Dear Prudence,
I’ve lived most of my life in the U.S., but I was born in the U.K., and my parents are British. They use a lot of regional slang, including using the word fag as a synonym for cigarette. It makes me deeply uncomfortable. They know I’m gay, but there’s an unspoken agreement that we never mention it, ever. It’s jarring to hear this in everyday conversation, and I’m wondering if there’s a script I can use to make them stop without bursting into tears. For context, I’m college-age and staying with them for the summer. My dad is the sort of guy who is very proud of having liberal beliefs and thinks homophobia ended in the ’80s. He gets very angry and defensive if you try to mention that anything he is doing might be slightly less than P.C. My mother starts crying if I mention being gay, as if I have done it in order to spite her and her dreams of grandchildren.
—Instant Fear Reaction