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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/ExcitementSecure2737 on 2023-09-27 01:04:34.
I (29f) recently moved to the US with my girlfriend Emma (27f). We met 3 years ago when she moved to the UK to get a professional qualification that took 2 years, then she worked in the UK for a year before we both moved to the US together. I had never met her parents in person before moving here, but I had met her older sister Jane (29f) and I know that they both had spoken to their parents about me.
I’m Scottish, have lived there for my whole life, as have my parents, grandparents, great grandparents etc. what I’m saying is my family are on record here since the Scottish census began in 1801, and know my family line goes back several hundred years before that. It doesn’t really come up other than when Americans tell me they’re Scottish, which doesn’t normally bother me. Yet when we were at Emma’s parents’ last weekend for a family gathering members of the extended family kept coming up to me and telling me how happy they were that Emma is back from England and how they thought it was interesting I’m English which was confusing because Emma studied not far from my village in Scotland, and I’m not English. I politely corrected them and they all looked confused but changed the subject. After the 10th person — that’s not an exaggeration— I talked to Emma about it and she was just as confused as I was.
About an hour later and after several more instances I was in the kitchen with Emma when her mum (54f) came storming in and asked what I’d been telling people, I was confused bc I had talked to lots of people about lots of things. Then when she clarified I told her that I’ve been telling them I’m not English bc I’m not, and that Emma studied in Scotland bc she did. She went off saying how England is just what they call the UK and it’s the same. I told her that it’s not the same. She said I was letting politics get in the way. I told her that regardless of politics it’s still not the same bc England and Scotland are 2 separate countries and I want her to stop telling people I’m English, and to say Scottish or British instead. Emma agreed with me and we told her that we know she didn’t mean offence, but it is confusing and a tiny bit offensive. Bizarrely, she then said that she was referring to the continent and accused me of trying to make her seem stupid when I pointed out that would make me European. She talked to neither of us the rest of the night, neither Jane when she agreed with us.
Somehow since then it’s ended up being Emma, Jane and I vs their parents and everyone else since then and I kind of regret saying anything. Her mum has been alternating between blowing up our phones and silent treatment and I’m tired. AITA for asking her to change?