Caring parents typically try to instill the values, views, and habits they consider healthy and important in their children, which usually includes certain eating habits, too.

This redditor, too, wanted her daughter to have good eating habits, which is why she asked her sister-in-law not to slather her food in butter in front of the child. Such a request was not well-received by the SIL, and seemingly split the netizens into camps about it, as they couldn’t unanimously agree on whether or not the OP was a jerk in the situation.

Eating large amounts of butter every day might not be the healthiest of decisions

Image credits: Sorin Gheorghita / Unsplash (not the actual photo)

This redditor asked her SIL not to slather her food in butter in front of her 7yo daughter

Image credits: Tiger Lily / Pexels (not the actual photo)

Image credits: throwRA123334

Healthy eating habits include following a well-balanced diet

While butter might not be the healthiest add-on to one’s foods, eating habits are a highly subjective matter and not everyone is equally interested in following strict food-related regimes. That might be why, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), unhealthy diet, together with lack of physical activity, are the leading global risks to health.

According to WHO’s recommendations, in order to stay healthy, it’s important to align your energy intake with energy expenditure. Also, it’s worth remembering that the total fat one consumes shouldn’t exceed 30% of the total energy intake, free sugars should comprise less than 10% (ideally, less than 5%), and the intake of salt should not be higher than 5 grams per day.

In spite of butter being quite a source of fat—and salt, if it’s the salted kind, which makes it far less favorable health-wise—it might not be as bad for our health as it’s often deemed. According to a registered dietitian, Abbey Sharp, the creamy goodness can fit into a healthy diet, as long as the saturated fat is not replaced with highly processed carbohydrates.

If consumed in moderation, butter might not be as bad for one’s health as it’s been previously presented to be

Image credits: Andrea Piacquadio / Pexels (not the actual photo)

A 2022 study found that, contrary to the common belief that butter—rich in saturated fat—is bad for you, it doesn’t actually seem to have a detrimental effect on one’s health, if consumed in conventional amounts. According to Sharp, such a belief comes from a time when people were taught that fat in general, including the saturated kind, was bad for them, which made the popularity of margarine and similar products rise.

“We know, of course, that replacing saturated fat with fiber-rich foods or polyunsaturated fats may be advantageous, but we don’t want to be replacing it with more highly processed carbohydrates that we were previously taught to do,” Sharp told USA Today.

It’s unclear how much butter the OP’s sister-in-law consumed on the day-to-day and whether it was above the norm, which could result in detrimental effects on her health. Be that as it may, the redditor didn’t want her habits to set an example to her child, as the little ones are often quite eager to copy people’s behavior, be it certain mannerisms or intake of fat-rich foods.

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Children tend to copy many things adults do, no matter how irrelevant

Image credits: Alexander Dummer / Pexels (not the actual photo)

The OP’s fear that her child might ask for the same butter-infused meal her aunt was having is not completely unfounded. PsychCentral pointed out that children have always been known to imitate the behavior of the adults around them, but a new study carried out in Australia proved that they might copy everything a grown up shows them, even if it doesn’t really make sense or includes irrelevant steps that lead to a certain goal.

According to professor of psychology at the University of Queensland in Australia, Mark Nielsen, scientists have noticed a rather odd effect where kids would copy everything that they see an adult demonstrate, even if there are obvious reasons why certain steps would be irrelevant. Apparently, it’s something other primates don’t do, as chimpanzees, for instance, won’t copy the irrelevant actions and skip right to the ones that actually lead somewhere.

Kids’ tendency to copy adults, together with the likelihood of an uncomfortable conversation about why putting butter on everything might not be good for you in front of the SIL, didn’t seem all that appealing to the redditor. That’s why she asked her relative to add the ingredient outside of the sight of her daughter, but such a request was not well-received by the SIL, nor by some of the fellow redditors, who shared their opinions in the comment section.

The woman provided more details in the comments section

Some redditors didn’t think the OP was in the wrong here

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Others believed the redditor shouldn’t have asked her SIL to hide her eating habits

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There were netizens who believed that everyone was a jerk, too

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