To have shouted at MIL for being racist?

[Eurydice84]

MIL has many annoying habits. One of them (which has been going on for a while) is that she mocks Italian accent and gestures (I am Italian). This could be funny from a friend once in a while, but the way she does it - when talking to DD, whom I am raising bilingual, and in a sneaky way - really upsets me. DH told her more than once that I hate it and she should stop.

Anyway yesterday she was doing it a lot. At first I made some subtle comments it should stop, then DH had a word, but it carried on so I lost it and shouted at her. I said it is disrespectful, borderline racist and if she carries on she is not welcome in my house anymore. She then left without having dinner, after DH also said she was out of order.

I feel I was wrong at shouting, but I felt really violated and needed to stand up for myself. I went through all the alternative options first (DH having a word, etc).

Now it's an incredibly awkward situation as she lives quite close and I am dreading having to see this woman again. She looks after DD once a week.... not sure I can cope with it anymore!

@scottishnames

It's not a generational thing. The UK Race Relations Act was passed in 1965, after years of campaigning (it was first introduced as a bill in Parliament in 1956). So the notion that it's utterly wrong to mock/stigmatise/discriminate against anyone on grounds of ethnic origin has been in the general public arena since the time the OP's mother was a child; maybe even before she was born.

I can quite understand why you shouted OP; her behaviour was disgraceful.

I hope it's not intrusive to add: how great that you are raising your daughter to be bilingual. That's such a gift to any child.

However the reality is that this did not have much impact on everyday life eg television continued to have discriminatory and offensive throughout the 1960s, 70s and beyond .I therefore can't agree with you on that point.

@HaveringWavering

She sounds really thick. Do you by any chance have a few burly Italian brothers who could have a word?

What are you getting at here? Are you really suggesting, that if the Op has some Burly brothers, that she sends them to scare and threaten an old lady? WOW.

@scottishnames

To repeat myself, the OP's MIL's behaviour can't be explained away 'because she's old'. It's because she's racist - and because she's spectacularly bad-mannered.

I'm probably as old - or older - than the OP's mother, and, both at home and at school, we were always taught that it was EXTREMELY bad manners to mock anyone for perceived 'differences' of speech or appearance - or anything else - and that anyone who did mock was revealing not only their own ignorance but also their own low standard of behaviour. Pretending that you were joking was absolutely no excuse.

I suspect I am even older than you and in fact grew up in the opposite way. Our dialects and accents were deemed to be wrong and were corrected at school and by ambitious parents who obviously assumed a certain life with a certain accent ( which was probably true at the time). I'm not excusing the MIL at all Sorry this is related but off point somewhat.

I suspect she is someone who lacks empathy and has never experiences being 'the other' in a social situation, so doesn't really understand that her perspective is not the only normal and truly valid perspective.

If lonely, she may have lost a clear distinction between talking to herself and talking out loud to others. She may have lost social skills through lack of practice.

So she may feel that she's just chuntering away as if in her own home, chatting nonsense to a toddler.

Also, she may think that everything that is not her normal really is an acceptable target for ridicule and even expect you to go along with that, as if you'd recognise your own 'difference' as an oddity in a British context and laugh with her, in a self-deprecating way.

A person without empathy or imagination, the type who can only understand things they've experienced themselves (of which there are legions posting regularly on Mumsnet), just won't be able to understand this from your point of view. Her riposte will be 'but you are different, your accent is funny', as if those are facts.

So wrong as she is, she may not be capable of thinking her way out of this.

@Opus17

My DH is German and I'd be really pissed off if a family member did that with him and our DS. Especially after having been told multiple times to stop. You did the right thing. Hopefully mil will apologise and realise what she's done

So is mine and we have had some “hilarious” comments from friends and family

You were not being unreasonable to be annoyed and call her out. I'm not sure it's 'racist' if there's no race angle here (are you black? is she white?) but it's certainly prejudiced, bullying, belittling and stupid.

Does she feel intimidated by your (enviable) bilingualism? Does she feel as if you will have a connection via your shared Italian with your daughter (and that her granddaughter will have with your side of the family) that she will be excluded from? I'm not suggesting this would any way excuse her behaviour, but it might explain her ridiculous and annoying reactions.

I ask partly because my own mother (racist, homophobe, intolerant and angry person on so many levels!) used to react very badly and try to undermine me. If I'd had a bit more insight into why she was behaving so horribly, I might have been able to challenge her more effectively than I did (I used to get defensive and try to defend or excuse my perfectly reasonable behaviour and preferences instead of asking her why she was so intolerant). Now I feel it's too late for me, but you can still save yourself!

@HaveringWavering

She sounds really thick. Do you by any chance have a few burly Italian brothers who could have a word?

Do you mean Mafia style? Are you buying into a misconception here?

It's horrid, and I agree it's racist.

Fwiw, I live in France and I'm heartily sick of all the comments about my English accent. Sometimes it stops me speaking to people even though French is my first language. Hate it. Racist and inctedibly rude.

Do you mean Mafia style? Are you buying into a misconception here?

No, I mean that bullies think twice about mocking burly men rather than women.

What are you getting at here? Are you really suggesting, that if the Op has some Burly brothers, that she sends them to scare and threaten an old lady? WOW.

No need for any overt scaring and threatening. But no harm in rude MIL hearing from some other Italians that mocking them is not acceptable. Who says she’s “an old lady” anyway?

Well done and good for you, OP.

@Soul11Soul

If only life were as simple and black and white as you make out *@AmaryllisNightAndDay*.

