Bye bye bigot MIL

[222333Annie]

My MIL has always had questionable views on things but I’ve always for the most part not engaged with her as she is the kind of idiot it’s impossible to reason with.

now I have a DS (10 months) .On Xmas day, she said most disgraced celebs are innocent and women “put themselves into these situations” she used a number of racial slurs Infront of my family (my parents are immigrants and my brother in law / nieces are people of colour )

she then proceeded to tell me I read “ too much science ” when raising my son and her way (the old fashioned way) is the only way.To which my mother replied current guidelines are based on research to reduce SIDS so cannot be a bad thing.

I guess my point here is.Can I really have an anti feminist,racists science denier around my son? She is from the boomer generation but still…?Husband says he supports cutting down contact if she says things like this around him when he is older but obviously cannot completely disown his mum.In an ideal world,I would never mix with someone so ridiculous so at a loss as to how to handle it.She is also very angry she will not be assisting me with childcare when I return to work .Obviously all of the above is the reason why.Should I get DH to explain this to her?

Quite. We're all bigots by default? How about your own nasty ageism OP?

boomer generation here; born in late 40s. Thus came of age in late 60s and were key members of the 2nd wave feminists. Your MIL is horrid but that is not typical of her geneation.

I assume your MIL is about my age as the guidelines when my children were babies was to wean at 4 months but I’m quite capable of realising guidelines change. I parented my children differently to how I was parented but it doesn’t mean my mum was wrong.

im not sorry for saying that her parenting views may be different coz of age im standing by it never said the racism was to do with age made that clear but it could be who knows doesn’t mean I think everyone her age is racist.I only sorry I said boomer and that is offensive which I didn’t know as she refers to herself as a baby boomer

Why on earth is it a problem that your mother in law doesn't drink? What does that have to do with your other concerns about her?

Just an aside but it’s so annoying everyone only calling out the racism “it wasn’t acceptable in the past either” but totally ignoring the blatant sexism in MILs comments.. Is it ignored because we know it is true that the MILs generation generally had even more of a sexist attitudes or is it sadly because we STILL don’t believe it is a problem worth addressing?

Not Nasty to put the idea forward her age and generational differences could be a contributing factor to our different views in parenting not sorry not being nasty was trying to empathise with her and make sense of her behaviour not generalising all people of her age I’ve said 100 times my mum is older and completely different she’s just mean and that’s why I don’t like her nothing to do with her age then I would dislike a lot of my own family and my husbands other older family members if I had some ridiculous vendetta towards older people

I actually don’t drink either it’s the worst thing becuase she’s so vile even when sober so alcohol can’t even be a contributing factor

Good lord

Really? What about golly wogs? They were a pound a penny back in the day. What about black face on TV and as costumes used as humour? Casual racism was rife and seen as a joke.

No, what is ageist is ascribing any stereotypical negative behaviour to someone's age. It's the same with any 'ism'.

So your MiL is being sexist by saying that women 'ask for it' (I'm paraphrasing).

You are being ageist by implying that boomers in general are incapable of understanding that practices in childcare change over time because we have greater awareness of safety issues.

Anyone who has suggested on here that her racist or homophobic views are somehow more acceptable to her because she grew up at a different time, and therefore implying that everyone who grew up then is likely to have the same views, is being ageist.

If you wouldn't say, this black person did such and such negative behaviour, then don't say this old person did such and such negative behaviour.

It's a her problem not an age problem. I would be worried if she is likely to do things that physically put your child at risk, but you can resolve that by not allowing her to look after them alone. As for the attitudes, your child will be influenced far more by you and their peers than by a GP who is an anomaly.

@VimtoVimto i never said she’s wrong she just doesn’t respect what I’m doing now

lays him in his from falls asleep with him on the sofa feeds him stuff I tell her not to .Im sure when I’m older what I’m
doing now will be ‘wrong’ but she does nothing to put me at ease and I tried to use her norms when being a parent to justify it but just got jumped on as ageist

OP, you are doing yourself no favours here.

Will gen x become an insult too I wonder.
OP obviously American so cut her some slack.
I wouldn't use the boomer word but my xmil refused to believe anything had change. Requests to her to google if you don't believe the guidance has change were met with an eye roll as she knew better than Google.

That comment about disgrace celebrities would have been like a match on petrol for me. I would have been unable to keep my gob shut.

