She Made Her Nephew Cry at His Birthday Party. Is She a Jerk?

It’s my party and I’ll cry if I want to!

You’ve probably heard that song before, but this story is a twist on that classic tune…and we want to know if you think this woman acted like a major a**hole by making her nephew cry at his own birthday party.

Let’s see what’s going on here!

AITA for making my nephew cry on his birthday party over some gifts?

“My (f26) sister (f29) has a son Eric, he’s eight years old.

I don’t visit a lot, we live away, but I see them (and most of my family) at birthdays and holidays. When I visit I usually buy Eric a toy or some candy, as he’s my only nephew. Tbh I like to spoil him and maybe I am a little bit to blame for what happened too.

It was Eric’s birthday this week. I visited them and I brought him a nice car toy, the car was quite big and had lights and stuff. When I got to the party I wished him a happy birthday and handed him the gift. He opened and he loved it, he said “so far this is the best one”, which at the time I thought he was just excited but with what happened later I kinda get the idea it was more malicious intended.

Like an hour or so after the party started, when everyone had already arrived, Eric made an announcement to the table in which the adults were sitting. He said that I have won and that I was now the person who he loved the most because my gift was the one he liked the most. I thought it was sweet that he liked it.

Then he told to my mom that her gift sucked (she brought him a board game) so he didn’t loved her anymore, he also told one of his friends that next year he won’t be invited because his gift was poor (he gifted him a set of dinosaurs figures).

I think this whole thing of ranking the gifts people got them was pretty s**tty, I expected my sister or her husband to say something, but they didn’t, they just laughed. So I told Eric that he’s not supposed to say that about his gifts, people get them what they can and he should be grateful with it.

He said that he doesn’t understand why he has to love people who doesn’t buy him nice gifts. I genuinely can’t believe my sister is teaching this bulls**t to her son. His dad told him “yeah, they should give you all the best”

So I then again told him that a person’s worth is not about how expensive or big the gift they got him was, and that if he thought that way then I will not be continuing buying him gifts. Eric started to cry, my sister told me off because I made him cry but most of my family and some of her in laws were on my side and told them it was bad to teach their kid such thing.

Our mom was quite affected and I wanted to leave too, so we left after that. My sister texted me later to call me an a**hole for leaving before the candles were blow and for telling her child he won’t get any more gifts from me, she said I shouldn’t make empty threats to a child. I said that it’s not empty and it’s not a threat, its a promise until they teach their kids some manners.

Am I wrong for discussing this when my nephew was present? Am l being unreasonable to him since he’s young? And would I be wrong in the future if I keep my promise and do not buy him a gift the next time we see each other?”