My DM is an extremist

[Summersunshine112]

My parents have always had strong political views, strong racist views, strong fattest views. From a young age I always knew I didn't agree with them and I tried my best to argue back. But I was shouted down and punished for voicing my own opinions. I am ashamed that I have parents who have these views.

However my DM as she's gotten older has begun to have more extreme views. She now follows a far right extreme political party (you probably can guess which one). She has begun watching so much stuff online and since all this unrest recently she's been further sucked into it all. She even told me that she was considering going to a protest in London. She's never said anything like this before.

I have a young DC and I am also worried about them being around my mum. I don't want her extreme views put onto them.

I love my DM because she's my mum but I don't like her as a person and what she believes in and stands for. I feel sad for me. I feel embarrassed and ashamed by her too.

Has anyone else got parents like this? If so what did you do?

Please don’t let her call it a protest. It’s a racist riot. Protesting what? Immigrants? That’s just racism. If she calls it a protest, correct her.

My bio father was like that, he is a racist, ablest and sexist. He also took part in many riots back in the day (even a crack to the head by a police batton didn't knock sense into him).

He is simply not in our lives anymore and life is so much more peaceful and stress less without him.

Look on the bright side, you weren't brainwashed by them so if your children are like you they will see the ridiculousness of them too. Only one of my 3 kids met my bio dad and even from a young age they asked why he said things and acted so badly/unkindly. Kids aren't stupid, they notice bullies even from a young age.

Whats more bizarre is my mam was never anything like that at all, she would be utterly appalled at everything going on now. It baffled me why she was ever with him but she was young so I assume it was simple naivety.

No it's not. Dealing with parents like this is very different than dealing with cousins or even friends like this that are much easier to just reduce contact with.

I swear some people hear scream ageism every time there's a hint of criticism of an older person, as of age should entirely protect you from any sort of criticism.

Just feeling really depressed this a.m. having just watched a clip on Twitter of a family after the 'protest' in Belfast. Girl of about ten skipping down the street chanting 'P out, P out' while her mother laughs on. Really wtf is happening in this country at the minute. There's something very wicked taking hold. If your mother is outrightly racist, then keep your kids away from her.

You obviously think for yourself, OP. You'll doubtless be teaching your DD to think about issues too. If your DM does say anything dodgy to her, you can discuss context and what other sides to the story there may be.

Nothing back on my post showing lots of threads about racist brothers / sisters / sons etc from the people who said questions about racist family members are only ever about older people. Funny that.

Well, actually it is. OP asked if anyone's parents were like this? They could just have easily asked if anyone's else had family members like this.

Nonsense. The adult child / parent dynamic is completely different from a sibling relationship / cousins relationship / in law relationship. And that's why OP specifically asked about parents.

Thanks for explaining. I couldn't imagine your situation, but now I sort of can. I have a few Facebook contacts in the US from years ago who are now ardent Trump supporters, which I find mind boggling. But back when I met them in uni 20+ years ago it was their pleasant personalities that led me to ‘friend’ them in the first place. It’s true that culture and upbringing plays a huge part in what people believe, however questionable.

Does she get panicky and arsey if she's surrounded by people speaking English?

My mum is the same (she is a foreigner too!) and I am NC because I don’t want her attitudes infecting my kids. It was the right thing to do and my oldest is early 20s

It can be partly explained by a lack of political options for the traditional working class. Labour haven't represented the working class in a long time and there are a lot of people who feel frustrated and disenfranchised.

The right wing press have been feeding the public negative stories about immigrants and asylum seekers for a long time and they have become a convenient scapegoat.

A lot of people don’t really think about their politics, they just stick with their earliest allegiance, which is often what their parents voted, until they become unhappy enough to fall prey to whichever populist cuts through to them. It doesn’t make sense logically / ideologically, but they’re not thinking logically.

I’m not surprised this is happening because many people are living horrendous lives die to the cost of living and Farage has been waiting in the wings to take advantage of this mood. Starmer really does have his work cut out. Talk about a poisoned chalice.

He’s just a dick. He doesn’t actually stand for anything the flag represents but has this ridiculous idea that it makes him look like a big tough man. He is neither big nor tough but incredibly stupid and small.

Strikes me that you are the ageist here. You have assumed OP's age and her mother's age and decided her mother must be old. There is nothing in the OP itself to indicate that. OP's mum could be in her thirties if both she and her mother were young parents.

I have gone NC with my father over his views. He is now an old man, but has always been a bigot. Hates women in the workplace, all people whose skin is not the same as his, gay people. He doesn't believe rape exists, women should keep their legs crossed. And so on. None of that is anything to do with his age, it is to do with him being vile. And I don't need that in my or my kids life so I went NC a long time ago when he wasn't an old man.

One of the biggest misconceptions on mumsnet is that people vote Labour because they are nice and fluffy and want to help people.

Traditionally the working classes voted Labour because it made them better off personally not to be kind and help others. These people do not align in views with the largely champagne socialists we have in power. Labour voters are not less likely to be racist than Tory voters.

