Opinions on this?

retro:electro

Op I think there was nothing ignorant about his initial response saying he took them by mistake. He probably meant he didn't realise they were yours or that you'd be needing them. They were in his bedroom stored alongside his DVDs, so he probably felt no harm in taking them. It was you then who acted like a smart Alec and started getting cheeky. "You hardly bought pocohantas yourself", of course he's entitled to tell you to cop on. You were being completely irrational.

The fact your mother is now involved and accusations are being thrown at the fiancé has taken this to a whole new level. It should have been between you and your brother, nobody else. It's shocking that you are so irate about this.

maggiepip

anna080 wrote: »

Op I think there was nothing ignorant about his initial response saying he took them by mistake. He probably meant he didn't realise they were yours or that you'd be needing them. They were in his bedroom stored alongside his DVDs, so he probably felt no harm in taking them. It was you then who acted like a smart Alec and started getting cheeky. "You hardly bought pocohantas yourself", of course he's entitled to tell you to cop on. You were being completely irrational.

The fact your mother is now involved and accusations are being thrown at the fiancé has taken this to a whole new level. It should have been between you and your brother, nobody else. It's shocking that you are so irate about this.

Totally agree and thinking more about the op 's reaction is actually making me angry! Smart alec is right, as for the demand he admits guilt and intentional theft...:( The mother should know better too.

Flippyfloppy

anna080 wrote: »

acted like a smart Alec and started getting cheeky. "You hardly bought pocohantas yourself

So true. Op a better, more amicable response to his genuine, level headed first response would have been along the lines of 'yeah....I still watch those DVDs on rainy Sunday's! Please keep them safe and bring them with you next time you're over or even post them!'

Instead a whole family is at war now, a heavily pregnant woman has now been accused of stealing at such a vulnerable time in her life, if I were her I would not want my kids around your family either for fear of what you'd all come out with.

LegacyUser

Lux23 wrote: »

why do you need a copy of Aladdin at 24 years of age? Let your brother have them for his step child.

I'm 34 and have a copy of Aladdin as well as every other Disney and Pixar film and hundreds more animated films and I've no kids. Just because some people look down their nose on animated films and see it as only for children doesn't mean they are. Content of the dvds is irrelevant, fact remains they weren't his.

power pants

anna080 wrote: »

Op I think there was nothing ignorant about his initial response saying he took them by mistake. He probably meant he didn't realise they were yours or that you'd be needing them. They were in his bedroom stored alongside his DVDs, so he probably felt no harm in taking them. It was you then who acted like a smart Alec and started getting cheeky. "You hardly bought pocohantas yourself", of course he's entitled to tell you to cop on. You were being completely irrational.

The fact your mother is now involved and accusations are being thrown at the fiancé has taken this to a whole new level. It should have been between you and your brother, nobody else. It's shocking that you are so irate about this.

Going to sound harsh but is the reason that op is so annoyed due to the "backing" from the mother. Im still puzzled at her sitting by and watching yet reporting to the daughter everything in an almost tell tale way.

Could be wide of the mark, just how it comes accross to me reading this

meeeeh

Flippyfloppy wrote: »

So true. Op a better, more amicable response to his genuine, level headed first response would have been along the lines of 'yeah....I still watch those DVDs on rainy Sunday's! Please keep them safe and bring them with you next time you're over or even post them!'

Instead a whole family is at war now, a heavily pregnant woman has now been accused of stealing at such a vulnerable time in her life, if I were her I would not want my kids around your family either for fear of what you'd all come out with.

Threatening with not seeing kids is extreme imo. And I do think brother and fiancee overreacted but I agree with gist of this post. There was no need for a full on attack and blowing everything out of proportion.

Btw like op's brother we stay with my parents when visiting. I get sometimes calls weeks or months after we left saying I was in the room and I think you forgot whatever. Not two hours later when it is obvious it was first checked if anything was taken. This situation could be handled so much more tactfully and frankly I would give it couple of weeks for everything to calm down and then try to apologize. For me the most important would be the apology to fiancee for accusations levelled at her. Make her an enemy and brother will be choosing between his parents and his new family. And the choice will be obvious.

PearlJ

I agree OP it is the principal of the thing that would really irk you. Has he even offered to send the stuff back?. It's very strange behaviour on his part.

maggiepip

power pants wrote: »

Going to sound harsh but is the reason that op is so annoyed due to the "backing" from the mother. Im still puzzled at her sitting by and watching yet reporting to the daughter everything in an almost tell tale way.

