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The original was posted on /r/bestofredditorupdates by /u/Direct-Caterpillar77 on 2024-04-10 06:02:12.
I am not The OOP, OOP is u/sammiiesosa
My (29f) fiance’s (29m) best man is ‘joking’ with his other groomsmen about slut shaming me during his best man speech as a joke, what do I do?
Originally posted to r/TwoHotTakes
TRIGGER WARNING: misogyny, sexism
Original Post Apr 1, 2024
My fiance, best man, groomsmen, and I have known each other since we were kids. We collectively met between 6th and 7th grade and have been running around in the same friend group ever since. The group has grown and shrunk over the years, but a small core of us have remained extremely close.
Recently, my fiance’s best man Jay (30m) has been making jokes when we’re hanging out about the two us dating that have now escalated. Admittedly, when I met Jay in 6th grade I had the hugest crush on him, and everyone knew. I was much taller than average for a girl at that age and he was one of two guys in the entire school as tall as me. That, though, is where the story ends.
I had one hell of an awkward phase in middle school, and he was very clear from the start that he was not into it. Post-awkward phase, as friends and adults, it was something we constantly joked about, but never seriously, since everything between us had always been platonic.
This joke of me being rejected by him has now recently turned into how he “dated me first” whenever Fiance and I are around. Despite the inaccuracy and an increase of it being brought up, everything has remained pretty light hearted in context and while annoying, is something I have been able to brush off or quickly rebuttal.
This escalated this weekend when two of Fiance’s groomsmen were over hanging out with Fiancé and I. The wedding was brought up, and after a concerning look between the two, they mentioned something had happened with Jay they thought we should know about. Apparently Jay had been telling them stories he was considering for his best man speech, with the main one centering around how I had been “shared around” and had “made my way through the entire friend group.” While they kept what was explicitly said fairly vague out of respect for me, they were clear it crossed the line and insinuated I had slept with the entirety of the group attending the wedding.
They were very clear with Jay that he could not say anything like this in his speech/toast. Jay responded with an “I know” stating that I had already made it clear my Maid of Honor would be proof reading all speeches prior to the wedding, so he “wouldn’t be able to get away with it anyway” – but ended the conversation by saying something along the lines of “but what if I could?” leaving the possibility open.
Of all the groomsman in the party (6 including Jay) these two were the only ones in this core friend group, and the only ones I had any sort of history with that could potentially be notable. It was all prior to high school and very innocent.
One I went on my first movie date with, where our parents had to drop each of us off because we couldn’t drive, and picked us up afterwards. The other was the classic “first” six-month relationship in middle school where it took six weeks to muster up enough courage to hug each other between classes in the hallway. Sure, we madeout and very middle-school-level things happened. But this is something we’ve all laughed about now for over a decade. I wasn’t the only girl in this larger friend group, and throughout the years, this was something that happened pretty frequently. Because we grew up in a smaller area, overlap happened like this regularly in every group and even more so as we went through high school.
My fiance is the only one I have seriously dated or had any sort of intimate relationship with of this friend group. We had an on-again, off-again relationship throughout high school that ended for a bit once I moved out of state for college, but we remained close friends and eventually reconnected when I moved back in 2019. We started dating in 2021 and got engaged in 2023. He’s the only one in all of this I have ever slept with, who has seen me naked, and so-on, making this situation even more odd and off-putting.
Jay and I have been close friends since high school. When Fiance was in a toxic relationship that isolated him from Jay after I had left for college, Jay would reach out to me for advice on school, girls, relationship and more. He had always been our number one supporter, advocating for Fiance and I to reconcile our relationship throghout college and into adulthood. He even took a bit of credit and would throw around an “I told you so” here and there when we eventually did reconnect.
I’m not sure how to handle this. I could write an additional post about how frustrated, confused, wronged, and uncomfortable I feel, all of which I plan to discuss in more detail with Fiance after sitting on the issue for a bit longer. We’ve all talked about it, recognizing the way Jay is framing things is wrong, but Fiance and the groomsmen are able to brush it off in a way I feel like I can’t. I don’t know how to move forward from this or what to do next.
Additional Information
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Fiancé and I aren’t getting married until the end of next summer, so much of the conversations had about toasts and speeches have been more theoretical, except that a few have asked for the opportunity to give a toast (including best man). We have loosely put this information in save the dates, on the website, and other prints.
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Fiancé and best man have been best friends since kindergarten. They were neighbors and inseparable until they each went their own way for college. My fiancé’s parents basically raised him alongside fiancé.
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Jay has strictly only ever expressed platonic feelings for me. Even when both single, or alone together, we have only ever acted as friends towards each other after the embarrassing early middle school crush I had.
TL;DR - My fiance’s best man is lying about having history with me as well as my history with others, proposing the idea that he calls me out as a joke for being shared around their friend group in his best man speech/toast at our wedding. I don’t know how to move forward from this or what to do next.
