AIBU to be seriously fed up with mansplaining, knowledge flexing partner on holiday

[Woolyminded]

I've just come back off hol with my partner and kids.

He is a terrible mansplainer and correcter. This holiday I've just realised what a smug knowledge flexer he is too.
A few examples- I was telling my DS that mallorca is majorca but the Spanish spelling. DPs ears pricked up, he's almost gleeful when he thinks I've said something wrong, he said 'well actually, mallorca is a different island' and proceeded to show me a map on his phone to prove it. He shows me menorca on a map. I say that's menorca. He then realises hes talking crap and starts telling us about menorca being a separate island.
I've pointed his habit out to him before, he knows its something that really starts to wear me down when I feel like he's constantly poised to disprove things I say. If I say something that he doesn't already know, his first reaction is to query it and Google it to find out if its right. Its incredibly demeaning.
There was a particular moment this holiday when I had a moment of realisation that he gets on my effing tits.
We were at the lunch buffet and I was doing the usual trying to spark up a conversation to involve everyone, my ds and dd, 11 and 14, and dp and his 12 and 15 yr old. DP and his DS starts quizzing everyone on the periodic table. 'What elements make up salt' or something like that.
I said it wasn't a fun conversation, it was just a knowledge flex. He looked surprised and carried on, started asking who knows the characteristics of cells. It just seemed like it was showing off and highlighting how little I've got in common with him. I like a niche random intellectual conversation if its interesting but it felt like I was taking an exam that I hadn't prepared for. Is this normal dinnertable chat and am I weird for not wanting to talk about chemistry? Or be involved in pretentious, dull knowledge flexing? I'd sat through a monologue on the causes of the cold war the previous day.
I know I'm in a bitchy mood cos of holiday tiredness but I found it as irritating as a bad case of thrush.

He and his kids sound insufferable. I can't imagine what your own kids think. My dh has never done this, ever. We don't find anything to gain by having one up on each other.

I think you have a case of "the ick"
It's fatal to the relationship
Your poor kids putting up with a mansplainer and his understudy on their holiday.

My DD has ASD and she really makes an effort to involve herself and be sociable. She was baffled by the topic of that conversation though. Its not a conversation if only a few people can join in and it excludes others.

He sounds like the You're Wrong brigade on here. Coiled and ready to attack instantly. No real substance behind their arguement, just childish bullies.

It's smug showing off, yuck. Brings to mind an episode of the Graham Norton Show when Daniel Radcliffe decided to do his party piece of reciting the Periodic Table, Graham's face and the audience reaction as DR blathered on said it all they were cringing with embarrassment and boredom.

I find it amusing how when you corrected him re Mallorca/Menorca he tried to cover up by going on about Menorca being a different island, what a twat.

Get rid of him, like thrush he's not welcome.

Urgh - reading your post has even made me feel annoyed and get the ‘ick’ with your partner. It’s a terrible trait that - needing to be better than you ask always right. How fucking irritating of him. Sorry OP but I just couldn’t tolerate someone like this - imagine this for the rest of your life! Yuck.

I can't remember how the conversation started but he once tried to mansplain tampons to me. I think I mustve been talking about them with either of our DDs, Id mentioned the purpose of the string, and a friend who lost the string and had to get it removed at doctors. DP pipes up 'well actually the string isn't necessary you could just pull it out with your fingers' .
I'm still amazed that he thought he was more qualified to talk about tampon removal than someone with a vagina.

Do you live with him?

I have an aunt and uncle and cousins who are like this, they’re all in the same profession / education and every discussion around the dinner table is like a dick swinging contest of who is the most intelligent. It ruins any decent conversation cos everyone is just poised to point out the error in what someone else says

Utter knobs the lot of them

I don't EmmaH2022. Phew!!

People like this are insufferably tedious and boring.

I remember reading a book with a character like this called Oliver, whose nephew referred to him as Uncle KnowItOlly 😂.

It would be a deal breaker for me because underneath it all there is a need for constantly asserting their intellectual dominance/alpha status, which basically means they see you as "lesser" - even when they don't know half as much as they think they do, or deliberately manage/restrict topics of discussion to their knowledge base.

You've definitely got the ick.....and quite rightly so...

Sorry Op, but he sounds insufferable!

Wow ShirleyPhallus thats exactly what it is, dick swinging! I really hate the desire people like that have to be 'better' and prove they know more. I don't know why it unsettles me so much, I just know that I want no part of it.

He sounds awful. I once had a boyfriend who mansplained that the book I'd just finished was set in South America, even though he'd never read it. I pointed out that it was set in Italy, but he still kept banging on. The relationship didn't last...

Say what now? I’m not sure I would have been able to let that one go. Ye gads!

That sounds really really boring.

You could have a post holiday come to Jesus conversation with him, and pull him up every time going forward. But it’s really difficult for someone like this to see what they’re doing. It’s probably going to grate on you more and more..

I've made a point of pulling him up on it, I ask him why he he assumes I'm wrong, get him to repeat what he's said when he's been dismissive of something I've said, etc. It doesn't seem to stop him though. I've officially ran out of patience this week, I think.

Phew indeed. Might be time to get rid.

You must have the patience of a Saint, I'm irritated just reading your post. Talking about the periodic table at dinner I'd have done a fake nod off and snore. And the tampon thing. I don't know how you cope honestly.

How utterly tedious. I don't think I could take this in anything other than short doses, and certainly not as part of a long term relationship.

I can't stick mansplainers. Fortunately my DH rarely does it, and gets "the look" from me if he does start.

I do remember once when we were on a holiday in Spain and had hired a kettle for our apartment from reception. The deposit was returnable when you took it back undamaged on your last day. I was about to take it back and DH began trying to explain how to approach the reception desk, present the kettle with our original receipts and ask for the money back! Like I couldn't possibly have worked it out myself. I just laughed at him and he realised how ridiculous he was being. We now look on it as a comedy moment from that holiday.

I call it 'willy waving' but dick swinging is excellent. Oops, did I just tit-plain something?!

I can't believe your friend wasted a doctors' precious time instead of asking your DP first.

She was definitely being unreasonable.

Dear lord. How have you not actually strangled him?

In my experience, this comes from insecurities on the mainsplainer's part. I know someone like this, and they never finished school, so they are super sensitive about their lack of education, and try too hard to impress everyone that they are intelligent despite the lack of qualifications. It makes everyone avoid them!

Oh god that sounds just like my partner 😳He doesn't do it because he's a smug twat though,he does it because he's autistic and thinks being accurate is more important than being pleasant company (his words, not mine). He also has trouble distinguishing between what is pleasant conversation and what is just combative, annoying pedantry. It's my least favourite trait of his and I do sometimes lose my rag with him when he's being particularly unbearable. His dad is the same, so I think he's grown up just thinking this is a normal way to interact.

The "fact-checking" what I say on Google has largely stopped since I started doing it to him.