To consider kicking my MIL out for this 'joke'

[radioactiveimagination]

MIL arrived to spend Xmas with me, DH and DCs. DS 6 months has recently started babbling, 'dada' being a regular noise he makes (much to my chagrin ). Five minutes into stay, DH is saying to DS, 'who's your dada?' as DS has also started pointing/reaching for people he likes the look of. MIL looks on fondly. So far so cute. DH asks DS again, 'who's your dada?' To which MIL pipes up, 'we may never know.' WTAF? DH assures me this was meant as a joke, but I find it coarse and off-colour. We don't make jokes like that in my family and I don't understand the humour - 'haha, DIL, your child is probably illegitimate as you are clearly shagging around'. I feel like it was just an excuse to be bitchy (me and MIL don't get exactly see eye to eye). AIBU to be fuming?

It’s the kind of thing that you only say if you know it would be taken as a joke. Some people are very sensitive and don’t find this sort of thing funny at all. So she shouldn’t have said it.

I think it's the sort of "joke" that can be made within immediate families - however it's the type of joke that is very risky to make to your DIL or other inlaws that you don't know well and may not know their actual circumstances. It can also come over as a PA put-down if you are not close.

A friend of mine was really upset as she was the target of a similar comment from an inlaw who didn't know that they had conceived via IVF with donor sperm.

In my house this would be mild, but you know your MIL so are better suited to whether she meant it (And if there’s any truth behind it ).

A bad joke. But a joke!

I'd have pmsl if my MIL had said that. It would have made me like her a lot more

This. The MIL sounds a lot more fun than the OP.

I wouldn't have found it in the least bit funny but not bad enough to throw her out.

DH has 3 siblings. He is the spitting image of his father, the other 3 look completely different and not even like one another. His 80-year old mum joins in with the "milkman" jokes, which also include the postman and the window cleaner, to explain why there is no family resemblance.

Your MIL's delivery could use some work, but I think it's very unlikely that she meant anything by it and you should lighten up, OP.

Sorry OP I think thats pretty funny, especially because it came from your MIL. I can see why you are pissed though. Im sure it wasnt a dig. Its definitely the kind of thing i would say to someone 😂

Tweety1981 "Depends on your relationship overall .. do you get on well ?"

It seems that you and a lot of other posters have missed that the OP and her MIL "don't exactly see eye to eye", so it is a lot different to a jokey comment made by someone with whom you have a good and close relationship.

Haha, that might be what they said about your children....

She sounds like an absolute thundercunt.

She really doesn't.

OP does not get on with MIL so this type of "joke" is offensive. Nobody cracks personal jokes to someone who they are not on friendly terms with. MIL should have apologised as she offended the OP with a tasteless comment. DH should have checked his DM as OP was offended.

Blimey, it’s going to be a fun Christmas at yours, Op

In my family that wouldn’t ever occur to anyone to be a joke - not for any real reason just not very funny.
BUT knowing that it is frequently thought to be funny or clever by other people I wouldn’t dream of being offended by my mil saying this.
Unless I knew her to be a nasty piece of work I would just think ‘oh her sense of humour is different to mine and different than I had thought’.
If I knew her to be a nasty piece of work she wouldn’t be at my house and/or I wouldn’t be phased by this at all.
Sorry you have been stressed by this but I think YABU in the levelnof your reaction.
Good luck with the rest of the visit and Christmas etc !!

Revenge is a dish served cold. Wait until the moment arises and get someone to ask your DH who is your dada- that’s when you say, ‘we’ll never know will we DMIL?’ With a merry little laugh of course.

Yes, that should be super easy to pull off in a breezy, PA manner. Now, how to seamlessly manoeuvre someone into asking an adult male who their father is in direct earshot of their mother ... hhhhmmmm ...

Just say 'well this is your dada but we've got no idea if that's actually your grandpa'

Yes, rewind time and do precisely that.

Hopefully Santa is bringing you a grip for Christmas

Such a "joke" made by someone with little self-awareness probably wouldn't have bothered me when our kids were young. I wouldn't have found it funny, but would have grinned, shrugged it off and got my own back later, to ensure the MIL daft cunt kept their mouth shut on another occasion.

If my DM, (very much of the old school, goes to church etc.) had been there, she would have been incredibly shocked and it would have caused her a lot of avoidable embarrassment.

It’s a shitty joke but YWBU to kick her out for it. We’re all guilty of misreading the room sometimes.

Where do pirates do their Christmas shopping?

No?

Aaaaarrrrgos

MiL's joke is slightly less funny than that, but hardly worth throwing a tantrum about.

Your mil has a shite sense of humour but hey ho.id recommend ignore it
My dp mum said of all my kids who do you look like.whooooo?o’er where are you from then. All the time.no explanation
To put you in picture the weans are all the image of their da.

It’s a joke, unless there’s some doubt as to the paternity, not really worth getting upset over.
And the time for a witty comeback would have been when the ‘joke’ was made, waiting to make a passive aggressive comment about her sons paternity would likely go down like a lead balloon and amp up the animosity between you.
Let it go.

That joke is as old as the hills. But from what I see, we can be seriously divided by what we find funny.

The Mn recommendation of pithy putdown only work in folk head
In real life folks would think you were a right tit if you delivered these so called funny riposte
It’s a shite joke,but no it’s not worth having a barney about

The Mn recommendation of pithy putdown only work in folk head

That, and the fact that these devastatingly clever ripostes lose a little something in being delivered hours - days, even - after the event.

'Hey, MIL, you know that thing you said hours ago about maybe not knowing who our baby's dad was? Well, erm, yeah, so who's DH's dad, eh? Eh? See, you can dish it but you can't take it, can you? Owned, bee-atch.'