'AITA for telling my family member if she can’t afford a wedding, she shouldn’t get married?'

"AITA for telling my family member if she can’t afford a wedding, she shouldn’t get married?"

My cousin (25F) let’s call her Bella and her sister (22F) let’s call her Rose are both engaged and are planning their weddings. Bella sent me a message of her trying on groomsmen’s suits to help Rose out with which ones to select for her wedding.

I (24F) have messaged Bella asking when Rose is getting married, to which Bella sends me a photo of Rose’s wedding invitation and follows it up with “you aren’t invited though."

Now, Bella and I are extremely close and I’m over at Bella and Rose’s house literally every week, and I even help babysit Rose’s child. Back in 2022, Rose had her engagement party and at the bottom of the invite wrote that she didn’t want gifts but would like money to go towards her wedding/honeymoon, I chipped in $250.

Based on how my cousins complain about having no money and how expensive everything is, I would say 2 years later, that money is long gone and this wedding planning has literally started 2 days ago.

I was told that a lot of people from the engagement party won’t be at the wedding and it will be a small intimate, immediate family only wedding. I don’t have an issue with these intimate weddings, but what I do have an issue with is inviting over 100 people to your engagement party, taking money off of them to fund your wedding and then not invite them because you’re trying to cut down on costs.

I told Bella this and asked where my money went to and if they can’t afford to be having a wedding, they shouldn’t be having one at all. I was told I’m being unfair and rude and that I don’t know what it costs to have a wedding.

I was then told that I won’t be at the actual wedding but would be at the reception, as will the rest of the engagement party to save on costs. I don’t know about you but the reception generally costs more than the actual wedding, as you have to pay for seats, food, drinks (open bar wedding), DJ and the venue you’re having that reception at.

I was then told this is why people generally have destination weddings, to save on costs because Australia is so expensive when it comes to weddings. I then explained that people who have destination weddings aren’t expecting everyone to buy their own tickets to that country but will pay for their guests, so destination weddings are not cheaper by any means.

I come from an Irish family, family traditions are very important to us and we like doing everything in big groups. I’m just super offended that I’ve been invited to something with the intent of being invited to something else and then just dropped. I said it was like this big scheme to get as much money from people as possible.

Am I being rude? Am I being disrespectful? I spoke to my parents and partner and they agree with me. My parents who have been married for 23 years have told me that being married really isn’t worth it all in the end, it doesn’t change your relationship and you’re just paying thousands for a piece of paper. So, am I the ahole?

Here's what top commenters had to say about this one:

Dazzling_Elle284 said:

Inviting people to an engagement party and asking for money towards a wedding creates an expectation of being invited to the wedding itself.

LordTaddeus said:

Feels like the money they asked for was never meant for the wedding if she used it all. Probably just wanted money for some other reason. NTA.

Spiritual-Vanilla-39 said:

NTA. All people need are the people getting married, an officiant, 2 witnesses, and a license. That's it. That's all that's legally needed for a wedding. Your cousin is TA for asking for money towards her wedding and then not inviting the people who helped fund it. However, not all destination wedding are covered by the couple in regards to traveling there and back.

TwoIndependent3006 said:

Nta. Go to the reception Party and gift like 5 bucks.

SaxoSad said:

NTA. Just the title is enough for me to agree with you, because people who don't have the money to finance a wedding shouldn't have a wedding, because they always end up "bullying" relatives to pay for them and they go into bitch mode when they are told no. For me, those kinds of people are the most stupid and negligent.

Proud_Fee_1542 said:

NTA. They basically scammed people into giving them money. Kind of unrelated but I would add though that I’ve never heard of any destination weddings where the bride/groom pay for all their guests tickets

. Maybe the bridal party, but definitely not all the guests. People sometimes literally have destination weddings because they know people won’t want to come because of the cost, but the bride and groom don’t get any hassle about not inviting them.