Really offended a friend. Would this upset you?

[Eastie77Returns]

Arranging where to go to dinner on a group chat with 3 friends and came up with a shortlist of restaurants. One friend (‘Sally’) said she could not afford any of those venues. The other 2 friends suggested some cheaper options but she said it was still too pricey as she has to factor in travel and babysitting costs for the evening. So we asked her to suggest somewhere and she came up with a pub that is honestly not somewhere I’d choose to eat (or drink for that matter) but by this time the group had been going back and forth for days so I said if everyone was in agreement we should go. We had a nice evening. The food was not very good and the pub attracts a rough crowd so not a great atmosphere but we sat in the garden and all enjoyed catching up.

My other two friends then messaged me separately and suggested that the three of go to one of the restaurants Sally had vetoed.

Can I ask if you were Sally, would you be upset or offended at this? She found out and is really hurt.

Lovely. You'll be sending her a link to this then, no?

I agree that I don't think I'd care. I'd probably feel a bit shit more that I couldn't afford it and feel a bit sad I missed out. But your friend is upset about it, so I guess that's the point. I think yes shes being a bit silly but why did the other friend feel the need to post it. It's ok to have dinner, but it's not very nice to rub someone's face in their misfortune?

I think you did the right thing. She sounds rather selfish, having derided the place.

Exactly.
She literally derided the place and made it clear it's not somewhere she would ever want to go.
So no, they don't have to ask, invite or run it past her if they go, or hide the event on SM.
Imagine being that enmeshed in "friendship group" politics that you had to run every little detail past everyone before you ever did anything for fear of offending someone. My gosh I couldn't be arsed with that.
I'm glad me and my friends can do things together or separately, with or without people there or getting offended.
She sounds like hard work.

Your reaction to this post really says a lot about who you are and how sensitive you are to your friend's hurt. People have explained to you why she feels upset, and how they'd feel the same, but you're not really open to empathising with her or her situation.
It's really easy to empathise with people who think in exactly the same way as you do- not so easy when they think and feel and are sensitive about different things.

I’m laughing at the assumptions people are making about poor Sally. I don’t want to write chapter and verse but she lives outside our city (London) in a lovely house. She & her DH have prioritised renovating the house above eating out in fancy restaurants etc. I eat at nice places, take several holidays a year. My house needs work. It’s scruffy and Sally would be horrified if she had to live in it. We all have different priorities. Sally is not an impoverished individual. She just didn’t have £££ to spend in a restaurant she doesn’t like which is completely reasonable and not a sign of abject poverty.

But I don’t understand why she’d be upset about the rest of us choosing to do so!

It's ok to have dinner, but it's not very nice to rub someone's face in their misfortune?

Posting something to your own social media is not 'rubbing someone's face in her misfortune'. Sending her a pic of the meal directly saying 'look what you missed haha' would be rubbing her face in it.

Except that Sally didn't want to go there, so why would she mind?

There's a lot of patronising of Sally on this thread. Suggesting OP should pay for her meal, assuming she didn't mean it when she said she wouldn't want to go to the restaurant.

Why not do her the courtesy of assuming she's an adult who knows her own mind and means what she says?

You say Sally is really hurt, you still don't understand why after 14 pages.

Is it more important to you, that Sally is wrong? Or is it more important to you that her feelings are hurt?

I made absolutely no assumptions about her finances in the post you quote. She is hurt. You don't empathise.

It's probably nothing to do with how much money she has- it's that you made plans without telling her that you were going out and deliberately excluded her. You could have put a message in the group chat saying, "We're all going to the Ivy next week, we know it's not your thing so we'll get together again with you soon!"

OP asks Mumsnet is it reasonable for someone to feel upset in these circumstances. 90% answer yes it is. OP spends the next 13 pages trying to justify why she disagrees.

Yes she could have but the point is she doesn't have to. To the point where a grown ass adult is now having a hissy fit over not being invited somewhere she made clear she would never go to.
I think Sally is just one of those drama llamas who wants to make everything all about her.

I didn't say any of that. I assume Sally did want to go but couldn't afford it. I think if she couldn't afford it that's too bad and I don't think anyone should feel obliged to pay for her. I also think it fine to go to the restaurant she couldn't afford to go to. I do think posting it on SM is a bit mean, which is also tainted because who even does this anymore, no one cares yo5ur out for dinner, except probably Sally!.

As opposed to a "grown ass adult having a hissy fit" on mumsnet for fourteen pages because it's so completely beyond her understanding that one of her friends feels differently to her?

Well then sally needs to understand that people aren't mind-readers, and that if she said something sounded shit and a rip off, that actually she was just hurting inside and there were secret reasons that others should have somehow known that she wanted to come after all??

Well it's not 14 pages of op typing is it? I wouldn't exactly say op is having a hissy fit, she initially sounded like she just wanted to find out genuinely if she was being unreasonable etc over friend being offended but then as per usual we get a load of batshit replies and things escalate😂

OK I missed she said the place was shit and a rip off, in that case she doesn't have a leg to stand on

Many of us dont understand why Sally is hurt at people going for a meal that she has declined tbh

Sorry where are you getting 90% from? There is no poll or am I being blind?

Yet many have explained why Sally could be feeling hurt, what could have been done to mitigate that, and the OP still doesn't care. She should just fuck her off really and be done with it.

That's not why she's hurt - she's hurt because she was openly excluded.

This is the crux of the problem: it's unsustainable when you have a well off, spendy group that includes one person who isn't. Sally's choice is between being excluded and being resented for imposing Wetherspoons meals on everybody else. There isn't a solution.

Sally is not wrong to feel hurt, and the group is not unreasonable to want to dine in fancy restaurants, but there's a basic incompatibility there. She needs to find friends who are less loaded or more frugal. Personally I.think dinner parties/barbecues etc are nicer and more relaxed.

She should just fuck her off really and be done with it

Yep, also I think Sally may be better off without the ‘friendship’ of OP. In OP’s latest post, she snidely refers to Sally as “poor Sally”. Nice way to talk about your so-called friend whose feelings you’ve (inadvertently) hurt.

I’ve been left out of things in the past when I was really skint because people assumed I wouldn’t be able to afford them, and tbh it really hurt, especially having to find out via Facebook. (It was very kindly ‘explained’ to me afterwards that this was the reasoning, which just twisted the knife tbh.) I get that your friend was probably trying to spare Sally embarrassment, as were my friends probably, but tbh I’d have appreciated the opportunity to decide for myself whether I could afford it.

Of course not. But personally I’d have told her the rest of us were going and added something like ‘I know you didn’t want to go to this one, but let us know by (whenever you need to book) if you change your mind.’ This lets her feel her company is wanted (which I think is the real issue here) while acknowledging you know she’ll probably want to give this one a miss.

I don’t see that you’ve done anything wrong! You went to the place she could afford and suggested and then on a separate occasion went to the place she didn’t want to go so why would you invite her?
I wouldn’t be offended by that particularly if I’d already said I didn’t want to go there!!!
Ive had similar with a friend who whenever a large group try and arrange something she literally will jump on and make us all go to the cheap place. It’s ok occasionally but sometimes a night out is a precious occasion and you want to make the most of it! She’s also the type that never tries to arrange stuff on her own just when someone else is trying to organise. Sympathy op!