Most people don’t agree with their friends about everything, even their best friends.
Sometimes what attracts us to other people is not our similarities, but our differences.
But when a friend’s beliefs or opinions are so fundamentally different, it can be challenging not to get caught in arguments with them.
In more severe cases, maintaining the friendship might not even be feasible.
Redditor Leading_Key258 was soon to be married, and her fiancé’s childhood friend had agreed to be his best man.
However, over the passage of time, the original poster (OP)’s fiancé and his best man began to view the world in very different ways.
So strong were these differences that the intended best man wasn’t even sure he could. go on with his duties.
At a loss as to how to handle this, the OP took to the subReddit “Am I The A**hole” (AITA), where she asked fellow Redditors:
“WIBTA? My fiancé’s best man threatened to leave the wedding party because my fiancé and I moved in together.”
The OP explained why her fiancé and his best man reached a possibly irrevocable dent in their friendship:
“So my fiancee, 22 M[ale], (we’ll call him Harry) and I, 23 F[emale], grew up most of our lives in very conservative Christian circles with very traditional views and rules.”
“My fiancée’s best man, 22 M, (we’ll call him Grant) also grew up like this.”
“As Harry and I have gotten older, we have drifted away from following the traditions we were raised in.”
“Grant still very strongly believes in traditional values and will straight up tell you you are wrong if you don’t agree with said values.”
“We are one month away from our wedding, and I have been moved in with my fiancé for one month total already.”
“I moved in due to my previous living situation being a toxic environment that I needed to get away from, and it didn’t make sense to move anywhere else when the wedding was so close and Harry was already living/paying rent in our soon to be shared apartment.”
“The only reason we weren’t living together our entire engagement is because we wanted to keep peace with our very conservative parents, who would view us living together as a straight-up sin against God, and are also the people paying for the wedding, and would pull the funding if they found out.”
“Yes, if I could go back, I wouldn’t have let them pay for it and have that power over us, but it’s too late for that now.”
“The other important detail here is that our apartment is literally across the parking lot from Grant and his wife’s apartment in the same apartment complex.”
“Yes, we did this on purpose because up until this point, Grant and his wife have been super chill about our difference in values and best friends of ours.”
“However, not long after I moved in, Grant obviously saw my car in the apartment parking lot and realized we were living together.”
“He had a talk with Harry and straight up told him that ‘it’s wrong for us to live together’ and that Harry ‘needs to move out into separate housing until the wedding’.”
“We clearly don’t agree with him and have no desire to move our things/life/routine again for the whopping month that is left before our wedding just to appease his wishes.”
“When Harry told Grant that we don’t agree with his moral convictions and have no plans of moving into separate housing, Grant said that he might not be able to be Harry’s best man if he doesn’t change his mind and move.”
“To Grant, standing up at someone’s wedding is a statement that he supports everything we are and we do as a couple.”
“He said he couldn’t in good conscience stand up at our wedding knowing he doesn’t agree with the choices we’ve made and the fact that we had to lie to my parents to live together and get me out of my previous situation.”
“Despite this disagreement, Harry still really wants Grant to be his best man and to be a part of our special day.”
“What should we do?”
“Should Harry move out just so that Grant will for sure be in the wedding?”
“Should Harry and I say Harry’s not moving and possibly risk Grant stepping down?”
“Would we be the a**holes if we just found a way to lie to Grant so he gets off our case?”
Fellow Redditors weighed in on where they believed the OP fell in this particular situation, by declaring:
- NTA: Not the A**hole
- YTA: You’re the A**hole
- ESH: Everybody Sucks Here
- NAH: No A**holes Here
The Reddit community was in agreement that the OP was not the a**hole.
Everyone agreed that if Grant was going to let the fact that the OP and Harry were living together before their wedding ruin their friendship, then he wasn’t a friend worth holding onto, and didn’t deserve to be a part of their wedding:
“NTA and instead of letting Grant decide whether he can allow this behavior I’d remove him from the wedding party and let him know that his threats are unkind, unnecessary and unwelcome.”-1TiredPrsn
“NTA.”
“Do nothing.”
“If you lie, it will be found out and make everything worse.”
“Let Grant decide now.”
“He’s not the ultimate moral authority of what’s right and wrong.”
“Tell Grant to decide asap so he can be replaced if he’s so repulsed by you two living together.”
