Would you refer to someone's step-siblings as their brother or sister?

May 12, 2023 4:57 AM

I was with a teenager and sort of stumbled over how to refer to his step-brothers who were living in the same house. He seemed to take offense and replied "you mean my brothers?"--is that the normal usage these days?
posted by Jon44 to Human Relations (25 answers total)

Yes.

Not for everyone but it’s super common.
posted by warriorqueen at 4:59 AM on May 12, 2023 [6 favorites]

I’d always default to the more inclusive language (brothers, sisters, instead of half brothers, step sisters) unless the person you’re talking to has already used step-/half- or has corrected you.
posted by blue suede stockings at 5:07 AM on May 12, 2023 [20 favorites]

I don't know what you mean by "these days." I'm 52, my step and half sisters are and always have been my sisters, and that has been the case since 1976.
posted by DarlingBri at 5:11 AM on May 12, 2023 [28 favorites]

I doubt there is a convention across all cultures and countries so codified that anyone here is able to say what is the "normal usage these days." I use "brother" or "sister" until more information is required when speaking about myself, and also because it seems polite and more inclusive to do it this way, as blue suede stockings says. Because I have every type of sibling one can have: full, half, step, adoptive, biological
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 5:13 AM on May 12, 2023 [14 favorites]

I think the answers will demonstrate that there's no one correct answer to this. In contrast to above, I would ABSOLUTELY NOT refer to someone's stepsiblings (that I knew to be stepsiblings) as just "siblings" without knowing for a fact that they preferred that. I also come from a background of a contentious and awful step-relative situation, so that's obviously coloring my thoughts. In my eyes, "calling a stepbrother a 'brother' when he is considered a 'stepbrother'" is a worse offense than "calling a stepbrother a 'stepbrother' when he is considered a 'brother.'"
posted by obfuscation at 5:26 AM on May 12, 2023 [21 favorites]

Yes. It’s a designator of emotional attachment and not parental lineage. I have a young family member with both step- and half- siblings and they all refer to each other as brother and sister because they see themselves as a whole family. And, yes, the pack of them get offended if someone refers to any of their group as a half- or step-. Best to just ask - “do you refer to Jane and Bob as your brother and sister…?” - and follow suit.
posted by Silvery Fish at 5:27 AM on May 12, 2023 [9 favorites]

I think there are some occasions in which referring to a step-sibling as a sibling is common and appropriate:

1) You are/were in childhood and are/were living in the same home together sharing in family life
2) You are/were far apart in age but created a bond via the young age of the younger, eg: You are 15 and your parent remarries to someone with a baby. You watch that baby fully grow up and that baby has never known life without you in it.

Instances where I probably wouldn't:

A) The family dynamic of 1 or 2 is unhealthy or unhappy
B) When the step-siblings enter the picture as adults or elder and you never really get to know each other or don't have a sibling-type relationship.

But YMMV, really depends on the choice of the step-siblings in question as to how they view their relationship.
posted by greta simone at 5:29 AM on May 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

Nthing that it depends on the situation. My dad got remarried when I was in college and I had two step-siblings for almost a decade. But I didn't spend much time with either of them and don't really consider them siblings. And since my dad and their mom then got a divorce, what are they not? Ex-step-siblings?

But I've also met people who have step siblings and have a close sibling relationship and for them, those people absolutely are siblings, no step modified used.
posted by carrioncomfort at 5:51 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

There's not going to be a universal answer to this, but I don't think it's unusual for someone to prefer to refer to them that way. Others may prefer to call them step siblings.
posted by bearette at 5:53 AM on May 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

I grew up in a purely white american culture where these relationship terms were always about blood relation and precision was absolute. I worked in an office where your exact blood relationship to a deceased person determined whether you'd get funeral leave. The allowable relationships were spelled out in a list.

Later in life as I have a more diverse set of people in my life, especially more Native and queer people, I have learned that some people describe relationships according to the role a person plays in their life. If someone acts as your nephew, they're your nephew. If someone acts as your grandmother, they're your grandmother. I am so lucky to have a grandmother in my life now, even though both of my blood grandmothers died years ago. I recently went to the funeral of a kind and loved man that a whole community honored and talked about as an Uncle.

Please, just be generous and accepting of how other people describe their relationships. These are very personal choices and they should be honored.
posted by fritley at 5:58 AM on May 12, 2023 [28 favorites]

Default to the inclusive language and if corrected, then use whatever they specify in the correction. The inclusive language will be fine most of the time.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:10 AM on May 12, 2023 [8 favorites]

Oh, and since my answer didn't make it really clear... while I would not default to calling stepsiblings just siblings, I don't consider that unusual at all, and I will always refer to someone's family however they prefer.
posted by obfuscation at 6:18 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

I agree that it's mostly an emotional thing. My step-father, who was literally the only father I ever knew (my mom was divorced and remarried before I was two years old) has always been my dad. The child he and my mom had together was always my sister, and still is.
posted by lhauser at 6:30 AM on May 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

Default to the inclusive language and if corrected, then use whatever they specify in the correction. The inclusive language will be fine most of the time.

This, or simply ask first. But if you are going to assume and use a term without asking, I agree that you should default to the inclusive version and then adjust if you are corrected.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:33 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

This is a situation where there is no clear answer and someone could be offended either way (how dare you call her my sister - she is my stepsister!).