I'm very close in age to you @Summersunshine112 and also found this entertaining. You're being accused of ageism as you have a problem with your mother but we're naive and inexperienced due to our age 😂
For what it's worth I'm glad that although I grew up in a time of 9/11, 7/7 etc where racism was rife with people blaming everything on Muslims, I was lucky enough to be around children and adults of different races and cultures from my own where I could see for myself that skin colour and religion doesn't mean someone is good or bad. There are extremists in all races and religions.

But unfortunately it does seem in this country, if horrendous crimes are committed by someone with a skin colour or religion that isn't white/Christian then the kick off is racist protests/riots. People may say things like the Lucy letby case was horrible but no-one was throwing bricks at police/shops/religious buildings
They haven't said there was any terrorist ideology to the Southport attack, his family were Christian, he was born in Wales. So how does it make sense that people are trying to set fire to hotels with asylum seekers in, mosques, shops. Destroying cars and walls on the streets of Southport when they are already trying to grieve. It's all bizarre to me

I know its quite ironic they are calling me ageist whilst being ageist themselves 😂

I agree with everything you've said. I believe some people ie. My mum is incapable of critical thinking and following a herd mentality and groupthink

There’s no need to insult me

• op has described her mother as holding very racist views which have recently further escalated. This is understandably concerning to her
• the recent protests she is showing interest and support of are characterised by widespread, illegal and extreme racist violence
• voting for party does not make holding racist and hateful views acceptable to other people, even though many feel it does legitimatise them

www.protectuk.police.uk/threat-risk/threat-analysis/threat-extreme-right-wing-terrorism

You show how ridiculous her views are to your children by examples and showing them that they are not accurate and in spaces outside her home you ask her not to express them. It's important that you show your children that these views are not valid but also important for them to know people have them and they will come across them in life. You need to equip your children to be confident in challenging these views. Going NC as alot seem to do doesn't do actually do this.

To an extent but it’s worse when she doesn’t understand what people say. It’s the same with strong accents. If she’s relaxed and it doesn’t matter she doesn’t care. If she’s asking directions because she’s lost, or in a medical situation, she panics.

By getting arsey, I’m not saying she’s rude or shouty. She’s more likely to go a bit posh and shout ‘excuuuuuse me!’.

With the medical things, she’ll come out and complain to me that she doesn’t know what she’s supposed to do, she couldn’t hear properly, she doesn’t know what they said.

Haven't read all comments, but it's tricky isn't it? I think it's important for kids to experience different points of view and opinions/political ideologies, just like it's important for them to experience other cultures and religions.

The problem I've found is that you can't debate, or even rationally discuss, with people who've gone down the alt-right conspiracy rabbit hole because as far as they're concerned you have no credible points or evidence. Anything you hold up as a contradiction of their beliefs of mindset is met with "woke", "sheeple" or something other insult that shuts down discussion completely, so actually all you get is a hose of their views with no rebuke.

In that situation I'd be really hardline about it not being a topic for discussion - as in, leaving the second it's brought up. I think if you ostracise your mum completely you might push her in even deeper (not that it's your responsibility to keep her out, but it sounds like you want to keep a relationship going).

The anti semitism shown by many senior MPs prove your point.

DM is like this and has become more entrenched in old age as her world has shrunk.

15 years ago, I could get a word in edgeways to challenge her, or shut the conversation down and I could cope with a substantial difference of point of view. If I couldn't cope with different points of view, I wouldn't MN!

But in recent years she's been more determined to chisel her opinions into every conversation and just wants the same rant every time. It's not a discussion. Her life is not affected by migration other than the positive of the NHS being staffed substantially by people who may not have had anglo-saxon ancestors.

Conversation with her is no longer a pleasure. I don't pick up the phone to ring her these days, but I will answer when she bothers. They're not opinions I want my DCs subjected to- she's unknowingly insulting their friends and teachers.

Is her age relevant? Yes. In her mid-80s, she's not going to suddenly change her mind after decades of holding such opinions. (Clearly other people of her age group with differing opinions are avaliable) There's so much social guilt about parental relationships and society is awful at accepting that not all elderly parents are wonderful people, and idealises mothers generally. If it was a DC spouting those views, I'd have to challenge and manage them very differently.

DM doesn't use the internet; this is just resentment that it's not the 1970s any more and that the boundaries have shifted. And I'm tired of hearing her unpleasant rants on loop.

I wouldn't be able to continue contact.

A poster on here could have parents anywhere between 40-90 years old. I’m 45, I had a friend at school who got pregnant at 14. Her daughter must be 31 now, easily old enough to have a child herself. I first fell pregnancy aged 21, if I hadn’t miscarried that child would be 24 now. Would you say me and my friend are both “older ladies” at 45? How rude of you.

I’m 55 and have a mum 85. I identify with the OP even if I’m her parents’ age. It’s hard dealing with close family members whose opinions are very different if they get repetitive.

Whether it’s Brexit, Vaccines, Covid, the 20mph limit in wales or whatever.

In fact I managed to tackle the last one. She was ranting about it and I pointed out that many people on the road don’t need to be the way she does. If it’s made harder for everyone else, the roads will get quieter and it will be easier for her.
She actually paused to breathe while she thought that one through.