To be irritated DS is 'posh' like DH?

[highlandsabroad]

Ok slightly clickbaity title but please don't flame - supposed to be (sort of) lighthearted!

I am early 40s, DH early-mid 50s. We have 1 DS, who is 13. (who we both totally adore).

I am Scottish and from a very loving, but very ordinary background. My parents were a primary school teacher and a countryside ranger / handyman / tour guide.

DH is from a v. posh part of London and from a family where his mother was basically an heiress + his father a lawyer. They can trace their family back for generations and it's all a bit ridiculous. I don't quite know how we've ended up together but we do love each other. (even though he has voted Tory in the past)

I was stunned that as soon as our DS started talking, he's just sounded exactly like DH. Despite my best efforts to teach him how to use the short 'a' in words (e.g. 'bath') out it comes as if he's been living in Surrey all his life, and as if he didn't have a Scottish bone in his body.

We live in a European country where he attends an international School, which is private but has kids from all over the world, so it's not as if he's even surrounded by little Hooray Henrys.

The other day it emerged DS knows all the distinctions in importance for various noble titles and ranks of the armed forces etc because DH has essentially taught him all this stuff 'because he just ought to know it 🤔'

• *I have taken DS back to my home several times, which he agrees under duress is beautiful, but he already seems more at home in DH's world.

There are some differences in parenting as well - DH assumed we would get a nanny, despite only living in a flat and having quite flexible jobs, and he wants to send DS to some posh boys' camp in the summer (in the UK) that he used to go to with his brothers.

I love DH and DS but I am disturbed by seeing just how strong those English public school genes are from generation to generation ... and I can't quite understand how I, a proud Scottish highlands woman, have somehow contributed to this!

Wait until he brings home the mid-Atlantic semi-US drawl from the international schoolmates. You can bond with your husband over how he doesn't sound like either of you and you can't work out why.

I don't know where to start with this!

There are lots of posh Scots.
If you're talking posh English, scon is the correct pronunciation.
Knowing stuff about army ranks and so on is useful for quizzes. And in some circles/jobs knowing how to address lords and such is still useful. Ditto formal table manners- I hope he knows how to eat asparagus!
My children are trilingual -posh, Yorkshire and Estuary Kentish. But they've been exposed to all since birth. Not sure how you'll get him up to speed at this stage, @highlandsabroad!

And most significantly, are you absolutely sure he's not bullshitting you? Tell me more and I'll be your posh fact checker-I know this stuff!

Your kid is massively privileged and speaks and carries himself accordingly.

I'm not sure why you are surprised/irritated

It would be far more surprising if your son went to an expensive international school in France but spoke with a Scottish accent and ate fried mars bars and heroin for dinner

Have another child? My eldest speaks posh southern like his father but I’m training my youngest harder to say Bath Grass and good proper northern. It’s working so far. He is in year 1 at school and corrected his teacher who said b-a-th = Barth 😂

I think that when your children turn out to be almost the polar opposite of how you were as a child, it can feel a bit odd. It's not always a bad thing, but it can be a little disconcerting.

I actually did marry a crofter, and my parents are pretty well off. I went to boarding school, and have a Surrey accent. Two of my children sound like they have never left the Highlands, and two sound like me. One of the kids who sound like their dad changed his accent deliberately, because he was bullied at school for being a Sassenach. Apart from the bullying, I never really thought about their accents until one moved to Glasgow and phoned to ask why everyone kept assuming he was from England.

The one child who has a Highland/Islands accent naturally has always spent more time with his dad, whereas the others always wanted to be with me. It can be hard to balance what they learn about both cultures, and to battle the assumption that England doesn't really have one!

OP, if your kid likes military stuff (I don't, but come from a military family, so I know a lot of people do), then you could talk to him about the Highland regiments, which probably means researching them together. If he is interested in nobility/titles, you can talk to him about the clan system. It will help him to feel linked to both sides of his family, so tell him about your extended family and their part in historical events. My kids are as fascinated by their grandfather being a loom fitter for Harris tweed weavers and all the stories about that, as they are by the military campaigns that my parents/grandparents/cousins etc fought in.

(Also, if it helps, the military thing is often just a phase!).

I feel you OP, but total opposite. I am considered quite "Posh" scottish in accent (at least, when i've not been on the phone to my Glaswegian parents).

Two of the children are pure Norfolk through and through (we live here). Their Father and Grandparents are heavy on the Norfolk Dialect. T

The third is not speaking yet so I have hope!

I grew up in an old mining town in the Midlands. One grandfather was a miner and the other was a builder. I moved south when I went to university and stayed. My DH is from Manchester, but also moved south when he was younger. He didn’t go to university.

Somehow, we have produced two classic Home Counties children (now in their 20s). They didn’t even go to private school! We both do our best to make them recognise their, and our, privilege and we are involved in lots of community volunteering as well.

I don’t think knowing the intricacies of titles and ranks in the armed forces and aristocracy is automatically a bad thing though. Ironically, it’s something I had to learn for work purposes when I was in my early 20s.

Ultimately, your DS will pick up on values and perspective from you as much as from your DH. My own view is that my children can make the most difference by knowing and understanding about lots of different people and backgrounds. Rather than being reticent about advantages they have, I hope they will use them to give voice to those without and change things for the better.

