Sorry for the long title, I couldn’t think of a shorter way to phrase it. I met my boyfriend’s family yesterday. I was worried about meeting everyone all at once on a holiday, but they seemed really nice. I have difficulties with social interactions and was very focused on not saying the wrong thing.

They played games, including a get-to-know-you game. We were asked questions and went around to answer. One of them was, “What is your pet peeve?”. I was trying to think of an answer that was neutral. For mine I said, “People who don’t return their carts to the cradle after shopping.” I thought that was a basic courtesy thing.

Hi dad immediately said, “There are guys whose job is to return them.” Another relative mentioned that was unfair to people with disabilities. A few others rolled their eyes and made faces I couldn’t quite discern. But I knew I’d definitely said the wrong thing.

My boyfriend is upset, he’s been getting a bunch of texts from his family because of what I said. I explained that I didn’t realize it was a controversial pet peeve, but he told me to stop blaming things on my mental problems. Am I wrong? And how so?