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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/AITAEnablingAuntie on 2023-06-27 01:45:04+00:00.

My sister Taylor got married earlier this year. Before that happened, my niece Isabela was bullied by a classmate named Joey in middle school. Taylor had to request a meeting with the school to demand Joey be separated from Isabela because Joey had been making extremely unacceptable comments towards her. Joey had been causing issues for other classmates as well, such as purposely spilling drinks into another kid’s backpack or taking another kid’s notebook and threatening to tear up the pages. Joey was kept separate from Isabela, and he attended a different high school. Isabela said she thought she would never have to see Joey again.

Well, Taylor and her now husband Asher had dated for four years. They decided only after getting engaged to introduce each others’ children, which is when Isabela discovered that Asher’s son was the same Joey who used to bully her. Obviously, this immediately caused some issues. Taylor uses the same explanations as Joey, which is that Joey was an ignorant kid and didn’t know any better, and his parents’ divorce pushed him to act out. While I’m sure those things are true, Isabela says that Joey refuses to take self-accountability.

According to Isabela, Taylor and Asher keep trying to push her to be friends with Joey. Isabela will explain that she just doesn’t want to hang out with Joey, but her mom will simply go behind her back. For example, Taylor invited Isabela to go to the mall saying it would be just the two of them, Isabela agreed, and then Joey hopped in the car at the last second because they were all going to shop at the mall together.

Taylor explains that she and especially Asher are upset that Isabela doesn’t want to include him or Joey in activities. She’s also worried because Isabela has been mentioning moving out, which Taylor thinks is too soon because she’s only nineteen. Taylor says she and Joey should just be friends now that they’re stepsiblings (this is why she and Asher didn’t introduce children until after their engagement.)

I told Taylor that she can’t force Isabela to be friends with Joey just because they are now stepsiblings. Taylor kept giving me the same explanations for Joey’s behavior. I told Taylor if Joey has truly changed and is genuinely remorseful for the way he treated Isabela, then he would understand that he is not entitled to Isabela’s friendship. Trying to force a friendship never works outside of movies regardless. She’ll only strain her relationship with her daughter if she doesn’t let go of her “become best friends” expectation.

Isabela thanked me later for trying to reason with her mom, but my parents had the opposite reaction. Taylor was devastated by her first husband’s death and she finally found someone new who makes her happy, so they said of course she wants her family to get along. They told me I was enabling my niece to act childish, and that the bullying stopped by high school so I should also encourage Isabela to “stop holding grudges.” AITA?