“Accept the fact that Grant and his wife aren’t good friends, they are judgmental AHs.”
“Not all friendships are forever.”- noccie
“NTA.”
“You can say that you’re sorry he feels that way and that if he feels so strongly about it, he should step down, so you can have someone who accepts you for who you are standing beside you.”- North_Artichoke_6721
“‘He said he couldn’t in good conscience stand up at our wedding knowing he doesn’t agree with the choices we’ve made’.”
“Do you and Harry really want someone who doesn’t support you standing up at your wedding?”
“NTA.”
“Start your life together on your terms, not someone else’s.”- MorphogeneticGrid
“Grant is not even family.”
“Grant can stay home and read his bible.”
“Get married without him and his ridiculous judgment.”
“Letting him have that much power over you tells him he’s allowed to keep pushing his values onto you and walk all over.”
“All about forcing his perspective on something down your throat.”
“It’s utter hogwash.”
“I’m sorry, Harry may lose a friend, but who does he want to build an entire marriage with, Grant or you?”
“And if that’s actually a hard choice for him, you know where you really stand.”
“NTA.”- angel9_writes
“Why don’t you two go down to the courthouse and quietly elope?”
“Then you’re married on your terms and can enjoy the party your parents paid for later?”
“Also, NTA.”
“Grant needs to leave well enough alone.”- Ok_Complaint_5472
“NTA.”
“Grant should stop pushing his outdated Puritan views on others.”
“You don’t need this guy at your wedding.”
“Get someone who lives in the 21st century, not 1600s Salem.”- Totallynaturalvibes
“NTA.”
“It’s weird that Grant is all strict about your living situation, even your parents.”
“Tell Grant that a true friend wouldn’t be offended by you moving in and tell him it’s not his business.”
“Why would he abandon the friendship over your guys’ living situation?”
“It’s weird.”
“He being manipulative and a major a-hole.”
“It’s not his place.”
“‘Shall not judge be neighbor’ I believe is one of the 10 commandments.”
“He is committing a sin according to that.”- Soullessr0bin
“NTA.”
“Tell Grant to get off his high horse.”- RumSoakedChap
“NTA.”
“And you’re likely to have a better marriage because of this.”
“I am my husband’s second wife because he caved to pressures from his parents to not live together with his college sweetheart.”
“And it turned out they weren’t well-matched, and because they got married simply to live together, the marriage didn’t last.”
“She cheated on him and they wound up divorced.”
“A WHOLE lotta heartache that could have been avoided.”
“They both, at least, figured out early that they didn’t want to have kids together.”
“When I came along, we were pretty much an insta-couple.”
“My hubby moved in with me and then proposed.”
“We took a year to plan a ginormous wedding.”
“During that time, we asked all siblings and the one SIL to be in our wedding party.”
“My BIL and his wife are those holier-than-thou types, too.”
“After being asked, he said he needed time to think about it.”
“Ultimately, four months later, he called my husband to ‘talk about the predicament we had put him in’.”
“He and his wife wanted to support my husband.”
“But I was clearly the ‘devil incarnate’ and they worried that a marriage to me would mean that I would corrupt my husband, allowing the devil to win over my husband’s soul and relinquishing him to a certain afterlife in hell.”
“My BIL still to this day does not know that conversation took place on speaker and that my husband wanted me involved.”
“I stayed quiet.”
“But, to say it has forever tainted the relationship would be an understatement.”
“My hubby called his mom, who then told my BIL in no uncertain terms to knock it off.”
“My faith is and always has been important to me.”
“But that said.”
“I most definitely think you have made a wise choice in extracting yourself from toxicity and placing yourself where you have.”
“You are now going into your marriage with eyes wide open.”
“And how cool is that, with eyes wide open, that you still want to marry him.”
“Maybe the bff needs to bow out and exit stage left.”
“Maybe he’ll realize how judgmental and stupid he’s being someday.”
“And maybe not.”
“But you and your fiancé are the only ones that need to make this decision.”
“And maybe it’s best to decide him right out of the wedding party.”- Master_Necessary581
If Grant doesn’t approve of couples living together before marriage, that is his right, and nothing can change that.
But is sticking to that belief really worth possibly ending his longest-lasting friendship?
A question that Grant will have to answer for himself.
After the way he behaved toward the OP and Harry, it’s hard to imagine Grant will even be missed at their wedding.