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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/Komosho on 2023-07-19 04:33:22.

Hi there! I’m a 22(m) dude with a problem. My younger cousin, Paul(21m) is a total shit head that the family is mostly in denial about. He leeches off his family and makes them spend money that they really shouldn’t be spending on luxury items to fit in better with his rich friends. He’s an alcoholic and has shown up shitfaced to basically every family gathering since he was 17. And ever since we were young, I’ve basically been his punching bag.

My grandmother has tried to call out that he’s incredibly irresponsible for his age(all of his writing assignments for college are being done by his older sister and dad, he’s stolen money multiple times for stupid video game shit etc,), with the main excuse being that he’s “figuring things out”.

I have no desire to reconcile with him, he’s been a dick to me my whole life. The entire family just seems to assume he’ll eventually become not an asswipe, but i’ve been hearing that for decades.

So for years, after trying and failing to stand up for myself, I just sort of caved and took it. I disassociated at every family gathering, tried to leave, failed, and got shat on. Until a miracle happened.

I came out as gay.

See: turns out Paul is painfully homophobic. I had only kinda discerned this. We had a trans family friend as well who recently died and he was incredibly rude during the dinner after the funeral, deadnaming etc. I just sorta assumed it’d be another thing I’d get shat on for.

Until I brought my boyfriend to one of our family gatherings. Paul, mysteriously, just straight up avoids me. For the first time ever, I have a holiday where I am left alone by him. And I LOVE IT. I start too notice that whenever my partner isn’t in my proximity, he feels comfortable attempting to start shit. However, if my boyfriend is around, or if we show any degree of affection, he gets visibly disgusted and distances himself.

After testing this a few times, I found out it worked like a charm. My partner was overjoyed he could help me, and i got to actually have a great time with the rest of my family as well. Paul just stuck with other family members who weren’t in the same room as me. Since then I’ve used this tactic to basically every family gathering, me and the boyf think it’s funny and he just avoids us.

My older cousin,his sister, Alexa called me recently. He was complaining to her about it and she thought the whole thing was hilarious. I appreciated this until my sister found out. She said it’s unfair of me to weaponize my sexuality this way, and that making him uncomfortable like this is really is no better then how he’s treated me.Alexa and I argued that he’s been doing the same to me for years, it isn’t hurting him, and it’s made family gatherings actually fun to go to. She’s incredibly angry about this and is threatening too tell him that it’s intentional. I legitimately do not care if she does, but I worry a bit that I’m enjoying this a bit too much.

AITA?