Update Apr 3, 2024
First, I wanted to thank those who were clear and honest about how alarming the situation was from their perspective. When posting I was still processing various feelings about the matter, and still am, which not only limited by ability to really look at the situation from a different perspective, but also left me in a state of paralysis of what to do next, both long and short term.
Given the nature of this situation, there was a lot of historical context that was ommitted to avoid making the orignal post too lengthy. I have done my best to include context that seems most relevant based on the original comments in my update below.
UPDATE
Since posting, I have spoken in further detail to both my fiance and one of the other groomsmen. I also confided in my maid of honor about the situation for an additional perspective outside of this specific friend group. After these conversations and reading through all comments on the original post, I’ve come to realize the significance of a few key details:
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Jay has a deep rooted superiority complex. He always has, and it is something many in our friend group have become acustomed to. He has always been the type who seemed to believe he was the standout amongst his friends. Whether that be through education, athletics, his career, or with women.
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Jas has also always been a bit egocentric, and a lack of accountability or consequences for his actions has been growing for some time now. Despite it almost always being unintentional, he more often than not is oblivious to the inconveniences and harm he causes others, as long as it is beneficial to his personal ego.
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This is about jealousy from a few different angles, but not about me specifically. When looking at the full picture, this escalation feels like a continued attempt to knock my fiance down for reaching that next stage in life. Whether that is because Fiance has reached it before him or has moved onward without him, I cannot say for sure.
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Jay has issues with misogyny that have also been escalating in tangent with everything else. His lack of respect for the women he has dated has also seemed to increase. Much of the personal tension him and I have had recently pertain to his perspective of women that have begun to veer into a more direspectful realm, alluding to an increased belief that due to their gender alone, women are inferior.
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The good friend he was to me over the years, who was always kind and supportive, who never overstepped boundaries and was always there when needed, can exist in tangent with the above information. They are not mutually exclusive. Life happens and people grow, sometimes in opposite directions.
I spoke in depth with one of the groomsmen to have further transparency of the situation and what was explicitly said. He acknowledged that the conversation initially centered around the excitement they had for the wedding, and Jay clearly stating he wanted to give Fiance and I the best wedding and experience…
Content cut off. Read original on https://old.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/comments/1c0cgbn/my_29f_fiances_29m_best_man_is_joking_with_his/
I spoke in depth with one of the groomsmen to have further transparency of the situation and what was explicitly said. He acknowledged that the conversation initially centered around the excitement they had for the wedding, and Jay clearly stating he wanted to give Fiance and I the best wedding and experience possible.
The conversation evolved and Jay mentioned looking for ‘icebreakers’ for his speech/toast and began bouncing a varierty of ‘distasteful jokes’ that focused more so on the expense of my fiance than anything else. Then the idea was proposed about explicitly stating that my being ‘passed around the friend group’ was how they all remained ‘relatively close since middle school and high school.’ Jay was immediately shut down by the other groomsmen, told to know his audience, and also recognize he was openly alluding to things that were untrue and that could have an extremely negative impact on me personally. The conversation stopped shortly after this, and the groomsmen, without context of how this issue had been escalating, chalked it up to a one-off situation with Jay acting full of himself in the moment.
Fiance and I are the first of our cohort to get married and have a full blown wedding with a ceremony and reception. These comments did not start escalating untill after our engagement roughly one year ago, following Jay’s breakup with his long term girlfriend. Jay has never made comments like this to me or my fiance privately or when it is just the three of us together. Any scenario where this has been an issue has been in an environment which involved others, and mostly others that are not a part of this cohort from middle school.
…So, what next?
As mentioned in my original post, I spoke with Fiance in detail about the situation and how I was feeling. When all of this had been brought to our attention a few days prior, in an attempt to preserve myself in the moment, I brushed it off more so than I probably should have. I do not blame Fiance for not having any immediate or strong reaction in the moment, because I had avoided one myself.
I think it’s imoprtant to note that Jay is not a day-to-day character in our lives. While he travels frequently for work that brings him to our area, we live states a part. He has not lived in the same area as me or my fiance since high school. Much of this evolution with his personality has happened in the last few years as well. I recognize this is not an excuse for the lack of accountability on our part, but felt it added important context that this was not something that was observed and ignored daily, but one that has slowly been recognized over time, since we maybe see him 4 times a year at most.
Fiance was extremely open in conversation, immediately brought up having a conversation with Jay, but admitted to not viewing this as anything more than Jay ‘just being Jay’ and that he was ‘all talk.’ At this point, we had only discussed how Jay had continually escalated the situation and how uncomfortable I had now become from this. The lack of accountability Fiance had made for Jay’s action definitely hurt, but then I recalled a commenter who had asked if I still considered Jay a friend because he actually was, or because ‘that was how it has always been.’
To sum up what turned into a lengthier and much more productive conversation with Fiance, I told him that while I recognized his friendship with Jay was something that had always been a part of his life, I did not personally want to be friends with him anymore after this. I brought to Fiance’s attention that while the scenario was explicitly about me, and attacking the integrity and character of a 12 year old girl, every action or usage of the scenario was used against him to invalidate his accomplishments of getting married or make him come off as less than.
