Excluding a friend?

[StephPlum]

In the last few years my friendship group has settled into a nice little group of 5.
We have a WhatsApp that's busy with chat and support and we often get together with or without families. Husbands all get along too.
Before Xmas friend 1 told friend 2 that she's moving her child to a new school because of bullying that friend 2's child was involved in. Friend 1 insisted she didn't want to fall out, but friend 2 was upset, said it was all liesbso they had words and friend 1 left the WhatsApp.
Friend 1 has kept in touch with everyone except friend 2. When sending invites to stuff friend 1 includes everyone (Inc. Friend 2, who won't join in).
Friend 2 won't join anything that friend 1 is involved in. So we've had a few get together with just friend 2.
Friend 1 found out about this and is really upset. She thinks they should both be included in everything, and that we are actually preventing a reconciliation by enabling friend 2 to just leave her out. She left the WhatsApp group herself but is now feeling excluded.
If we didn't do anything with friend 2 separately she wouldn't see any of us.
Aibu to leave out friend 1 sometimes?

I'd continue to default-invite both friends to everything, just as you always have done.
If either friend decides they don't want to come, then that's on them really.

I can see how Friend 1 wouldn't be gasping to hang out with Friend 2, especially after Friend 2 called it all lies, and referred to Friend 1's child as a "tell-tale" type of kid. But also, these are Year 6 kids, hardly babies. This is a "them" problem, to a certain extent, not a "parent" problem.

@StephPlum It's a difficult situation for you, but I really think the friendship group should continue to operate as it always has i.e. Everyone is invited to everything. The fact that Friend 2 won't come is neither here nor there. That is HER choice and she sounds like a bully who wants her own way in things

If you really want to stay 'neutral' then there is nothing to stop you having a one on one meet up with Friend 2 from time to time. But to arrange a group outing/meet up without Friend 1, entirely sends the message to her that you are siding with Friend 2, and I completely understand Friend 1 being very upset at being left out. She sounds like she has handled the whole situation in a very adult fashion - and you and the other 2 not involved are penalising her for that?

If we didn't do anything with friend 2 separately she wouldn't see any of us.
Aibu to leave out friend 1 sometimes?

But that is Friend 2's choice. If she decides not to go then it is HER choice not to see any of you. YABVU to exclude friend 1 from any of your group outings/meet-ups. Sorry

The more of your replies that I read OP, the more I’m actually wondering if this is real or if you’re having us on.. wtf ? F1 sounds a gem to be fair re how she’s handled it all? What is F2 on ????

Same.

F1 did NOT go nuclear and bring drama to the group She tried to handle it privately and quietly. F2 brought the drama and continues to bring the drama. And is definitely weaponising the group in an attempt to permanently push F1 out.

I'm not at all surprised F1 has plenty of other friends to go to and F2 has none, frankly. And I don't feel sorry for her either.

If the children are in Year 6 the likelihood is that the group will die by next September anyway. Even if your children all end up in the same secondary school, they will be scattered amongst a number of classes and parent groups really stop being a thing once children get more independent anyway.

I don't think she went nuclear either. I think she did what she felt was the best for her child.
It seems to have been a positive change for her child, just very impactful to the rest of us (I'm not suggesting that should have been a consideration for her).
It seems it was all going on for a long time we just didn't know about it until she'd decided to move them.

I can't understand the results of this poll, but there again, I suspect it's different for men and women. I'm a man. As far as I'm concerned, on each and every occasion it's entirely up to you who you invite. I really can't see the problem. Friends 1 and 2 are the ones with the problem, not you. Don't make their problem your own.

@StephPlum
You mention that Friend 1 still keeps in touch with the other two and that the group chat that just has Friend 1, you, and the other two friends is not used. You’ve also made it abundantly clear on this thread that you have been supporting Friend 2.

It’s extremely likely that Friend 1 and the other two have a group chat that excludes both Friend 2 and you since you are so strongly on her side. If Friend 2 continues to be such a lunatic I’d imagine that the group chat that she is in will gradually become less active as the other two slowly fade out.

The friend group you were in is already over. If you continue to fawn over Friend 2 you will probably be left out of the new friend group as well.

….friend 2?

Oh God, groups of women!! This sounds like a group I belong to where I had clearly been 'wendied.' I felt like leaving the group but decided to take a bit of a step back instead. There are times when I feel like leaving the lot of them to get on with it but somehow I never do in the end. I just think women are like that. I have a friend who won't get friendly with a group for that very reason. I think you'll just have to try to make the best of it. Both of them might come round at some point.

I don’t think you actually want to hear that friend 2 is wrong, that she’s an awful person and it’s clear to see where her child has learned their bullying behaviour.

But regardless of how it is spelled out, your takeaway appears to be friend 1 should have put up and shut up. And to be fair to her, she did. She tried to sort it through the school first and that was apparently also wrong.

