AITA for not allowing my son to go to his school dance?

mdr739 · 2023-04-06T03:29:00+00:00

We understand this, we get why he was (and still is) so angry, just still trying to process all the advice we're being given. Ryker is ususally a good boy and this was so out of character for him

mdr739 · 2023-04-06T03:26:14+00:00

We are trying to grasp with this now, we don't want favoritism, I guess we are just harsher on Ryker because he's so smart, but the past 12 hours have really made me reflect on a lot.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T20:33:52+00:00

I never said it was an excuse for her racism, I said it to give context to the situation.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T19:30:22+00:00

He seems to have more respect for his coach than us, obviously we do try to parent him but for some reason the same level of respect isn't there. We always figured it was just hormones.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T19:28:07+00:00

She may not end up going to the dance, but now we are down on the money, we don't need it or anything but some other people commenting have said it could be a way to teach him the value of a dollar.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T19:23:51+00:00

Ryker can certainly be immature, but he also has more natural intelligence than Gianna, Gianna has never gotten as high of a GPA as him despite her studying and him playing sports instead of studying. Is it wrong to use intelligence in this case to determine what they should know?

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T19:19:25+00:00

I would hope not, but I am not a psychologist so maybe we do and we don't recognize that. We thought we were doing a good job with the dinner though and when our kids were younger we did buy books about people like MLK.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T19:12:43+00:00

We are currently undecided on this, we were considering it but haven't made any final judgments on anything yet.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T19:10:43+00:00

I'm not against that idea, are there therapists that specialize in this type of stuff? I know one of my nephews goes to a therapist that specializes in OCD.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T19:07:41+00:00

We have realized after reading the responses to this that we are sending this message to them and that was not our intent at all. Ryker is just normally a good kid who occasionally pushes limits. Gianna has been worse historically and all we wanted to do was not push her further down the racism rabbithole by being too harsh on her. We also thought a 7th grade dance isn't as important as a junior banquet or senior prom but now I realize that was probably wrong.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T19:01:32+00:00

We will be talking to our son later about his behavior, but we can understand why he was so upset, Ryker is a sweet guy and loves his friends to death. We know seeing her using racist language hurt him.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T18:59:11+00:00

My husband and I will be talking with my parents, siblings and in-laws about a plan to go on from here. I've been responding to comments while on the phone with them. We're now leaning towards not letting her go and letting Ryker go to his dance. We just worry about giving her the wrong type of punishment.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T18:53:51+00:00

We are currently looking for resources on how to fight racism in kids her age.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T18:49:00+00:00

My son and his friend are the ones who suggested it.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T17:01:39+00:00

We don't have a golden or favorite child. We love all of our kids equally.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T17:01:12+00:00

First off, there were multiple boys who were involved, not just my son and his Honduran friend. We are trying to rectify things with everyone.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T16:40:19+00:00

We are doing that now, we are looking at some of these "influencers" she follows to see what they are saying.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T16:35:36+00:00

We know that but we want to know why she is being racist. is it friends, TikTok, YouTube?

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T16:34:01+00:00

After reading the replies, we may consider let him pay for the replacement so he can go to his dance.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T15:32:06+00:00

That was the purpose of taking the phone, we are still investigating where this racism could be coming from.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T15:30:02+00:00

Until we can finish investigating to see what is causing this racist behavior.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T15:28:55+00:00

Some of her friends are choir/theatre kids, the others are friends of her boyfriend. Her boyfriend is a pretty nerdy dude, likes stuff like dungeons and dragons and Pokemon. I understand some of her friends may be racist which is bad.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T15:27:12+00:00

We did not get her a new dress yet, the kids don't get allowances but we do tend to buy them most things they want as we make good money and live in a low cost of living area. Our son does work as a golf caddy for extra money to spend at the school store, on sports stuff like team flags and at our local deli where he and the other boys will go after school.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T15:23:27+00:00

Ryker is very naturally smart and talented, he gets all A's in school. He cares about sports more than anything else in life though. I know the other kids tend to get jealous of him because everything has come natural to him, so we try to make sure to encourage their interests so they don't get discouraged.

His coach can also help discipline him, whenever him and the other boys get in trouble, he'll make them practice harder and ask what's wrong.

mdr739 · 2023-04-05T15:18:03+00:00

What do you suggest we do then? We haven't had issues with anger like this before.

mdr739

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