I told Fiance it was up to him on how he handles his conversation with Jay, but regardless, the disrespect Jay had shown me in this was a clear statement of what he thought of our own personal friendship. I firmly believe it is not my place to force how my fiance handles his own personal relatiobship with Jay in this. All of this was deeply taken to heart, and you could tell that Fiance had started coming to his own realizations as the conversation progressed. He recognized that if the roles were reversed, or if it had been any one of my bridesmaids slandering me or him in any way, he would be firmly advocating for me to reevaluate my friendship with them.
Fiance asked for a few days to stomach the information himself and reflect on what he wants to say to Jay. He asked if it would be acceptable for him to bring up that I no longer wanted to be friends with Jay personally, and I said yes. I was clear that if Jay wanted to talk with me following their conversation as well, it would need to be the three of us and not a personal converasation.
I am still evaluating how to approach the speeches/toasts at our wedding and open to perspectives and ideas. For now, I reserved the right with my Fiance to omit Jay from giving a speech and having my fiance choose another groomsmen to do so in his place, potentially canceling the speeches/toasts altogether, and if Jay is allowed to give a toast, telling the DJ to cut the mic if need be. All of which he agreed with.
There is still plenty of time for the situation to develop, and for potential future updates, but I wanted to again thank those that emphasized the seriousness of this issue, gave their honest input and advice on how to handle the situation, and provided perspective on what they belive should be done next. When originally posting, I was still in a state of shock, trying to accept the situation as it had unfolded. Your responses contsructively pushed me into the reality of what was happening, and what I was feeling.
RELEVANT COMMENTS/ADDITIONAL INFO
RELEVANT COMMENTS/ADDITIONAL INFO
miserablywinning
Whew I have a couple of comments…
How were you/fiance friends with this guy for that long and been okay with his behavior?
Why is his best man so comfortable to even joke about something like that?
Why does he need time to digest cutting him off?
Why is he even still involved in the wedding??? Me personally, I wouldn’t allow anyone to disrespect my significant other, let alone someone I am supposed to be marrying, best man or not. I think they are both walking red flags. Jay for being a misogynist and your fiance for not cutting him out of the wedding and his life. These things can be taken as a joke sure but the level of disrespect is too great and your fiance should stick up for you if he has any shroud of decency and respect for you as his fiance and soon to be wife.
OOP
Happy to answer, since I think it will be helpful for many. I also added a very small edit to the update to acknlowedge a bit of this.
Much of this behavior has developed over time and a part from all of us. As a kid he always had a superiority complex, but he was also very kind and respectful. It came off more as immaturity than anything else. Plus, at the time, we were kids too. Following high school, Jay and I each moved a significant distance away from where we grew up. He still lives that far away. We get together maybe four times a year at most, and
I genuinenly believe he did not see me as more than some woman to use as collateral to knock his ‘friend’ down when he made those comments.
Fiance has no brothers, and Jay has always been a part of his life, filling that space. Jay also has no immediate family in his life, and hasn’t for quite sometime, making Fiance’s role a bit more impactful. It is much more similar to him cutting off a brother than just another friend. Fiance has also always been extremely kind and had a very peaceful soul. Don’t get me wrong, while Fiance prefers to avoid conflict, he has always been willing to stand up when necessary as well. I don’t believe he realized how much had been at his expense as of late until after our conversation. Given their long history, I believe he’s reflecting on a lot more than just this specific situation.
The wedding is still over a year away, and not untill the end of next summer. And this all has happened in less than a week. Neither Fiance or I have talked with Jay yet, so I did not feel it was right to post about any hard decisions regarding cutting him from the wedding, and so on. “These things can be taken as a joke sure but the level of disrespect is too great and your fiance should stick up for you if he has any shroud of decency and respect for you as his fiance and soon to be wife.”
This was a huge part of the larger conversation we had and something my fiance acknowledged as well. I think initially, it was viewed under the lens of us collectively being childhood friends, and Fiance as the mediator, rather than the lens of me as his wife until our second, much larger conversation.
OOP’s reply about the fiances reaction
“It’s only been a handful of days since this all came to light. I wish your fiancé’s reaction had been more about coming to your defense than Jay’s, but understand that sometimes people need time to truly process all that contributes to a messy situation, especially one with deep roots and close ties.”
Thank you for conveying this so well. I did my best to add an emphasis to this, but could not do so as well in my own words and fear it got lost in the length of the post (something for me to work on in future posts for sure).
I very much have worries, and knowing my personality, will also be worried day-of. I expressed this to my fiance as well, and he completely understood. I recognize there is still plenty of concern to still address with my fiance. But given how fresh this situation is, I wanted to afford myself a little grace of absorbing my feelings for what has happened before figuring out exactly what to do. I lost a friend too.
THIS IS A REPOST SUB - I AM NOT THE OOP
DO NOT CONTACT THE OOP’s OR COMMENT ON LINKED POSTS, REMEMBER - RULE 7