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What would you have done?
By Nia Tipton
Last updated on Dec 06, 2023
A woman posted to the 'AITA' subreddit asking if she is in the wrong after choosing to uninvite her cousin, brother, uncle, and father to her wedding over a cruel "prank" they pulled on her fiancé to "test" him.
The woman, 22, grew up in a family where the men love to tease and prank each other, a tradition that unfortunately involved the woman's fiancé Tim, 23, since the two became engaged.
Her cousin, brother, uncle, and father joked about "testing" Tim to see what "type" of man he is.
They ended up doing things that included forcing him to play chess four times in a row and secretly slashing his tires to see if he could fix it himself or choose to get help like "those lazy guys."
"They'd asked him questions like what joke he'd like to tell his future [mother-in-law], his opinions on abortion, jesus, gender equality etc.," the woman wrote in her Reddit post.
Her family also tested Tim's fishing and hunting skills and overwhelmed him with hypothetical scenarios to test his decision-making abilities and mental strength.
They would also repeatedly call him "slow and soft," not taking into account that Tim has asthma. Instead, they figured that he was "making excuses," and wouldn't stop teasing and pranking him despite the woman begging them to leave her fiancé alone.
Anytime she'd speak up, her father would respond that it's just typical stuff men do to challenge each other, and said that she was "ruining the fun."
Before the wedding, her family took Tim on a three-day trip and decided to hide his inhaler "as a challenge."
Her fiancé ended up leaving after seven hours, immediately telling her what had happened. The woman became furious and confronted her family once they all got back home. She yelled at all four of them, ultimately deciding to uninvite them from her wedding, prompting her brother to "freak out," telling the woman that it had all been just a prank and they had been planning on giving it back.
"Dad said they'll apologize if I insist but Tim will have lost the little respect they'd gained for him and in their eyes will always be "the soft college kid" who's not up for the challenge. I called him and the others awful then I left," the woman continued.
Since the woman decided to uninvite her family, her cousin has been begging that they talk, her uncle has been quiet, but her father is extremely upset and has been getting her mother involved to try and reconsider her decision.
However, the woman is adamant on not having them at her wedding for how they treated her fiancé, and refuses to listen to her mother, who says that she is exaggerating and should "let bygones be bygones," so that this doesn't ruin her relationship with her family.
The consensus is that the woman's decision to uninvite her family members is a legitimate one.
"This doesn’t sound like pranking but more like bullying. Who slashed [tires] as a prank? Or messes with someone’s health as a prank?" one person asked. "Just they just seem like big bullies to me," they continued, which brings up a good point — there's certainly a fine line between pranking and bullying.
According to the American Psychological Association, anything that "intentionally and repeatedly causes another person injury or discomfort" is considered bullying. While these "pranks" may have been in good fun for the men pulling them, the target of the pranks, the woman's fiancé, found himself in physical danger from a couple of them. As one person commented, "Pranking is meant to be HARMLESS fun. None of these are harmless."
"You don't invite your bullies to your wedding," one person wrote in response to the post, and experts agree. Weddings are costly and meant to be a joyful occasion, so "when choosing who will be on your guest list it's imperative that you consider people that hold a special place in your lives, will support you throughout your marriage, and will generally be happy for you," Jade Ladson, founder of Jade Ladson Weddings and Wedding League, told The Knot. Ladson noted that it's perfectly acceptable not to invite anyone who doesn't support your relationship or with whom you've had a falling out.
While the woman's fiancé "is a trooper for putting up with them," as one person commented, the couple is by no means obligated to be around that energy on their wedding day.
Nia Tipton is a Chicago-based entertainment, news, and lifestyle writer whose work delves into modern-day issues and experiences.