You haven’t said anything wrong, ignore them.
Boomer mums are weird about the SIDS guidelines. I think it makes them feel bad even though they were following the advice at the time. My mum is absolutely lovely and still got a bit bristly though is fully on board.

Anyway, this is all a sidetrack from the real issue which is that your mother-in-law is a racist. When encountering racist older people I usually say, firmly and assertively, “We don’t say that any more.” Or you could try, “I don’t want that kind of language around my child/nieces/in my home.”

You could try that approach and if she still doesn’t listen you could say “You are not welcome in my home if you use that language”.

Ultimately protecting your mixed race family members is more important than possibly offending your mother-in-law, who sounds horrible. There’s a difference between older people being a bit unaware of language changing, and those who are out and out bigots. She sounds like the latter.

I’m not upset with her because of her age nor do I think she acts that way just because of age.It could be a factor to her not understanding parenting today partnered with her not wanting to most grandparents do not do this they ask questions and respect wishes

Boomers and Millennials arguing about who is the most offended
I have to be honest, the comments in here super all the stereotypes about both generation groups.
For those of you saying that Boomer alone is use in a negative fashion, I think you are wrong and all groups have positive and negative stereotypes attached. From the slacker generation

@222333Annie the thread has been derailed by an ageist comment, you’ve explained you meant a generational difference in parenting and perceived acceptable language. I’m sure you’ll be more careful with your language next time - ie learn from mistakes? Doesn’t sound like your MIL has the same flexibility in terms of learning different things as time moves on. I loved my grandmother very very much but she was homophobic and racist, then my older sister brought home her gay friends and black friends and she accepted their humanity and evolved and became less homophobic/racist. I think in her case it was a matter of ‘exposure’, she had ‘othered’ them from not (knowing) she knowing people who were gay and/or non white. Again, Doesn’t sound like your MIL has that flexibility of mind.
now I think you can try to put the ageist stuff behind in this thread otherwise it will just keep going.

btw, I wouldn’t have my child around someone like her either

It’s not, read the whole thread and you will understand the comment. OP was asked whether her MIL was drunk when making the racist remarks.

I think you're getting an unnecessarily hard time on here. It's not ageism to say that different generations had different ideas and attitudes, it's a fact. People will continue to insist on being offended though. With MIL just call her out on it, every single time. She'll either rethink herself, learn to keep it to herself or shout louder. If it's the latter then you can reduce contact and it shouldn't come as a surprise to her if she's any common sense at all.

Free to speak their hate filled mind? The OP is free to keep her child away from such heinous views.
My FIL is like this OP. We see him bare minimum (about 2 hours twice a year, my teenagers now take the piss out of him and play racist grandad bingo). He is not an important part of their lives as a result.

Yeah that one isn’t the first time shes dropped these one liners about how women deserve all manner of issues that come their way

I experienced similar with my MIL OP, she also seemed to be much worse after I had my DD. As a person of colour I spent 10 years letting her racist remarks (amongst other things) slide until I decided one day I'd had enough. Now I dont have contact. I gave her plenty of chances to change and I really didn't see her that often but she was not able to keep it in the locker and frequently used the n word and p word. Which is totally unacceptable and morally indefensible - don't care what generation you're from.
She was also not able to accept that I parented differently to her either and constantly criticised my parenting.
You're not obligated to keep her in your life. Your DH can facilitate that if he wants to. Do not waste your time and energy on people that don't deserve it. If she wants to see her grandkids she needs to behave better and if she is unable to do that then no, she doesn't get to see them.

She's homophobic, racist, misogynist. Reduce her influence.

Re word choice, I'm of your generation and know very well that the word boomer is only really used in the 'ok boomer' insulting sense - especially as you refer to memes.
Perhaps use the full term of baby boomer to clarify. Or be more precise and use 'born in 1958'. After all, us millennials/GenY/whatever term thought up by an advertising agency you want to use are (roughly) assigned to 1980-2000, but those born in 1980 will have more in common with someone from 1979 than with someone born in 2000.

Re childcare: hold your line. It’s one thing having out of date information but to actively choose to stay ignorant in a world where you can google anything

This is the problem though. Older people have had many life experiences and often base their views on this rather than some 'google' which could often tell them that their life experiences are not valid and that they should think in another more 'progressive' way which does not at all align with their experiences. It sometimes seems that the 'progressives' live in an idealistic world and not a realistic one.
This is a general comment on the 'google' one above and not referring to the 'racist' issue