Could be wide of the mark, just how it comes accross to me reading this

Yeah, I think the mother is probably even more at fault by winding this up and allowing it to escalate and creating a "gang up" situation. As a parent she should know better and setting a really bad example.

retro:electro

maggiepip wrote: »

Yeah, I think the mother is probably even more at fault by winding this up and allowing it to escalate and creating a "gang up" situation. As a parent she should know better and setting a really bad example.

Agreed. It's very calculated between them. They've filled in the blanks and added 1+1 and came up with 100. If I ever came to my mother with such silly notions she would tell me to cop and get over myself

TizTaly2015

Ok, had to read the post a couple of times before I made a comment.

Here it goes - I think you are over reacting op, you and your mother. As many have said already, why did your mother wait until they were gone to say check the dvds? Anyways, in my own family, I have often been in my mothers and taken a loan of cd or dvd without asking - its just how we are. And members of my family have taken dvds from my house without asking - I don't really care. I've already seen them, why not spread the joy to others?? We do the same with books..

You and your mother did accuse the fiancé - there's no denying that and if I was her, I would be very very upset. However, it does not condone any abusive texts from her to your mother - could you clarify how abusive or is it just the same 'how dare you.......' texts?

I agree with so many here - young girl saw the movies, asked could she have them, fiancé asked your brother, he said 'yeah, why not, we've seen them all already', took them and that was that.

In relation to the CD's - same thing. Making a presumption here but most people have their music on an ipod now or on the computer - maybe he knew the CDs weren't being listened to and felt that they could get a use out of them?

He was silly in a way - he should of just asked but he didn't. But I really don't think you can lose your brother and your new niece/nephew over this. Let it be for a while maybe but keep in touch with him (hows the pregnancy, are you all set, are you excited, hows the niece keeping etc etc...)

That's just my few cents worth.

Flippyfloppy

meeeeh wrote: »

Threatening with not seeing kids is extreme imo. And I do think brother and fiancee overreacted but I agree with gist of this post. There was no need for a full on attack and blowing everything out of proportion.

I get that, and I don't think using the kids as leverage is right either. However I don't think it's a threat as such I think not seeing them again or their kids is a possible consequence to the mess of the situation and how it snowballed into these accusations.

Bananaleaf

Flippyfloppy wrote: »

I get that, and I don't think using the kids as leverage is right either. However I don't think it's a threat as such I think not seeing them again or their kids is a possible consequence to the mess of the situation and how it snowballed into these accusations.

There is no way that this is JUST about a few DVDs.

The brother sounds like he has a "I'll do whatever I want" attitude. OP and her mother probably didn't handle it in a way which would be perceived as "the best" way to handle a situation like this but I get the feeling that's because they are at the end of their tether with this guy and sitting down to discuss the issue would get them nowhere.

As I said previous - the mother's reluctance to confront the son herself - I interpret this as the son being a figure of intimidation.

He most likely wasn't confronted before now about this (again I'm speculating that this is not the first instance of something like this happening) because threatening to not bring the grandchildren around is exactly how they expected him to react.

Edit - you know - I am 10 years or so out of my family home. If I were the OP's brother and even if those DVDs were mine I would still ask permission to take them back, having left them behind in someone else's property for so long.

Ethel

I'm astounded by the amount of people that are saying its only a few DVDs, there were books and CD's missing too. That is only the stuff they are aware of.

It doesn't matter a jot whether they were the above things or priceless items belonging to them, has all common decency gone out the window?? In my family if we visit each other we ask if we may borrow something or ask if they have any use for the item any more. Is it really that hard to do?

Instead, brother and fiancee took what they wanted and asked for a bigger case to accommodate their takings. What is happening here in this thread is some people have lost sight of the principle of this, or simply can't grasp why this wasn't right because someone didn't just help themselves to their own belongings. The items are irrelevant, these things weren't theirs.

I think the texting back and forth needs to settle and everyone cool off. Bully boy brother has thrown his rattle out of the pram, and threatening to cut off ties is just what I expect of him. Anything but say 'hey sorry about that, I didn't think anyone was using the stuff, I should have run it passed you first'. As for fiancees behaviour, if anyone spoke to my Mother the way the op has implied.. But he's allowing it.

The op's Mother's reaction to what she saw but didn't pull him up in it, tells me something.

Taking (it doesn't matter what!) Without the decency of mentioning it first, tells me something.

Refuses to even try to apologise or explain himself, tells me something.

'We are cutting you all off, never seeing us again or your grandchild on the way', tells me something.

Its less to do with these items and more to do with this mans attitude if you ask me. There is more to this.