Redditor Wants To Know “AITA” For Scolding Her Sister For Feeding Baby Junk Food

Everyone aspires to be and raise a healthy eater. Honestly, it’s a great goal! But food politics within families can get brutal. What, when, and how much someone is eating — especially if it’s something considered a “bad” food or a “junk food” — can get dicey, and the line between “I’m worried about your health and nutrition” and “I’m food and body shaming you” can be thin indeed. This is something Redditor u/WinComprehensive8274 (we’ll call her Win) recently encountered with her sister and nephew. Now she wants to know “Am I The Assh*le”?

“Feeling increasingly guilty about this,” she begins. “Help me feel better or worse.”

Always an auspicious beginning on the ever-popular AITA.

She goes on to explain that her sister has a 1 year old that Win has been looking after while her sister and partner move house.

“I’ve been increasingly shocked by what she sends him to my house with for lunch. This is now: a sausage roll … 2 bags of crisps … chocolate biscuits, cake bars and most recently Jaffa cakes,” she says. “There’s always a yogurt thank heavens, but that’s it in the way of any form of nutrients.”

Concerned, Win began to broach the subject with a “jokey approach,” telling her sister that her own child would be jealous of all the treats, or making comments about sugar-highs. But…

“After several weeks I’ve snapped and told her she is going to have a poorly child who looses all his teeth by age 5 if all she feeds him is junk.”

Obviously, the sister began upset and mortified.

“[She] said I’ve accused her of being a crap parent and now things aren’t the same between us,” Win laments. “Maybe I should have kept my mouth shut, but he’s a baby and really should be getting a healthier diet. No idea what to do from here.”

Generally with AITA, there’s variety in answers, but consensus is pretty clearly leaning toward either “Not The Assh*le” (NTA) or “You’re The Assh*le” (YTA). This was as thoroughly mixed between the two — along with “Everyone Sucks Here” (ESH) and “No Assh*les Here” (NAH) as I’ve ever seen…

“ESH,” reads the most upvoted comment. “Yes, she needs to feed him better. But you went the complete wrong way about it. Joking was never going to fix anything. And snapping and acting like the baby was gonna lose all of his teeth was a sh*tty thing to do. You are an adult. Learn to tell concerns to others like an adult with proper communication.”

““YTA,” says another. “You didn’t even try to talk to her sister to sister. You went from passive aggressive joking then straight for her throat. There was no conversation where you said ‘hey I’m seriously worried can we talk?’ That’s not cool.”

“NTA for your intentions,” offers a third. “But YTA for how you went about it.”

But not everyone felt Win was in the wrong at all. Plenty of commenters chimed in “NTA.”

“I know its not meant to be your responsibility,” says one of them, “but please feed this baby some real food.”

“NTA bad parenting needs to be shamed outright,” declares a second bluntly. “Someone needs to be standing up for these children.”

One comment stuck out to me, though. It did not offer a “YTA” or “NTA” or even “ESH,” but some sound advice.

“In my experience it is never wise to tell a parent how to raise their child,” they write. “Literally nothing good comes of it. The parent won’t alter their behavior towards their kid and they’ll just resent you. Even in situations where you’re completely right. But if the kid is in your care when he’s dropped off, you could simply not give him most of that food to eat.”