Man humiliates father-in-law who claims he's not a 'real man,' wife gets upset.

Dealing with a rude in-law is a real losing situation.

You're constantly forced to choose between keeping the peace at the expense of your own dignity, or standing up for yourself and risking more long-term conflict with both your partner and their family.

There's no one-size-fits-all answer on how to deal with a mean in-law, so you really have to follow your gut and hope for the best.

In a popular post on the AITA subreddit, a man asked if he's wrong for intentionally embarrassing his father-in-law in front of the extended family.

He wrote:

AITA for deliberately embarrassing my father-in-law in front of his family?

I (M36) am absolutely not what you would call a 'handy' kind of guy. I can build an IKEA flatpack, and I can follow a YouTube tutorial to find out how to de-clog my washing machine, but I don't have any (what my father-in-law (M60) would call) 'worthwhile skills.'

I have to give him the credit that he's due, and say that he's knowledgeable about plumbing, joinery, and electrics. He has often helped me and my wife with matters in our home (leaky pipe, some plastering work etc), and we have always been grateful and appreciative of his efforts. My skills are more IT based.

I work in this field for a living, which means I often get saddled with the old chestnuts such as 'can you fix the printer?', or 'the internet isn't working'. To me, these are simple issues to fix, but he's very IT illiterate. I never make a big deal about this, because it's the least I can do to repay his help. However, he spares no opportunity whatsoever to take shots at my lack of 'worthwhile skills.'

He'll say (often in front of family and friends) that I'm not a real man, or that I'd be useless in an emergency, that sort of thing. Because he does a lot of stuff that I generally suck at, I bite my tongue and don't say anything to him. This week changed that. We bought my daughter this massive climbing frame/swing set for her birthday.

My wife and I were able to assemble most of it, but the last few bits, as well as anchoring it to the ground were giving us issues. My brother happened to stop by to visit, so he helped, but my wife also phoned FIL to come and help. We got the job done, but again, the commentary continued, which was especially insulting considering my brother was there.

Yesterday we were up visiting him. I was there, as was my wife, his wife, and my wife's brother and his wife. He asked me if I could look at his laptop, as he had some sort of virus. When I fired it up, it was one of those ransomware programs - camera was showing the webcam feed on a fake police website.

I was able to get his computer somewhat back to normal after a while, which took longer than he'd have liked according to his comments. While I was bringing it back, he kept badgering me about what had caused the virus. A peruse through his internet history revealed a LOT of porn.

Nothing particularly embarrassing, but probably information that he wouldn't have wanted shared. It was out of my mouth before I had even finished processing the thought. 'Loads of these porn websites have a lot of viruses and dodgy stuff, I'll get you a membership from my Norton account.'

You could have cut the tension with a knife. His wife looked super angry, and sister in law stifled a laugh. We left shortly after that, but on the way out we heard the two of them arguing. My wife gave me both barrels in the car, but I said he is always giving me hassle and I keep my mouth shut. Things have been frosty ever since, and I wonder if I went too far. AITA?

People quickly shared their opinions about how OP handled the ongoing conflict.

Dittoheadforever wrote:

You're NTA. If he doesn't like the answer, he shouldn't ask the question. And he kind of got what he deserved after all his condescending badgering.

ThrowRA_Mermaid wrote:

NTA but your wife and her dad are. If someone in my family was speaking to my husband like that, I would have shut that ish down immediately. They can treat you with respect or they can kick rocks. You and your wife need to have a talk then establish boundaries with her parents.

my80saddiction wrote:

I seriously can't stop laughing. Well, Dad? What did we learn today? He asked. He badgered you, even, to tell him what caused the problem. You did so. Could you have done it better? Yes. You could have offered to teach him how to clean his browser history. But did you do anything wrong? Not a bit. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes, Dad. NTA, OP.

Nosdarb wrote:

I mean, I would have just not fixed the computer. Being as you have no worthwhile skills, and all. Also, feels like your wife probably should have put the kibosh on this a long time ago. The fact that she's on your case about it isn't great. NTA, and please ask him if he's 'po&^ed up the laptop again' every single time he maligns your life skills from now on.

jhdore wrote:

NTA. I laughed out loud - how could you pass up such an open goal? If he can't take it, he shouldn't dish it out.

Clearly, OP is NTA, and his father-in-law had it coming for a long time.