So in my book, unless you have purposely chosen the term someone doesn't want you to use, that person taking offense instead of just kindly alerting you to their preference is being a bit of a jerk. But since this is a teenager, I'd be more forgiving than I would if we were talking about someone in their 30s.
posted by FencingGal at 6:55 AM on May 12, 2023 [5 favorites]

Different people feel differently about how they want to refer to their siblings. If you don't know anything specific about the term someone prefers, and there's no contextual reason it's important to know, I would err on the side of calling them siblings. To me, it's much worse to separate out the kinds of siblings where that's not necessary than to lump everyone in as a sibling until it becomes clear to you that this specific family cares about the differentiation.

Where I'm coming from, so you can decide how to take that bias into account: I have an array of step-siblings on each side but absent a very specific situation where it's contextually important to know that, I think about them and talk about them as my siblings. Period. That's what I've been doing since the 1980s, it's not a "these days" usage thing.

It may or may not have anything to do with how very clear the step-side of my family made it to me that I was A Different Tier of Grandchild, being a step-grandchild vs. a blood-related one. It was incredibly hurtful, made parts of my childhood incredibly painful, and I would chew my arm off to avoid making anyone else feel as if they are somehow a Different And Clearly Lesser Kind of Family in a way that could cause similar pain, unless I knew for certain that they personally felt it was a useful, valueless descriptor for their own personal relationships.

(That said, I do refer to my step-parents on each side as my step-parents, and my shitty biological father as my biodad, and my mother who is an actual loving parent as my mother.. And that is, frankly, at least in part about differentiating ways in which each of those relationships is emotionally and functionally distinct as well as just being technically correct context. Which is to say: even for one person in one specific family context, it's complicated to know when to use which term. You're probably not going to go too wrong just asking what terms people use in their family, in most cases.)
posted by Stacey at 7:51 AM on May 12, 2023 [4 favorites]

The man I think of as my stepdad wasn't even married to my mother when he died. If they had had time to get married I'm 100% sure he would have been my dad almost immediately.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:22 AM on May 12, 2023

People are prickly about things. I didn't like it when my father-in-law said he'd just call my stepfather my Dad. (Married my Mom when I was 25, good guy, but not my deceased Dad. also, father-in-law was a massive jerk.) Some people can be a bit snotty; teen could have corrected you kindly.
posted by theora55 at 8:50 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

All combinations seem common in my (NE US) experience. Even within my own constellation of steps and halves, I’m not consistent about the labels, *even for the same people*. That being said, people are generally more likely to discard the “step” if they grew up with that person and/or if they are close and spend as much time together as blood relations. If they peacefully live together I’d probably say “siblings.”

I think the kids responded strongly because they’re kids who have not encountered a variety of ways to label extended family. Most folks with more experience know that you have no way to know their preferences, and will give them if they feel strongly about the label.
posted by tchemgrrl at 8:54 AM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

In Sweden, step siblings are most commonly called "bonus" siblings (this is my bonus brother) and stepparents are your bonus dad and bonus mom, most commonly. That is not a tradition in the US but am adding this information for future readers who may want to consider another approach to the ones cited above. I'm sorry the teenager got salty. I get salty when people refer to my half-sisters as half-sisters because nope, the group of us are fully sisters in every way according to me and them.
posted by Bella Donna at 11:41 AM on May 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

Yeah it's going to vary based on not just culture but also individual feelings and situations.

I am quite careful to refer to my (now-former) step-siblings as such because our families didn't blend well and we didn't live together most of the time, but I grew up (in the southern US in the 80s-90s) with friends who would have smacked me if I'd referred to their mom's husband's sons--who they grew up with basically from birth and had a great relationship with--as anything but "your brother".

Similarly, my sister & I have different fathers, but we both get really annoyed when someone points out that we're technically half-siblings. Like, why do you going out of your way to point out that there's something different about our relationship?
posted by rhiannonstone at 5:03 PM on May 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

Yes. In my case we even have a few people who have hung around enough they sometimes get the brother/sister moniker even though they have no blood or legal relationship to anyone. A Fast and Furious sort of family definition.
posted by Mitheral at 5:31 PM on May 12, 2023

Very recently there was a conversation here - maybe an AskMe question - about whether your parent’s spouse is your step-parent or your parent’s spouse to you.

My parent’s spouse is to me, my parent’s spouse. That said I’d be inclined to use sibling first - I feel like the sibling relationship implies childhood and that a sibling relationship, step or half or whatever, would include some level of compassion and recognition from a peer living as a kid in the same environment you are and as such lead to the closeness of a sibling.
posted by bendy at 5:39 PM on May 12, 2023

My spouse (definitely not a member of Today's Youth) has a full sibling, a half sibling, and a step-sibling, and he's only ever referred to them as his siblings.
posted by paper scissors sock at 7:32 PM on May 12, 2023

Main thing here is when you get corrected in this kind of circumstance - and you will be, eventually and inevitably, because telepathy isn't a thing - for fuck's sake don't try to Well Actually and double down on your initial usage even if you prefer it for some reason. Not even if you prefer it strongly. Not your family? Not your call.

For example, if somebody is telling you about their sister, and you know full well that their sister has a different father, do not say something like "oh, you mean your half sister?"

That kind of behaviour can get you written off as an insensitive clod for years. It comes across as roughly equivalent to insisting on not using a trans person's preferred pronouns "on principle" because lobsters or some fucking thing.
posted by flabdablet at 10:53 AM on May 13, 2023 [7 favorites]