Am I the A**hole 14 - SimplyPodLogical #145

General Rule of Thumb: Do not propose at someone else's event without getting their permission beforehand.

Kimchi is quintessentially Korean and I’d say the teacher was definitely hugely insensitive at best and racist at worst. Kimchi isn’t what I would consider particularly smelly. As someone who had kids in school judge me for my food it would be better for the teacher to teach the kids to accept other people’s food/cultures and not force the kid to have to eat like the other kids. That’ll just make them feel less accepted for their culture and having to forcible conform for others.

I’ve seen the proposal story before, the brother CONSTANTLY tries to upstage his sister because he’s the ✨golden child✨ that’s why the sister wasn’t mad at the boyfriend for standing up for her.

Christine and Ben giggling at each other and making up a whole legal argument about the proposal story was the most unhinged and hilarious moment in this podcasts history :P

The “smelly food” Argument is so annoying… I used to work for an early intervention and it was always really tough because parents send their kids in with food that they thought was the norm rather than actually food that they would eat so the kids will go hungry and get even more cranky. I used to ask the parents to bring in any food that they like to eat…no matter what it was because I would prefer a child be fed and not be fed at all. That teacher was extremely insensitive and completely the asshole

Ben saying a housewarming event isn't that important is killing me. This girl just bought her very first home, that's a huge deal. Maybe if this is the second or third housewarming party, I could see what he's saying. But come on. Even then, just don't take away from other people's celebratory events without asking permission.

Proposal story - Possible hot take. If you’re going to propose at someone else’s event (no matter what it is) you need prior approval before doing so. You’re hijacking the effort, time, and money the planner put into the event for your own event so they need to be okay with it.

it's not fair to expect your kids to take care of you when old but it's also not fair to expect your parents to save a bunch of money just to give (adult) you

My sister is a kindergarten teacher. She has a student who comes with junk food as lunch. My sister asked the mom “is your daughter supposed to be picking up a school lunch and eating these at snack time or the items in her bag for lunch?” The mother told my sister the items were the daughters lunch because the daughter is a picky eater and my sister dropped it. Is it a healthy nutritious lunch? No, is it my sister’s job to correct the parents decision? absolutely not.

Another thing I wanna add about the preschool child is that from what I understand the child probably is a picky eater and just really only likes to eat what his mom packs for lunch everyday. And for a mom what's more important for you is that your child eats than packing them something that doesn't smell that much just because the teacher is complaining about how "distracting" the food is. (I'm not a mom or anything but at least that's my understanding of it)

There is additional context from the OP ruining the proposal. It wasn’t the first time that her family hijacked her events so she was use to this kind of treatment.

25:29 Christine creating a hypothetical where Ben is abandoned on an island is the most long-term-couple thing ever 😂

As a 30-yr old married woman with my own house, I (& my brother) have always had a room at the houses my parents lived in when we moved out. Every time I come home, my mom would always say "You know that this is your home and you will always have a room/be welcomed here" Of course those rooms are technically guest rooms since we don't live there, but they're even decorated with our pictures of childhood. That makes me sad that they took her childhood room away so early into her adulthood (and honestly at 18 you're still a kid) and without discussing it with her.

RE: daughter's room - it's weird they didn't even talk to her about "hey we're renovating" it was just a surprise. Living with a boyfriend is not a stable environment for many women, being dependent on a boy with feeling like there's no safety net can lead to staying in a bad relationship.

33:07 As someone who lives in a country were you should save for 30+ years to buy a house, I would be so effing mad if this happened, I wouldn't stop it but I would be so mad. Its the op's gf first house, we don't know the sacrifices the gf made and he /did/ say she put so much effort in the party itself.

To say a housewarming isn’t an important event is a shocking take. That girl worked hard and bought a whole house. That is an achievement that should be celebrated. It’s always crazy to me when people find weddings more important than college graduations or home buying. Get your priorities straight.

The story about the parents demolishing their daughter's room right away is so upsetting! They had every right to do it, but they should have simply communicated that intention with her, or even at least told her that it'd been done. It looks like she just came home and didn't expect to find her room demolished. Like wow, clearly they don't care about her coming back or visiting (which most parents do), but also, sometimes your old room is just a place you're attached to. Having it destroyed within a few months without even knowing can be really sad. It's odd that the parents didn't realise that yes, that could make someone emotional.

The girlfriend meeting the parents for the first time I followed along with that one, and it turns out that the boyfriend/son actually put her up to it. He said that his parents would be fine with that joke, and then didn’t stand up for her or say that he said it to try to like relieve that tension. Poor girl.

for the proposal story-- it seems like the brother purposefully waited for his sister to not be in the room to propose, if you wanted it to be a family thing and didn't expect any issues, wouldn't you want everyone in the room? seems like he was trying to steal her thunder for whatever reason

Re: parents renovating - wow, when the scenario was explained, my first thought was "I wonder how long they'd been planning that renovation?" and I absolutely understood why the daughter was so hurt. I think if her parents had said to her beforehand, "hey we're thinking that its time to expand the living room, but we'd have to knock down the wall in your old room to do it - do you want to talk about it before we go ahead?" and given her an opportunity to voice her feelings, she'd have probably been really open to it, but to be blindsided by it was pretty inconsiderate on the part of her parents.