In today’s modern world, having the right technology is both a matter of status and necessity.

What would you do if you needed a laptop for school and your younger sister wanted a new phone because hers was old?

That is what happened to the older brother in this story, so he told his dad that he should get the laptop, but when he got it, his sister was upset.

AITA for telling my dad to buy me a laptop instead of buying my sibling a new phone because I really needed it for school?

I want to preface this by saying I do feel bad and that’s why I’m posting here.

Let’s see what this is about.

Because while I didn’t initially care I definitely looked back at the situation after I had calmed down and felt weird about it. And wondered AITA?.

I’m also just not using fake names because it’s not that confusing without but I’m not saying names at all just being general in my wording.

Older laptops can be slow and annoying.

So, I am currently doing college online and so I really needed a laptop because the one I had at the time was very old and slow.

My current wage job wasn’t gonna get me anything relatively good, so I had asked my dad if he could buy me an old laptop from ebay for $400.

Sometimes the money just isn’t there.

He told me he didn’t have the money. Fast forward a month later my little sister calls me and tells me that our dad is buying her the new iPhone 17 pro max for $1200.

I pretended like I was so happy for her and then asked her what she plans to do with this considering she already has a good enough working iPhone 13.

How old is the sister?

She basically just said she just wants the new one because all her friends have it and I was like “okay that’s cool”. I was secretly livid.

I live near my dad (not that close but not far), so I went over there and I made small talk then asked him about it and basically told him that I was really needing a laptop for school and I heard that he was paying like a thousand dollars for my sister’s phone.

Honestly, it isn’t his business what he does with his money.

I basically just told him that it makes more sense to buy me a laptop now and wait for my sister to get good grades at the end of the semester before buying her anything.

I was aware she wasn’t doing that well in school.

He must be in a better financial situation now.

He (to my surprise) agreed and bought me the laptop actually for a bit higher price of $650 and I of course didn’t wanna hurt my sister, so I didn’t tell her about this.

I then did call my sister later on and I asked her about it and she, as expected, told me that he wasn’t going to buy her anything unless she gets good grades and I told her I hope she does get the phone soon and keeps studying.

I doubt the dad’s decision was based on what he said.

I’m not sure if my dad told her but she didn’t tell me or if he did end up buying it for her but I did get my laptop.

Here is the thing, I have empathy for my sister but at the end of the day it’s between a want (her new phone) and a need (my new laptop).

Having the latest gadgets isn’t a big deal.

I’m going into college now and in high schoo I used an old 2008 blackberry and I was picked on but I was fine.

My older brother did end up telling her after finding out from my dad (I genuinely have no idea how he found out but I knew my dad wouldn’t keep it a secret for long).

Siblings can be jealous.

My sister didn’t talk to me for a while and that was expected but recently she has started talking to me again and I did apologize.

As her brother, it’s important for me to emphasize with her and understand her point of view and her perspective.

AITA?

He was just expressing what he needed help with. It was up to the Dad to decide who got what and when.

Let’s see what the people in the comments have to say about this situation.

He could have handled it better.

This person thinks he did the right thing.

He was kind of sneaky about it.

Here is someone who says that this is want vs need.

This commenter thinks Dad was playing favorites.

This is all just normal sibling jealousy.

If you enjoyed this post, check out this story about a woman who isn’t ready for a sibling relationship with a late-in-life sister.