not to share too. Just like me.

As for the boasting about their son's speech... It's just boasting! Loads of patents do this. I'm sure the 8yo didn't feel remotely upstaged.

I never force sharing. It’s weird. We look out toys they are happy to share and ask people not to touch the Lego Star Wars sets. They are not for sharing and would cause a lot of upset If touched. Anyone who had a problem with that may leave.

If someone came into my home I wouldn’t expect them to have access to all my stuff and I think children have that right too. Nothing snowflake about it.

i think its their own business. Kid will stop wanting to come round if they dont get to play with toys, so theyll learn soon enough

"inflated sense of own importance"? What an odd concept to equate with being able to say what happens to your own possessions. How does that thought process work?

Why can't his parents stop kids going in his room? I'm not sure it's the dgs who's the snowflake here