Relationships aren't that simplistic. Presumably OP loves her partner and her child. Presumably she loves her family being together. Given they have been so kind and thoughtful towards the mil up until this point in time, her partner loves his mum. He may be more likely to forgive his mum's behaviour because he knows her and understands her. Op herself has said that she wouldn't be bothered if this was a friend of hers but hates it because it's her mother in law because she feels like it is done to wind her up. How does she know this? She is attributing negative motivations to behaviour to one person that she wouldn't attribute to another. Her husband is less likely to attribute the same negative motivations because he knows and loves his mum. People are complicated and stupid and imperfect, they make mistakes and when given the opportunity can and sometimes do learn from them.

For example I can see my own mum doing this. It wouldn't be because she is xenophobic. It would be because she is socially awkward and it would be a misguided attempt to use humour and ribbing to bond. She is also very insecure and would probably be intimidated by someone she regarded as excitingly different. Of course Ops mother in law could just be mean and cruel, none of us know.

You are extrapolating wildly. She didn't say she wouldn't be bother if it was a friend. You made that up! She said it COULD be funny from a friend once in a while. That's totally different. Plus totally ignoring the fact that the MIL was asked and told more than once to stop. I find it impossible to believe that a socially awkward person would carry on. An utter tool would though.

Why do they need to be burly then?

@Theluggage15

Why do they need to be burly then?

Because physical presence can help when making a point, otherwise she’d probably decide to start mocking them for being puny or weak or something.

@BlondeDogLady

At first I made some subtle comments it should stop, then DH had a word, but it carried on so I lost it and shouted at her. I said it is disrespectful, borderline racist and if she carries on she is not welcome in my house anymore

You've taken it way too far, imo. Some things can't be unsaid and you were pretty brutal.

I love an Italian accent. So do most people - it's seen as one of the sexiest accents on the planet.

Your MIL is lonely. And now she will be even more lonely, and upset to boot. I wouldn't be happy with myself if I had done this.

Awww the xenophobic has found the consequences of her own actions. My heart bleeds.

If there was only a way she could've stopped this.

My grandson is being brought up bilingual and I try to learn with him, I have even been to madeira (when his dad was born) to learn some more, met a lovely waiter who corrected me as my accent is way off, but I thought that is what families do

@HaveringWavering

Do you mean Mafia style? Are you buying into a misconception here?

No, I mean that bullies think twice about mocking burly men rather than women.

You see though what i am getting at? How one person thinks something is OK to say but another one sees offence in it?

It's like the current situation with Whoopi Goldberg denying that the Holocaust was "racism" as Jews were not black.

@ChickenStripper I see your point but how is it relevant to the OP? The MIL was clearly mocking her accent and gestures, this was not a situation where OP might have taken offence to something that was not meant to be offensive.

For the avoidance of doubt I would have made the same “burly brother” suggestion if OP had said she was Bulgarian or Scottish or Portuguese.

[quote HaveringWavering]@ChickenStripper I see your point but how is it relevant to the OP? The MIL was clearly mocking her accent and gestures, this was not a situation where OP might have taken offence to something that was not meant to be offensive.

For the avoidance of doubt I would have made the same “burly brother” suggestion if OP had said she was Bulgarian or Scottish or Portuguese.[/quote]
and that is exactly my point - you are being as bad as her MIL. You have just added to your post by naming 3 other nationalities. Unbelievable.🙄

It's awkward isn't it ? MIL situations can be fraught . I think she should apologise to you and her son needs to tell her this. This isn't your fault

@WhatATimeToBeAlive

YANBU, but she is xenophobic, not racist.

How do you know?

OP hasn't specified what colour she, or anyone else mentioned is.

@ChickenStripper I am at a total loss as to what you are getting at. What do you mean about naming other nationalities? I picked them at random! I’ll say this very slowly- the nationality of the burly brother in my scenario was irrelevant. The only qualification was that he should be the same nationality as the OP, and burly!

ChickenStripper Many of those TV programmes were widely criticised at the time. It was a hot topic; no-one around at the time could have been unaware that (a) discrimation was against the law and (b) a growing number of people found it totally unacceptable.

And, in any case, as I said in my second post, mocking people for perceived differences has been bad manners for the past 100 years and more.

But I do absolutely accept your wider point - attitudes among older people in the 1960s and 1970s were slow to change. There was an horrendous amount of casual racism on TV and elsewhere. However - I presume - the OP's MIL would have been a child at that time. She would have grown up to adulthood when attitudes were changing. She's had ample time to learn.

And as to your experience re accents and dialects; that's very sad to hear. And I'm sure you're right about the ghastly social prejudice behind it. But there is surely a big difference between being taught - however misguidedly - to 'talk posh' and the face-to-face, individual mocking of someone who looks different or speaks with a different accent?
In any case, we're both agreed that the OP's MIL behaved very badly.

My original point was to call out the casual ageism that sometimes seems to infest Mumsnet. People seem to have no idea of the rapid and far-reaching changes that took place in the late 20th cent, and and how many of us 'oldies' argued and campaigned to bring those changes about! Being old does not make anyone lose the progressive ideas of their youth - or indeed get rid of their intellect, manners etc etc etc.

You did the right thing. You've tried being polite about it.
Hopefully she doesn't do it again.

I hope it's not white people correcting others for their use of racist or xenophobic.

My exH family were xenophobic and would make comments and one day I blew up and shouted at them to stop it. They never did it again.
My ex regularly slags off my country of birth. The nut didn't fall far from the tree.

I also had plenty of people mock me being deaf. After their stupid fake lip reading, flailing around sign language, and raising their voice, sometimes I say, well done on being a horse's arse.

Posted too early, Chickenstripper I meant to sign off with a good ol' 1960s slogan 'Peace and Love'!