to have refused to go because DP expected me to sit in back?

[Fauxfurrealwhiskey]

Wee bit of context before I start: DP has two DDs aged 11 and 9. He has a lot of residual guilt over leaving them/their mum back when they were little (years before we met) and consequently he lets his youngest daughter in particular get away with an awful lot that he shouldn't imo.

We've been dating for two years and don't live together.

He's on his way to drop them back to their mums, when I don't have my DC and am free I usually go along to keep him company (hour drive each way) so agreed to again this time.

He turned up to pick me up with his DD2 in the front seat. As I approached the car he told me I was in the back. I asked if I could sit in the front. He said she wanted to sit in the front. I told him in that case to go ahead without me then as I'm an adult and not a child so he could pick me up on the way back if he wanted instead and went back in the house. No big row or a scene of anything. I just wasn't willing, as a grown adult, to sit in the back while a 9 year old sits in the front. I would never dream of doing the same to him with my DC.

AIBU to think that adults get priority over children in terms of sitting in the front of the car? It's just basic manners imo.

Or is that horrendously old-fashioned of me and I've been a rampant cow?

Adults don't take priority in our family.

Oh, you’re deciding on which utility suppliers to use as a family, are you? Meals are chosen by committee? The kids have a say in what mortgage deal you switch to? How about car insurance? Pension contributions? The kids are deciding that, are they?

You do know that ‘calling shotgun’ was one of the defining characteristics of Neil, the thick one in The Inbetweeners? To show that he was thick?

Some of the hate for a 9 year old little girl no one knows fuck all about

Who is showing hate towards the nine year old? Do enlighten us. You’ll have no axe to grind, of course.

As my girls used to say, DPs DD got first dibs!

I think it is the adults not the 9 year old people are 50/50 about. A 9 year old sits where allowed to by an adult driver, surely? So not her fault

Everybody moans about people being 'entitled' this is just setting the stage for another 'entitled' person. The kids should given up the seat. And no you are not old fashioned in your thinking. Father needs to sort out his guilt issues and get over it. It will lead to strife forever in your relationship

I don't think the law takes into account how often a child sees a parent, in deciding if they sit in the front or not. Only if she was tall enough at 9, to be there without a booster seat. We don't know her but I don't know many, if any 9 year olds who don't need a booster.

I always sit in the back of a car - that is the leisured position - while the driver drives. The front seats are “working” seats - driver, navigator, translator if road signs etc. I just don’t understand this idea that the front seat is the best seat. We don’t have a car. Perhaps I’m missing something. When we hired a car to take my elderly parents on holiday, they sat in the back and looked out of the window - where they didn’t have to do any of the work involved in driving a car abroad.

@Fauxfurrealwhiskey PMSL. This thread (and the OP) is on mumsnet madness (on twitter and she is having the shit ripped out of her!

OP De-regged.

Being 9 does not mean she is incapable of thinking for herself and applying basic manners here

Why should she want to/have to? She’s not seeing her dad for a while now. I think it’s pretty natural for a nine year old to want to enjoy sitting next to her dad for her last sixty minutes.

Why would any one expect her to have the rational of a adult in this situation?

The op has shown her hand here to his kids and it wouldn’t surprise me if they view her negatively from here on in.

Two adults and a child here. The child is not at fault.

You are definitely NBU op. I had an almost identical situation with my DPs daughter except he would back me up when I calmly told her to get into the back seat. No way was I sitting back there with the kids!

He is setting her up to believe she is his peer, not you. If she is like my partner's you are heading for a battle; mine didn't want me to sit beside him on the couch, believed she would make the decision on what house we bought and was utterly enraged when she was told her baby name suggestions were most welcome but we as parents would be making the final decision.

For people saying it's only a seat; if my DP is driving my mother and I then we always insist she take the front seat. In fact the only time I sat there was when I had just left hospital. And my father would always tell me (in my forties) to sit in the back seat so his girlfriend could sit in the front. Not that I would need to be told, I absolutely would not expect her to sit in the back behind her boyfriend.

If I was in the situation for example of my husband picking me up from work and letting one of the kids sit in the front on the way to get me I’d tell them to move. Actually I do take priority over them given it’s my money that goes towards paying for run the bloody car. In your case I don’t think it’s the biggest deal, I’d pick your battles x

@Iamthewombat

You do know that ‘calling shotgun’ was one of the defining characteristics of Neil, the thick one in The Inbetweeners? To show that he was thick?

I suppose George Ezra with his degree from the British and Irish Modern Music Institute, and his multiple millions of songs that he has sold (that he wrote himself) is thick too?

Suggesting someone is 'thick' or immature because they use the phrase 'shotgun' to ride in the front is pathetic. A very low and pathetic dig.

@KatherineJaneway

How do you know the OP de-regged?

I've said more than once through this thread that none of us knows this child. It was also mentioned that the child and Dad would have the opportunity to chat. I constantly carried my 4 children in my car and took every available opportunity to keep them safe. They accepted that they didn't chat while I was driving. It could wait until we stopped. Nor did they ever sit in the front if there was another adult in the car. I make no excuses for encouraging them to be courteous or aware of circumstances around them. I know I'd be in a huge minority now.

Not sure why you were doing the trip in first place. Seems pointless. And if you’re going to call shots on seats, go for the driver position.

Is posting a video of George Ezra singing a song including the phrase ‘I’ll be riding shotgun underneath the hot sun’ your best argument against the assertion that people who think that saying “I call shotgun!” guarantees them the seat of their choice and negates any logical discussion, are a bit thick?

Adults in the front, kids in the back in this house too. I'm 40 and would still move out the front seat for my M or MIL etc!

Not sure why you were doing the trip in first place

For the twentieth time:

• because her partner asked her to accompany him.

• she exercised her right not to take the trip, because the circumstances didn’t suit her.

YANBU. Basic manners for adults to sit in the front. This attitude is why children have little respect for teachers, police etc. Another generation of spoilt, entitled snowflakes coming up.

I say wise up! It's only a bloody seat in a car for goodness sake. There are more important things to worry about 🙄😁😂😜

Sorry - shotgun rules apply. She was there first - them's the rules regardless of the age!

Ffs, another tiresome "shotgun" claim.
Shotgun is a stupid game played by children, which invariably causes dangerous rushing and ensuing fights.
It is NOT something to declare as valid when an adult is involved.
The OP was not being childish; she was actually calmly and assertively stating her boundaries. She no longer wanted to make the trip and was perfectly entitled to go back indoors and find something else to do.

Sorry - shotgun rules apply. She was there first - them's the rules regardless of the age!

How silly. So your arthritic grandfather has to scramble into the back seat, with less legroom, because a kid shrieks, “I call shotgun”?

It’s amazing how people latch on to ridiculous new phrases. Just as we moved away from “does what it says on the tin”, etc., another buzzword for idiots takes its place.