Restaurant row who is at fault?

[Polishedshoesalways]

Out with friends in a restaurant last night - six of us in total. Two of my friends were light heatedly disagreeing about gender politics between them. They were not bothering anyone else.

Friend x suddenly shouts at them quite aggressively and loudly to ‘shut up’

Loud enough for the tables around us to stop and stare.

Would you think this is rude? She was not part of the conversation at the time.

The table sat in stunned silence after that. It’s now really awkward. She hasn’t apologised or acknowledged that shouting or shutting a conversation down like that isn’t cool. The friends in question seem offended.

What do you think? Do they have a point?
Are you okay with being told to shut up?

I'd probably not want to be friends any more with someone who loudly and publicly shouted at me to shut up.

If it was someone you were friends with who had never done it before, would you not be wondering if they're OK?

She wouldn't be coming to a weekend away with us then.

Snapping, while not good, is one thing. Sometimes it happens. But if I'd snapped at friends like she did, regardless of whether I thought they'd been annoying or offensive, I'd have a conversation about it after, explain what the issue was, and apologise for my outburst. Brushing it off as 'authentic' and seeing no issue with the behaviour would be a concern for me.

There are ways of encouraging the end of tedious debates between friends which don't involve shouting at them.

Haha yeah never talk about religion and politics. I always switch off when a conversation moves to that territory. Making a scene like that was probably not needed though.

I think people need to start t as liking more about gender and its effects on women and children, your friend needs to toughen up if she can't cope with a talk about women's rights. Silencing debate on this has got us where we are, worried about even talking about it.

If my friend acted like that out of the blue, I'd be really concerned that there was something wrong.

My first thought wouldn't be to exclude her or end the friendship.

There's talking about it and there's two people in a group dominating discussion with the same debates that they've all heard before. If you want to make change then talk to people who haven't heard you both debating it 10000 times before. Neither of them are going to change their views so there's very little point debating it. It's dull.

It doesn’t sound like a nice topic. I’m going to say you hit a nerve. If I were the friends having this discussion I’d be reaching out to apologise to them.

It was rude, but then that's not everyone's idea of dinner table conversation. And she was clearly feeling left out and/or triggered.

There's fault on both sides, in my opinion.

To be honest this is pretty precious. She is perhaps struggling with something, she spoke out of turn, people do. But questioning whether to still go away is pretty dramatic and self centering. Perhaps some kindness towards her might help.

I agree. It's very extreme. They've clearly upset her and she's upset them. You all just need to chill a little and have a nice boozy weekend away

Slightly derailing (sorry)

I find talk about women's rights, politics etc interesting but some on the thread find these topics "boring" or "not nice" for a dinner conversation.

Fair enough, the world would be a boring place if we were all the same. But what on earth do you talk about if you go out with friends? Those who prefer "fun" topics, what do you call fun?

I was thinking this. It is also rude to bring up contentious subjects over a dinner.

It's not necessarily the topic that's boring. But if it's the umpteenth time they've both rehashed the same arguements it's dull

I mean, it sounds like a fun night out 😫Four mojitos and a debate on gender politics please.

Maybe she said a thought in her head out loud 😂

Absolutely, wonder if she did a Bridget Jones response in her head as to Peter-crashing-bore who did a similar domination of dinner parties 'gosh look at me and my intelligent chat' and didn't realise she'd spoken out loud!

I find politics interesting - in fact am borderline obsessed - but do not really want to engage in debate over dinner. What is especially boring is having the same conversation or debate with someone on repeat. For example, if you were anti-something and I were pro-something, once we have established that I would find it boring to rehash the topic unless there was new info to discuss. What would be the point?

Conversations between never really end, though. You pick them up as a developing debate next time you see each other.

I would not want to go for a weekend with Mrs Shouty. If she is an adult person she should be able either to turn the conversation, have a different conversation with somebody else or bow out. Shouting shut up at people is socially inept beyond what is tolerable.

Read the room? READ THE ROOM??

OP clearly says the 2 weren't bothering anyone else

There were 3 other people to talk to if one didn't want to join that conversation.

Clearly something was bothering the rude friend, but she should have. ...... kept it to herself, or ....... joined the conversation and put her point forward for discussion, or ....... apologized for the outburst.

I like talking politics but it's not always suitable for the dinner table as it has a tendency to get heated and awkward.

We talk about travel, music, food, things we've seen on TV, recent movies, our own lives and families, our animals - all sorts of things, really.

If anyone is truly a friend, turn you know if the behaviour is out of character or not. Unusual one-off behaviour is not something I would use to stop a friendship, presuming nobody was injured. It does sound like she should apologise (and I would tell her so clearly), but also that your group of friends are very judgemental and uninterested in her as a person.

Maybe the debating 2 were debating across her, a table for 6 could well be a round table, and they were just talking across her.

If this is the case, then no wonder she had an outburst.

Also if the gender thing is a thing they both take seriously then surely they'd now be curious as to why shouty friend didn't want to discuss it?

Very rude with no regard to other people out enjoying an evening

OP clearly says the 2 weren't bothering anyone else

Except they clearly were 🤷‍♀️ they may not have been bothering OP but she's not the only friend at the table.