To not invite my parents' siblings to my child's wedding

Well done, good outcome.
Weddings are, after all, about love, mutual-support and family.

Well no, because that would have meant that a quarter of our guests were people I didn't know and my husband barely knows. It would have been disproportionate. This is one uncle and aunt, who are family members. And it sounds like the groom already doesn't have much family attending.

But she has already chosen friends. Why did she not include her aunt and uncle then??

And by your own statement if FIL was paying you should have let him have all 40 people right?

As others have said, it's not your wedding so it's not your decision.

Great result OP! Glad it could be straightened out.

Thats great news. I hope you all have a wonderful time.

Well done @userzerozerozero
Often a chat is all it takes

If the the parents are paying for the wedding, they should have a day in who's invited.

You don’t control your children when you pay for them.

Everyone will have their own opinion regarding wedding guest lists. I don't agree that because it's the bride & grooms day they should have 100% autonomy over who to invite when it's someone else paying for the ocassion. In this instance I would definitely prioritise the aunt & uncle over random friends. It would simply be rude & uncaring to leave them out.

My parents won't have many people around them and I think there is an element of me wanting them to feel isolated. I'm not enjoying this insight into my motivation but this is the exact reason why I posted here.

Agree with the above post. It is good that you have had this insight. Don't let the issues with your DP ruin the day - even if nothing is said the negtaive sentiment is in the room which will shadow your day.

Are you worried that your DP will spend the day with a face like a slapped arse and bitching to your uncle that your sibling wasnt invited?

If you’re paying for it — or even just contributing to it — and have your own friends on the guest list, you jolly well can invite your own uncle and aunt. Younger vibe be damned — that’s not what weddings are about.

Are you paying towards wedding? If you are, then I think you can ask to invite a few guests along. If not then really you need to chat with your son to explain your reasons
If it’s a large wedding then shouldn’t make a difference

It's not unfair at all. I would agree if the OP wanted to dictate things like the wedding dress, the colour scheme or the menu, but if you are paying for it all and you haven't imposed any kind of budget restriction then you're perfectly within your rights to say you want some older family members invited. Especially when you're talking about two people. My FIL wanted to invite 40 of his friends to our wedding and offered to pay for them. We said no because we didn't know most of these people and it would really have altered the balance of our wedding, and let him choose three couples to invite. That was not including older family members, who we would not have dreamed of excluding. Such a mean and short sighted thing to do.

We got married 6 years ago. We invited one "old" person from my side of the family (my only surviving family member from my grandparents' generation at the time) and several from my husband's.

I recently went through our wedding photos and there are some absolutely gorgeous ones of those people, most of whom have since died. It's such a shame to exclude the older generation from these family events. Society has changed so much over the centuries but the one thing that has remained consistent is that people are born, they get married, they have their own children and they die. Whether you are religious or not, these are the common life milestones that connect the generations. Excluding one generation (whether it's old people or children) because they don't fit the vibe of the kind of party you want seems to be rather missing the point.

Because it makes it an entirely different situation from the one in the OP, where the parent is fully paying for the couple's 'no budget restriction' wedding.

I agree. It's dreadful. Not being invited because they're old.

@userzerozerozero - I think it’s a huge mistake not to invite people who have been good to you and you will regret it. Your motivation for not inviting them is not a good one, as you acknowledge. They may not hold it against you but this is an opportunity to show gratitude to your uncle and his wife for being supportive.

For various reasons to do with my DH’s mental health at the time, we had no-one at our wedding. It was very conflicting for me and if he hadn’t otherwise been very good with my family I wouldn’t have accepted it. I told myself I could have a special family party to celebrate later. I felt particularly bad about my mum.

Our children were young at the time and I didn’t get going on with sorting the party right away. And it never happened. About 9 months after we got married, my mum was diagnosed with an aggressive terminal cancer which immediately made her very ill. She died about 18 months after we got married. There was never a party. There was never a chance to put right what I had done.

You never know what’s round the corner. This is an important opportunity to celebrate how your uncle and his wife have supported you. You should take it.

And the young vibe thing - that’s really not weddings are about. They’re meant to be multi-generational.

You cannot use the fact you are paying towards it tonforce them tonyave people they don't want there. Especially if you have already decided on friends to invite.

That is massively unfair.

Either pay for what they want or they pay themselves but if you place conditions like this on them you may find you lose them.

Yes. Why is that relevant?

Did you pay for your own wedding?

This!!

i got married this year and the inky famiky therr from my side were my oarents and mybaunt & uncle becaue we are very close. My sister and I are NC I incited her to keep the peace with mum but she stayed long enough to eat a meal and then left so less than 3 hours.

No extended cousins etc were invited. And neither was my dad's sister. No fall outs, we just aren't close and I can't think when she last spoke to me...dd is 11 now and I think she was probably a newborn.

We could have afforded it, but why fill the room with people we barely know or have any relationship with when we could fill it with people we do?

I would simply have the conversation that ds and his fiancée have decided immediate family only as they have chosen to have more of their friends present.

Whilst it is ultimately the bride and groom's decision, having a conversation with them to agree to your wish on this is something I think you should have.