The mom said she and her brother had always gotten along, even though they lived very different lives. She had been vegetarian for nearly 20 years. Her brother hunted. They did not agree on everything, but according to her Reddit post, they usually respected each other’s choices.
That respect was part of why the Christmas gift caught her so off guard.
Her brother already had a teenage son who hunted with him, and the family seemed used to that. But that year, he bought guns for her 12-year-old twin sons without asking her first. One of the boys wanted nothing to do with the gift. He was sensitive, she said, and told his uncle he did not want to use it.
The other boy reacted completely differently. He was excited right away, especially when he realized the gift meant he might get to go hunting with his uncle.
The original Reddit post can be found here: https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/ej9ibd/aita_for_telling_my_brother_he_cant_take_my_son/
The mom did not immediately explode, but she was shocked and hurt. In her mind, buying a gun for someone else’s child was not a casual gift. It was the kind of decision that should have been discussed with the parent first, especially when the children were 12 and being raised in a vegetarian household.
She tried to explain hunting plainly to her son. It did not just mean going into the woods with his uncle. It meant carrying a gun and killing an animal. She said her younger son seemed a little put off once it was explained that directly, but he still wanted to go.
That put her in a hard spot. If she said no, she risked disappointing the son who was excited. If she said yes, she would be allowing something she was not comfortable with and had not been given a chance to consider before the gift was put in her sons’ hands.
Her brother tried to compromise. He offered to take the boy hunting but not let him actually use the gun, just so he could see what it was all about. That did not fully settle the mom’s concern. She was not sure whether allowing him to go along, even without shooting, would still be too much.
The guns themselves were not going to stay in her house. In an edit, she clarified that her brother said they would remain locked in his gun cabinet unless the boys were with him and using them. That addressed one safety concern, but it did not address the bigger boundary issue.
Her brother had taken a major parental decision and dropped it into her lap in front of the kids. Now she had to either allow something she did not agree with or become the person who took away an exciting gift after it had already been given.
The mom later said she was not against her sons ever hunting if they chose that path. Her family had plenty of hunters, including on her dad’s side. The problem was that her brother made the first move before she could talk to her sons about what hunting actually meant, what firearm safety required, and whether they were mature enough for it.
By the time she updated the post, she had decided both boys would take a hunter safety class regardless of whether either one went hunting. Even the son who wanted nothing to do with guns would take it, because she felt they were around guns enough through family that basic safety knowledge mattered.
Most commenters said the brother was wrong to buy guns for someone else’s children without asking first. Some were hunters and gun owners themselves, but they still said a parent should be consulted before a minor is given a firearm or invited into a hunting activity.
Several people focused on the way the gift put the mom in a bad position. By handing the guns to the kids first, the brother made her look like the bad guy if she said no afterward. Commenters said that was unfair, even if he meant well.
Others said 12 was not necessarily too young to start learning, depending on the child, the law, and the level of supervision. But even those commenters usually added the same condition: safety class first, range time first, and parental approval first.
Some commenters suggested that if the younger son was interested, he could begin with hunter safety or target shooting before going into the woods. That would let him learn the rules and see whether his interest was really in hunting or just in doing something exciting with his uncle.
The mom seemed to take that advice seriously. She was not trying to shut the door forever. She was trying to slow the situation down after her brother turned a Christmas gift into a parenting decision she never got to make ahead of time.