'Punching up' is still punching. As someone who happens to speak with an RP accent and pronounce things the 'posh' way, I reserve the right to be a bit pissed off there is basically an entire thread slating the way my child and I speak and present ourselves. We are decent, normal folk and would never dream of starting a thread about the way people speak, as basically it is a bit mean.

And I don't give a flying fuck if it was meant to be lighthearted. That is just a way of excusing a veiled dig under the cloak of humour.

It's not too late OP

You need to force him in to a kilt, start really celebrating Burn's night and feed him haggis.

Remove all reading matter that isn't written by a scot.

For Christmas sponsor a highland coo for him.

Don’t worry. When he does the teenage rebellion thing, he’ll be delighted to be Scottish.

I’m part Irish. My 17 yo goes to a posh school and mixes with a lot of ‘poshos’ as we affectionately call them, she is getting more Irish by the day to distinguish herself from the feckin Tory bastards. She has been to Ireland precisely twice in her entire life but that’s not the point apparently 🤣

The idea of going shooting and skiing is a very good point...

Skiing is not a class-based sport in France because - the Alps.

'Punching up' is still punching.

This. It’s also cowardly as the op thinks it’s fine to insult her dh and ds but retaliation isn’t allowed as that’s ’punching down’.
Op, rather than using ‘punching up’ as an excuse to sneer at people, maybe try not to see everything through a prism of class.

My children are trilingual -posh, Yorkshire and Estuary Kentish

Peak MN.

Haven't RTFT. But genuinely, why do you find it all a bit ridiculous, as you put it? What's actually wrong with being able to trace your family back through generations and having some sense of your family's particular history and heritage in a way that's relevant to it and you as an individual?

It isn't ridiculous at all - it's just not your familial background so it feels unfamiliar/uncomfortable/whatever.

But your son is your son and his father's, and it happens that he's taken after his father in some respects. He'll take after you in others.

I'm sure it was meant to be light-hearted, but I think you should allow your son to be who he naturally is. It's really not a big deal, is it.

(I'm sure that as I read the thread there will be more updates showing that actually you're quite relaxed about it. After all you married the man and are part of the family now so if it was good enough for you it's also good enough for your son...)

Slagging your kid off in a highly identifiable way in a public forum is absolutely not 'punching up'. You are the parent, and have control over his life, he is a child with no ability to influence the stuff that goes into his accent - where he lives, whether or not he goes to private school etc. Insulting him because of things beyond his control (who he is, who his dad is, how he talks) is punching down.

Forget all of this mum/mom/mother nonsense. We all seem to have ended up being called bro the last couple of years.

I think that children naturally have a strong sense of fairness and justice which doesn't need much to activate it OP - so you just need to make sure your DS hears from you why inheritance tax is not an outrageous attack on liberty but one way of making sure that poorer people don't become destitute, since we've organised our society so that not everyone has enough.

I laughed at the ranks etc (as I think you are too) - leave that all be, and just focus on the important stuff. With all that inherited wealth, class privilege, PLUS a sense of social justice he might well end up as Prime Minister .

Joking about Ross County aside, as a Highlander I see the hunting, shooting, fishing rah rah RP types lording it over us and patronising us as yokels. Swanning in in August with their horsey faces and tweeds like they own the place - oh hold on, they do. I see the rich buying buying and selling the land we've lived on for generations for another status symbol, the management of the countryside for their bloody entertainment and financial gain. I see how our beautiful Gaelic culture is disappearing, often due to the internalised snobbery from people whose grandparents spoke it. I also see the bullshit stereotypes about deep fried mars bars and being unemployed on this thread and I'm guess it's not from people who were brought up here.

No wonder it hurts to hear your son unwittingly associate himself with that.

Oh my god. You have the world, but you're hurt when it's pointed out.

There’s nothing wrong in having knowledge about different things, or how you speak. I hope he inherits and absorbs this information as opposed to your judgy streak.

Why does it need to be ‘pointed out’? Or denigrated?

Wait while I find my tiny violin. 🎻
It must be so awful being teased by the plebs for talking posh.

The other day it emerged DS knows all the distinctions in importance for various noble titles and ranks of the armed forces etc because DH has essentially taught him all this stuff 'because he just ought to know it 🤔

Taking just one example from your posts, what's wrong with that? Seems like your DH is wanting to pass down what he knows and the experiences he had, and I reckon most parents would want that for their kids. I want my children to experience the wonderful things I had when I was a child. If you want him to feel more Scottish then take him to Scotland more often, or very often teach him the things you think are important from your Scottish heritage. Words, culture, arts, history, all the rest of it. Make it as interesting as titles and ranks of the armed forces so he takes it in. As your DH to make an effort as well. Parenting is teamwork, after all.

OP I get the impression you suffer from imposter syndrome.

Your child is perfectly comfortable with his life & himself, who are you to slag him off.

If anyone is to blame for this it's you. You have been asked on this thread what you have done to encourage his interest in his Scottish heritage & family & I'm very interested to know.

It's sounds like you have left your DH & in laws shape his character then you go criticising them. How hands on are you? If you want your DH to know & respect his Scottish heritage you should have immersed him in it from birth.
It sounds like your DH did immerese him with his own background & that is why your son is so enconsed & comfortable with who he is & as he should be.
You only have yourself to blame op.

Sorry this made me laugh more than it probably meant to! 😁