Gin night ruined by my son?

[Becc91]

So my DS came back from Bristol Uni (with a mullet no less 😣) and told me off in front of my girl friends - all for singing Do They Know It's Christmas?
Apparently one term of a politics degree makes him qualified to tell me what I can and can't sing in my own home after a few gins. Feeling quite hurt and embarrassed as this all happened in front of my friends.

I don't see what I've done wrong but I don't want to be ignorant, is it just me??
Opinions wanted , thanks xx and merry christmas

Well the mullet would be enough excuse to disown him.

Could have come straight from AbFab.

It's not really about fragility. It's pointless trying to have a serious conversation with people who are merry from drink, and it's best done one-to-one.

Your daughter sounds like a woman of very good sense.

As far as OP's son is concerned, if he wishes to pursue a career in the political sphere he may need to understand the meaning of the words 'complicated', 'nuanced', 'compromise' and 'hindsight'. He may also need to consider the very, very many shades of grey between black and white.

i would have laughed at him. In private i'd have told him to wind his neck in and if he wants to stay at mine, he has to behave politely.

The song is problematic and the whole band aid thing caused more harm than good.

However, mulletman needs to wind his neck in and stop being a righteous little tool.

Ugh, a bunch of drunk women sitting around singing that awful racist song. If I had to listen to it, I’d ask you to stop too.

Can someone explain how it’s racist please?

Your son is a pompous ass who made a fool of himself.

And a MULLET!!

I've heard lots of criticism of the song (I was an adult when it came out) and I'm not hugely keen on it. But "it's racist" is not one of them. Can you parse the racism for us?

He could have handled it much better but it is well known that the song is considered extremely offensive. And i'm an old fart well into middle age.

The way it depicts the whole of Africa as some back water that doesn’t know it’s Christmas…

Africa is a huge continent. Much of which very much well knows it’s Christmas and has plenty of money. It’s not all mud huts and walking hours for water as much as the adverts or songs would have you to believe.

I don't think his approach was correct however I thought that song was considered a bit inappropriate nowadays, cheerily singing about suffering, suffering which continues to this day....

Ps: first Xmas holidays after uni is the absolute worst for parent-child relations.

I remember it so well. Try to laugh off the grim moments. He will mature v quickly in the next 2 years.

What the hell were you singing that for? Christ. How incredibly embarrassing, never mind anything else.

It’s not complex. OP is 40 years of ‘baby steps’ behind.

In what way did it do more harm than good?

Politics students are meant to be total wanks.

Ask him whether he's reflected on his patriarchal behaviour in lecturing women, and whether he would have done the same to white cis men (yes I know but you have to play them at their own game)

The song hasn't dated brilliantly to be fair. I'm in academia and can see that from a widening the curriculum point of view it is pretty 'white savioury' and lacking in representation- very few female singers apart from a hacked-off looking Bananarama and even fewer black artists. However, it was well-meaning at the time and was driven by an anger at the injustice of the suffering of fellow people as shown by Michael Buerk in his nine o clock news report. Different contexts.

I sing along without gin!

I'd sing it at every opportunity if my son did that to me.

Tell every who visits (place) it’s shit and poor and horrible and so on and expect tourism to stop.

Get him a student grant t shirt

I also hate fairy tale of New York. Just to add to the controversy

@Ooral I think OP's son is being a tit BUT if we're returning things then we as a nation can return all the wealth we got from colonialism in proportion to inflation and we'll see who comes out ahead.