Ok, this is my first diary and sorry that it is kinda personal. But I have a political and family problem and maybe some people out there have had a similar problem, and can tell me what they did about it, if anything.
On Christmas our family had our first real meeting with my older son's girlfriend. She's a very attractive young woman, but unfortunately she is a racist. At dinner she told a joke about President Obama that I absolutely refuse to repeat here. You'll have to take my word that it was an extremely offensive joke.
And that's not all. She also said things about Obama and politics in general to indicate that she is a follower of right wing media, such as Glenn Beck. I don't know if she likes him in particular but she certainly likes those sorts of opinions. She said that she didn't like socialism and that the president is friends with socialists and terrorists. It was pretty out of the blue. This was right before the joke in question. My family was in shock and it was very awkward from then on, at least for my wife and I.
Our family is very diverse, and we have never had to deal with racism or extreme opinions within it. That is part of the reason I am concerned right now and don't know what to do. My wife has three wonderful daughters. Her oldest is dating a Jewish man, and her youngest is already married to a young man who is half Algerian, and they have a baby daughter who looks just like him. My wife is part Native American, part Portuguese, and part Irish. My youngest son has been with the same Vietnamese-American girl since Middle School. Fortunately him and his fiancee weren't at our house for Christmas this year, given what my older son's girlfriend said.
My older son is definitely not a racist, but he is extremely not interested in anything political. He is definitely not a chip-off-the-old-block in that way! He is just a nice 'one of the guys' who doesn't care about politics at all, and probably just doesn't care what his girlfriend has to say on the subject. He is also, how can I say this... very vulnerable to the charms of a young woman. My father puts it another more direct way that I can't repeat here - it involves being addicted to a female body part.
So my son is with this girl who has already said really offensive things to my family and didn't even seem to notice that we didn't like it. I think it is going to cause big problems in the future. I also just don't trust her, I don't trust someone who has those right wing opinions and, more importantly, who would disrespect our house like that. I am worried about my son and the future meetings of our family, because of her.
It would be really hard to talk to my son about it because he is just completely not interested in anything remotely political and wouldn't really understand the problem. He would just think 'there goes dad again making a big deal about politics'. He wouldn't understand, I don't think, that the problem was the disrespect she showed by saying something racist. But I don't like her, I don't trust her, and I don't want a racist in my family.
Has anyone encountered anything like this before in their own family, and if so, what did you do? I want to respect my son as an adult, but I also want to prevent him from getting hurt or taken advantage of, and I want to protect my family from future problems.