Friend 2 is the only person causing problems here. But you’re clearly enamoured with her so it’s probably easier to carry on believing her bullshit.

Poor friend 1. She deserves a better group of friends.

Friend 74 became bored and started reading Wilde..........

Why has this popped up again? It was another thread yesterday which went to 40 pages with OP being highly selective about who was replied to.

I've not seen that one, but thought I'd better reply!

Friend 2 is manipulative. The fact she keeps spitting her dummy when she’s not the one who has had to move schools, and she’s minimised the experience of friend 1’s child AND now tries to exclude Friend 1 by causing drama. Textbook covert narcissism right here.

Sounds like you’re massive team friend two here and I think YABU. So what if she’s more upset? Do you think people really pull their kids out of school for minor issues? Poor friend one. First her child was bullied and now you’re excluding her because friend two is manipulating you. Sounds like her child didn’t fall too far from the tree.

I think it should be one big meet up and whoever declines the invite is excluding themselves.

It seems to have been a positive change for her child, just very impactful to the rest of us

Oh boo fucking hoo. You don’t give a shit about F1 do you. It’s purely about how this has inconvenienced you. How hard it is for you.

get over yourself

You should all resolve to remain neutral , abstain from all conversations about the disagreement and invite both F1 / F2 to gatherings. Invite the friend who left the WA group to rejoin , if refuses then OK.
All subsequent decisions regarding those gatherings should remain strictly the choice of F1 and F2.
Groups can feed off this kind of negative energy and it never ends well.

The disagreement will be the ultimate end of your Group unless you are really strict about keeping out of it .
If there is no other outlet for their discontent they might even resolve to be civil. However disputes involving children tend to be emotionally charged so it might never happen, who knows, but if the group has any further to do with it the inevitable result will be further factions ...
I honestly think if anyone tries to manage the situation within the group it will further deteriorate . I speak from experience.

Yup! Like many others I’m with @GertrudePerkinsPaperyThing (and friend 1)

I think F2 seems like a bit of a , she’s manipulating the situation. I think F1 probably thought the friendship was stronger than it was and you could talk about difficult situations and that the friendship was separate to the children’s relationship. I also think F2 reaction says guilt I think she knows that her child was being mean and is avoiding dealing with it.

I think you should continue to arrange things but make it clear that all are invited as all are friends, it is then up to them if they wish to attend or not. If F2 continues to exclude herself she clearly doesn’t think as much about your friendship as you do either. They are both adults and should start acting like it.

Why should she not tell friend 2? I would want to know if my child was upsetting another child in school, even if was quite trivial stuff, but especially if the child was upset enough to move school. Year 6 is old enough to take some responsibility for how you treat others, and by friend 2’s reaction it makes me think she’s not a great role model on how to treat friends.

If my friend was the parent of my child’s bully, I would hope they would know how significant it was, if I was moving my child schools, not trivialise it and call my child and myself a liar.

Just because friend 1 has other friends, and friend 2 doesn’t I don’t see why this makes you feel more sorry for friend 2 and have more loyalty/sympathy for her. She is victimising herself in this situation.

I agree

As someone who has been in a similar situation with a friend group, and myself being the one that (IMO) was wronged by another friend in our group, it changed the dynamic of the group completely. The ‘friend’ narrated her side of the story to the rest of the group early on, (supposedly) was so upset and got the others to feel sorry for her, they rallied round her, whilst I was left to deal with things on my own, as I didn’t go running to them as didn’t want them to be caught in the middle so tried to leave them out of it. So I wouldn’t take friend 1’s lack of being upset as meaning she isn’t as bothered, maybe she’s just being more adult about the situation and trying to not make you all feel awkward.

The ‘friend’ and I were past the point of making up, even though the others in the group tried to encourage me to make up for the ‘good of the group’. And that was my choice which I accepted, but it didn’t mean I wanted to not be friends with the others.

They essentially picked sides by inviting her to things and not me, and the groups reason for this was that they were doing things as couples and as I was single, but she was married, so was hard as their husbands were friends too.

I very rarely got an invite out at all, and felt like they had sided with her, so by the time I did get the odd invite, I felt like they weren’t real friends and so took myself out of the situation completely.

If you genuinely don’t want to side with anyone, I would invite them both and let them decide if they want to come. If one or the other is instant on not going because the other is, and it carries on too long. I would explain that in that case, there will be times that you do things without friend 1 and times you’ll do things without friend 2.

The alternative is to invite them both and if friend 2 decides not to come it’s her loss. You don’t have an alternative meet up just to accommodate her as it’s not fair on friend 1 she’s the one being left out and not friend 2

So it’s friend 2 dictating you all. Clearly if she’s upset about it being the latter which would be friend 1. Seems like she wants you all to break ties with friend 1