Man's SIL calls him a 'nepotism baby'; he says she's being 'wildly inappropriate.'
When this man is embarrassed by his 'inherited wealth,' he asks Reddit:
'AITA for taking a ‘nepotism baby’ joke too personally?'
At our family NYE get together, the topic of nepotism came up. I'm assuming it's something on the top of some people's minds as a result of the New York Magazine cover.
I (27m) had seen some buzz about it online but I can't say I had given it much thought myself - the number of celebrities I care about is a small one and there's a good chance I don't know anything about their family tree.
Because of lack of interest, I didn't participate in the initial conversation. The topic was brought up my by brother-in-law's wife, and I listened for a while before turning to a conversation with my husband.
After a few minutes, my BIL's wife said something along the lines of 'I want to know OP's thoughts on this since he’s a nepo baby.' It was said somewhat jokingly, but I was still confused so I asked her to explain.
She said that since I work for my dad and was basically handed a job when I graduated college that I was technically a nepotism baby.
I replied saying it was a little ridiculous to group me in with actors and models making millions on their parents' name when my husband and I were just regular people working to support ourselves and each other.
She said it was beyond just 'regular people working to support themselves' when I made [$$$] in a year. I thought the whole thing was wildly inappropriate to be discussing in front of all these people, and I told her so, saying, 'yeah you don't know what you're talking about.' She said it was just a joke and I was overreacting.
The atmosphere was obviously a little tense following that, and she all but forced my BIL out the door before the night was even over. There were mixed feelings after she left of people saying I took the joke too personally and people saying she went too far. AITA?
Let's find out.
alarmedjellyfish6 writes:
While she was an asshole for bringing it up and pushing the conversation when it clearly made OP uncomfortable, it genuinely baffles me how OP justifies and excuses the nepotism in his own situation. He doesn't make millions, so therefor being handed his job by his father isn't nepotism? ...What? ESH.
holidaycabinet8 writes:
Not being called out for it doesn’t make it less true though. Some of us struggle endlessly to find jobs and then people are just handed them on a silver platter.
OP’s situation is nowhere near as bad as celebrity or millionaire nepotism, but you do need to acknowledge that you have some degree of privilege if you didn’t have to spend a year+ getting ghosted by company after company to find a needle in a damn haystack.
Does it make OP an awful person that he was helped out? Absolutely not. Does it make him an awful person that he doesn’t like being called out?
Nope, that’s a human reaction. But burying your head in the sand pretending you weren’t one of the lucky ones isn’t the way to go either. Anyways. ESH.
cvvvvvvgrshhhhh writes:
Meritocracy fails to take family loyalty into account. A huge part of hiring family in a family business is being able to trust those family members implicitly with the business.
That they will care about it and nurture it in a different way than someone you hire off the street, because in some ways the business is part of the family, and certainly part of the family identity.
Family members are less likely to steal, to make short-term thinking decisions, to quit when things get hard, etc. Also, when you hire your children, you are training them to take over eventually.