Some people determine who their wedding party will be at a very young age.
With the passage of time, however, relationships change, and many discovering their wedding party isn't at all who they first imagined it might be.
Some friendships dissolve unexpectedly quickly, sometimes even after people agree to be a bridesmaid or groomsman.
Redditor ThrowRA-ex-note was initially excited to be the bridesmaid of one of her high school friends.
Unfortunately, the original poster (OP) saw the true colors of her fellow bridesmaids at the bachelorette weekend prior to the wedding.
Leaving the OP to question not only if she wanted to be a bridesmaid any more, but whether or not she even wanted to attend the wedding.
At a loss of what to do, the OP took to the subReddit "Would I Be The A**Hole Here (WIBTAH)?"
Unlike the similar "Am I The A**Hole" (AITA) subReddit, AITAH allows Redditors to ask for advice on issues that are not permitted on AITA, such as asking for advice or posting about ending relationships. Nor are voting acronyms required or a final judgment declared.
The OP asked fellow Redditors:
"WIBTAH if I dropped out as a bridesmaid a week before the wedding because of what happened at the bachelorette?"
The OP explained why they wanted to back out of an upcoming wedding:
"So I am a bridesmaid in my friends wedding."
'She just had a bachelorette party at the grooms family’s cabin for 2 nights.
"It started off okay, but as the attendants got more and more drunk, the racism and anti-semitism started coming out."
"For context, everyone else in the wedding party is white."
"I am mixed Jewish and Filipina."
"My part of the party was to put on a tea party in the afternoon."
"I spent weeks hand decorating a tea set as a wedding present."
"Weddings are huge in my culture and I wanted to share that joy, I bought and cooked a bunch of my cultural food (but the basic stuff even western food people like, lumpia, baked deserts, and skyflakes with cheese and meat)."
"I of course checked with the bride and MOH before hand and both of that would be okay, with the bride saying she loved Lumpia."
"I was so proud of it and it looked beautiful all set up."
"But immediately, some of the bridal party started making the 'ew ethnic food' faces (POC, IKYKYK) One of them chased around another with a sweet bun, laughing about how weird and 'scary' it was. It was literally bread and cream."
"I sent pictures of my set up to other friends to see if it was something I did wrong, and everyone said it looked amazing."
"People did say thank you, including the bride."
"They said the set up was very pretty."
"It was the reaction to the food by some of them (family of the groom who also made the Auschwitz jokes) that I was describing."
"That being said, almost nobody spoke during the tea party portion, and blamed it on being tired."
'The bride and friends did not say anything about the reactions of the other girls."
"The main feedback I got as that I was clearly a witch because my tea put everyone to sleep."
"It was a hibiscus, rose, mint, and calamansi mix."
"But oh well, maybe that food isn’t for them."
"I moved on. But then the racist jokes started."
"The party started on Juneteenth, you can imagine the 'jokes' that came out of that."
"Then antisemitic jokes about holocaust camps and more."
'This is a direct quote 'I say a lot of nazi and holocaust jokes for someone who isn’t racist'."
"I was trapped on a boat with them when this started happening."
"Later that night, as I was grabbing something from a room to then leave, the main perpetrator said to someone I considered a close friend 'I was worried you’d be offended by the Auschwitz jokes because you’re German'."
"That friend replied she wasn’t offended."
"I spoke up 'well I might be offended because I’m Jewish'."
"I got up to leave with my stuff, and the girl said 'she’s going back to Auschwitz!'”
"My friend, the bride, everyone laughed."
"I went outside and I cried."
"They saw me from the window when they all came to eat food."
"Not a single one of my 'friends' came to check on me."
"The vibes continued along that line, and I felt like I was in the Jewish/asian version of get out, stuck in a giant home with a bunch of racist white people."
"But honestly, the fear from it wasn’t the worst part, it was that not a single one of my 'friends' said anything."
"I then was in a 4-hour car ride with one of said friends/bridesmaids on the way home."
"She spent the last hour of it lecturing me about how she’s 'someone who can be cordial around people she doesn’t agree with, but not everyone has that skill, especially when it’s personal' and that 'I need to put myself in other people’s shoes and see that they have positive intentions' and more."
"For context, this cabin was 4 hours away, and I have a pretty moderate disability."
"I was using 110% of my energy for this, and had no energy left by the end of it. I pushed myself to extremes for these friends and the bride, and it was reciprocated with laughing at anti-Semitic jokes at my expense."
