Care and Feeding

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Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here .

I have an 11-year-old niece, “Bree,” and my brother “Ross,” just asked me to buy her a specific gift for Christmas—and for a specific reason.

He wants me to buy her an iPhone. The reason is that Bree has been clamoring for one for more than a year, but my sister-in-law, “Zindy,” is staunchly against it. She doesn’t want Bree or her younger brother to have a phone until they are in high school. Ross figures that my buying the iPhone for Bree is a clever workaround. Ordinarily I wouldn’t entertain such a prospect, but Zindy treats everyone around her like shit and I absolutely loathe her.…