AIBU to feel hurt my son will not visit while my dad lives here?

[Triniette]

So I have been up tossing and turning all night and I have no idea what to do about this.
My dad is 85, he doesn’t have any official diagnosis but he is certainly struggling with memory, controlling what he says and mood swings. He lives with DH and I, he has done since my mum passed away 9 years ago. Other than his state pension he has no income, and very little in the way of savings, my parents never owned a property.
Last week my son who is 27 and his relatively new girlfriend came to visit us.
My son’s new girlfriend has a French mother and an Italian father, her skin tone is notably tan though, perhaps what you would associate with south Italy more than anything.
My dad made a very stupid comment, something along the lines of “gosh aren’t you very dark, you wouldn’t think there was any French in you! You’re darker than some of the Italians I know, are you sure your French-Italian”
Now I don’t think my dad meant this maliciously, however I appreciate that it comes across awfully and his intentions don’t matter all that much if hurt is caused.
My son pulled us aside before they left and said it had upset his girlfriend and could my dad apologise. My dad apologised but it was clearly not all that sincere, I don’t think he believed he did anything wrong.

Today we are having a family get together, my son messaged me yesterday saying he and his girlfriend won’t be attending. There was no reason attached so I replied saying that’s okay, I hope all is well. He replied saying that his granddads comment made his girlfriend feel really uncomfortable and neither of them will be back in the house so long as my dad is still there. I replied saying I was really sorry that she had been made to feel uncomfortable and that I would talk to his granddad again as the last thing I would want is for anyone to feel uncomfortable in our home. My son replied saying it is irrelevant, as the damage is already done.

This is quite out of character for my son but I understand he just wants his girlfriend to feel comfortable.

My husband thinks they are being over dramatic and it’s not a massive deal, my dad apologised etc.

My daughter thinks their reaction is valid.

I feel totally stuck, I don’t know what to do with this, I really don’t want to have a bad relationship with my son or his partner.

AIBU to be really hurt he said they won’t come to our home again? We love hosting and all our family events are hosted at home, so he would be really missed.
What do I do?

One of the first signs of dementia is losing social inhibitions on what you can and can’t say without upsetting others. They tend to just blurt out what pops into their heads. It could happen to your son in his old age. A bit of compassion is essential in such cases.

I wonder how many people who expect nuance and ability to banter back and defend themselves at the time, would be able to do all that in a second language at your new foreign boyfriends family get together?
Especially at 24.

Daft.

She was a guest and should not have to ''stick up for herself'' when meeting her boyfriend's family for the first time...She should have been treated with respect and made to feel welcome.

Plus she had the added difficulty of English being a second language.

Completely agree, and I would only add that English will be her third language (at least), and her pronunciation of her boyfriend's name due to her accent was mocked during the visit in question, which as we all know is a real confidence-booster

@Genevieva
The op and her husband don't have dementia. Neither of them intervened to stop the grandfather's inappropriate comments, neither of them apologised to their son's girlfriend and in fact the op seems amazed that they were offended and upset.

I think op it depends on whether your father had form for these types of comments before his cognitive abilities declined or if this is actually just what he's like and the comments are just coming to the surface more freely.

If this is genuinely completely out of character for him then I'd meet with your son outside of your home and talk about it. I'd reiterate that it's really important to you that his partner feels welcome in your home and at every family event. I'd say again you understand why his girlfriend was upset and that he was inappropriate, I'd also say that the difficulty is that this is often part of cognitive decline and people can act out of character and yes, it can be upsetting but there needs to be recognition that this is illness rather than malice. I'd also say you'll still respect their decision but you would like to make the effort to all meet up together because you don't want to lose your relationship as you love him and you want to continue getting to know her.

However, if he does have prior form for this type of behaviour then I think you just need to respect their decision. She doesn't owe anyone her presence around people who make her uncomfortable, who are pass remarkable about her appearance and who make racist comments or observations around her language or skin tone.

I can see why it's upsetting because you want to be able to have everyone together but I think you have a chance here to show your sons girlfriend that you are on her side and really build on that relationship which is going to be really important if she's going to be in your sons life long term.

Did you call your dad out at the time or just expect everyone to ignore it? If you didn't then I think you also will have some repair work to do as you should have.

It is, when you know the answer to the question 'was the grandfather always rude, outspoken and inappropriate?'. Unfortunately that question has been ignored.

Oh come on. Even young children get taught that it's often better to walk away because it's good sound advice.