"The wedding is next weekend."
"I can barely see from the migraine I have, and my legs are struggling with walking."
"I don’t feel it’s worth it to hurt myself for someone who couldn’t bother to stand up for me, or even check on me after."
"All my friends of color agree with me, but this was my high school friend group (I grew up in a very white town) and I also feel guilty like I’m letting them down."
"I’m not quite sure what to do, so Reddit, please help me out."
Fellow Redditors weighed in, with some using the voting acronyms:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You're The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
The Reddit community fully supported the OP's intention of backing out of the wedding.
Everyone agreed that the OP needed to distance herself from everyone at this bridal party, believing no real "friend" would behave towards her the way they did:
"Hell no, don’t go to that wedding."- Inner_Top968
"FFS."
"That person who said they can get along with anyone is garbage."
"They are complicit in racism."
"You need a new set of friends."
"These people are foul."
"I’m so sorry OP."- wishingforarainyday
"What exactly is your dilemma here?"
"These people are not your friends and they are not good people."
"They behaved absolutely disgustingly, and you should cut them off immediately."
"You aren’t letting them down - they let you down."- SneakyTrevor
"YWNBTAH."
"Honestly, f*ck those people."
"People who openly mock others and 'joke' like that ARE racist."
"These are not good people and they don't need to be friends."
"Drop out and never once feel bad about cutting ties with people like that."- ccam04
"YWNBTA, but don’t expect these people to be understanding or apologetic in any way."
"In fact, you should at the very least expect that dropping out due to this behavior (which is extremely valid) probably will end the friendship."
"Which, personally, I think is better for you anyway."
"But if you’re seeking some heart-to-heart conversation and a productive discussion about the behavior leading up to your dropping out, squash those thoughts now so you’re not disappointed."- Vodkawaifuu
The OP later returned with an update, sharing a bit more information about her relationship with this group and what she ultimately decided to do about the wedding:
"I was a history major (which makes this whole thing even worse!!), so I have to add context that I didn’t realize I missed until the comments."
"The friend in the car is the friend who said she wasn’t offended by the holocaust jokes to the person she was asked by the 'jokester' because she’s German and lives in Germany."
"In the car, she did say that she is absolutely against the concentration camp 'joke' and that she feels guilty she didn’t say anything (the words 'I’m sorry' never came out of her mouth, though), but then I brought up the other stuff with the food and racist comments, and that’s when she went on that tangent."
"She also said she saw the racism but told me in those situations you just have to ignore it and choose to not be around those people again."
"As she knew there was racism happening, including towards me, and didn’t say anything or check in on me, I will be choosing to not be around her again."
"I also told her repeatedly that I didn’t want to talk about this now because I was so physically done, and she said, 'This is my car, and I am driving. I don’t want to be uncomfortable and have this tension here. We are talking'."
"I have a vocal cord disorder, and my speaking is limited, so I didn’t say much, and I didn’t want to get dropped off on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere."
"I told her she crossed a boundary she can’t come back from, though."
"The people making the racist jokes were the sibling/cousins of the groom."
"My friends were the ones laughing along and not saying anything."
"I have been long-distance with these friends since high school."
"The friend in the car with me was in a social justice club with me in high school."
"There were no signs of this behavior before from either this friend or the bride."
"In fact, the bride went with me to an anti-ICE fundraiser party earlier this year, and we had a lot of fun."
"I have never been shy with my opinions, especially as someone who studied history."
"This was the first time I was hanging with them around a bunch of other people."
"In reviewing these comments, I have realized that they may not have been racist when with me before, but didn’t stop or say anything about racism when it happened, which is, in fact, racism."
"That is a key difference."
"I am also more white than not."
"I am ethnically Jewish but not religiously."
"I often don’t feel like I have a right to be upset about these things because other families have gone through worse."
"That’s something I’m working to unlearn, and this was definitely some exposure therapy to that."
"Why didn’t I say anything at the party?"
"Because I was in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by drunk people making racist comments at me."
"I have survived violence before and know that sometimes keeping your mouth shut is what needs to happen until you’re in a safe space."
"Lastly I will not be going to the wedding."
"I need to get off screens because my head is killing me, but your comments and support helped settle me emotionally."
"I will decide tomorrow how I will inform the bride."
It seems this friend group needs to familiarize themselves with what constitutes a joke.
Because no one was laughing.
If this group of people doesn't realize how hurtful their words were to the OP, then it's probably in her best interest to find a new group of friends.