Dementia lowers inhibitions sure, but for him to make those comments shows what he thinks anyway. Dementia doesn’t make someone racist. He’s likely always been that way inclined.

He isn’t being discriminated against. Just excuses and a pass for his comments. OP would have been well aware her fathers viewpoints prior to his old age. He may have just not expressed them as forcefully.

Both my Grandmothers developed Alzheimer’s and dementia, neither made inappropriate or racist comments.

So tell us, why should it be acceptable to discriminate and not make allowances for the mentally and physically disabled or ill, such as dementia.

Not all disabilities are visible and the ableism on this thread is shocking. For many posters racism clearly ranks above ableism on the victim pyramid.

We’re still waiting for a description of the discrimination that you believe is taking place in this situation please, @1dayatatime.

So your counter argument is that he probably had racist thoughts anyway and that the dementia reduced his "inhibitions" and meant he openly expressed those views.

Firstly we have no way of knowing if he did or didn't have racist thoughts. Secondly people are allowed to have whatever awful and dark thoughts they like (and many do and a lot worse than racism ) so long as they don't openly express them.

We are now in the ridiculous situation of people getting pilloried for assumed racist thoughts.

That would be a failure by the son and his girlfriend to make allowances and show compassionate understanding of how the Grand Fathers dementia led to the comments that upset the son and his girlfriend.

@1dayatatime
And what about the failure of the op and her husband? They presumably know what he is like - they allowed him to make several unwanted personal remarks to this young woman and did and said nothing. Where is their compassionate understanding for the young woman who was his target?

Dementia doesn’t cause racism…

They’re no longer thoughts once they’ve been verbalised. So they’re no longer assumed, but expressed.

Is he to get a free pass then? Can say and do as he pleases and everyone else has to just suck it up?

There is a current thread of where an individual was sexually assaulted by a person with dementia and was essentially told to get over it, because he has dementia.

Yeah, that is not discrimination.

But she did make allowances” for the old man by not complaining or walking out. The subject under discussion is whether the young woman is forced by your weird conventions to continue to visit in this hostile environment. Are you discriminating and abelist if you don’t choose to visit a dementia ward full of strangers?

Also: there is no “discrimination pyramid”—its not like a nutritional pyramid with daily helpings of discrimination on it that you should make sure to have.

You should really stop trying to throw this weird pity party and stop trying to make this the oppression olympics.

The victim pyramid is a well established concept.

I disagree with its findings but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist. If you took some time to understand it then it would help to understand this situation.

OK let's clarify this:

If you choose to not visit your black grandfather because either you or your boyfriend / girlfriend don't like black people then that is racist.

If you choose not to visit your grandfather because he is disabled (mentally or physically) and either you or your boyfriend/ girlfriend don't like disabled people then that is ableist.

If you choose not to visit a ward of black patients in hospital because you are doing other things in life then that is not racist.
If you choose not to visit a ward of dementia patients because you are doing other things in life then that is not ableist.

Regardless of what you or I think an "Oppression Olympics " as you put it already exists.

She's not avoiding him in principle because he's disabled but because his behaviour is harmful towards her. There's nothing wrong with avoiding behaviour. Yes it's sad when someone can't control their behaviour but she's allowed to have her limits.

Maybe she showed compassionate understanding and made allowances by not confronting her bf’s grandfather at the time, @1dayatatime?

Does compassionate understanding mean she has to put herself into a situation where she is made to feel upset and hurt? I don’t think it does - and I don’t think she is harming the gentleman by not being in his company.

Yes ableism matters, however it's at the discretion of the person who's the victim of the racist abuse to decide whether or not they have the emotional bandwidth to tolerate or make allowances in any given moment.

Noone else's and no apologies need to be given for that either. The gf has the right to remove herself if she feels she is being harmed emotionally by the interactions.

We also know plenty of older people are racist as well as struggling with cognitive function. Just because you have dementia doesn't mean you can't also be a horrible person. It's not a get out of jail free card and we don't know the wider context as op has not given enough detail.

The gfs issue may not even purely have been the granddad himself, it could well have been the wider familys failure to support her in the moment or help redirect the grandad. From ops posts the only person who did that was the son.

I mean , how far are you willing to push this? Grandad was a prick. At some point he became an old, frailish, not all there , alcoholic (it’s an illness I know) prick. Did the shitty thing(while possibly drunk, don’t know, don’t care)and I cut him off.