"WIBTA for uninviting my brother because he is trying to ruin my father's funeral?"

I have three younger siblings, two brothers (Andrew and Ben), and one sister (Claire). When we were younger, my father discovered Ben was gay. He was enraged, and probably would have disowned Ben on the spot if it was not for the intervention of our mother. Dad and Ben never reconciled, and Dad did everything in his power to make Ben as uncomfortable as possible.

Us siblings stayed close, but eventually Ben could not take the constant abuse anymore and moved out. Claire followed, but for career reasons. Andrew and I stayed in our hometown. Dad died a few days ago. As the eldest son of the family, it became my responsibility to prepare the funeral. He was a prominent member of the local community, so attendance will be high. Now we come to the main issue.

Ben wanted to give a eulogy, and sent me a draft of his speech. Unsurprisingly, the contents were not flattering, and I rejected him on the spot. He got really angry, and told me that this was his best chance to expose Dad's hypocrisy, especially since he had the image of a good family man. He wanted everyone to know how much abuse he suffered at the hands of our father.

Now, I love Ben unconditionally. He is my younger brother, and there are not a lot of things I would not do for him. However, this is one of them. It is simply not appropriate to speak ill of the dead at their own funeral, which is supposed to be a celebration of their life.

For all his ugly, hideous flaws, Dad was a complicated person, and focusing the entire funeral on his relationship with one person is too much. There is also the fact that letting him do such a eulogy will probably cause a massive fallout in the community. Ben will not have the deal with the consequences, because he lives in another state, but Andrew and I will be left picking up the pieces.

Claire is on Ben's side for this one, while Andrew is on mine. I want to stress that I am not trying to cover for my father, or what he did to Ben. But there is a time and place for such things, and a funeral is not it.

Ben eventually backed down, but his husband has tipped me off that Ben is still preparing to cause trouble. I really really do not want to do this, but it seems to me that uninviting my brother from the funeral is the only choice. WIBTA if I did so?

What do you think? AITA? This is what top commenters had to say:

CrystalQueen3000 said:

Firstly I’m sorry for your loss. That said, YTA. Denying Ben closure to keep up appearances in the community is cruel. You and others experienced your father in a very different way than he did.

Do I think he should read a eulogy, no. But he shouldn’t be uninvited. He may cause a scene, he might not. I guarantee he’s going to show up with or without your permission, he’ll be responsible for how he behaves.

[deleted] said:

YTA. You can keep your brother from doing the eulogy, but barring him from the funeral to protect the legacy of a bigot and save yourself some inconvenience is you choosing your abusive, dead father over the living brother he victimized. I honestly find this post disturbing. You and your family should have done more to protect your brother.

PUNSLING3R said:

Not the @$$hole for not wanting drama at a funeral. However, if your dad managed to maintain this image despite his actions and you agree that your dad was in the wrong for what he did to ben, then I feel you have a responsibility to address his flaws and false image.

Not to mention, other people presumably know about Ben and their rocky relationship, or will have questions about why Ben isn't attending if he is uninvited, so questions will be asked regardless.

Whether this is addressed inside or outside the funeral is ultimately up to the organisers (you), but as a member of the LGBT community myself my sympathy goes to Ben here. As far as I'm concerned, your dad failed to be father.

And Prestigious-Fan-5530 said:

NTA: you are 100% right a funeral eulogy is not the place to air dirty family secrets. Be should take the high road at the funeral and post whatever he feels he needs to his social media accounts. Don’t listen to the YTAs. Sorry for your loss.

Edit from OP:

For those asking why I would even want to honor such a horrible man in the first place: it's complicated. Dad was a great father until the incident, which happened when I was in college. It's not easy being torn being two people you love, and even though I can say I did not hesitate to choose Ben, Dad was still the person I grew up admiring and loving.

I'm still sorting my own feelings out, and trying to reconcile the loving father that raised me and my siblings with the man who threw away everything for his petty prejudices.

For those asking about the fallout:

It has to do with the town's local politics. That's all I'm willing to say.

Going to do a last few clarifications here because people are making a lot of assumptions: No. We did not cover up the abuse. All four of us siblings have been clear to our friends and family why we moved out of the family house, and my mother has also made it clear why she and my late father were estranged, even if we did not go out of way to air the family's dirty laundry.

Ben has also made it clear that he does not resent any of us besides our father, and us falling out would just be what our Dad would have wanted. I might have understated a bit when I referred to the eulogy draft as unflattering. It was vulgar, vile and definitely not appropriate for a funeral.

Even if I had agreed with Ben's plan, there was no chance I would have approved the draft; the eulogy would have reflected badly on him, and not my father. I am not going to ask Ben to keep the abuse a secret. He is free to tell anyone he likes, on Facebook, the local obituary etc. I just think that the funeral is not the appropriate time, and especially not through an eulogy.

A week later, he shared this update:

Hello, it has been one of the longest weeks of my life, but the funeral has finally concluded. Thank you to everyone who commented on my original post. Some people sent me messages for an update, so here you go.

First of all, it would have been a mistake to rescind the invite to my brother, and thank you to the people who pointed out that I had no way of keeping him out of the church without asking security to throw him out. That would probably have been almost as bad, if not worse, than the eulogy.

I had to deal with a lot of people during the funeral preparations, many of them unpleasant but influential, and really was not in the right state of mind to make decisions. It was also wrong of me to try to deny Ben closure, though I do have to say that the comments accusing me of being complicit in or not having done enough to stop my brother's abuse were out of line.

A singular post where I am actively trying to limit personal information is not a fair basis from which to extrapolate our family relationships, and it seems to me that many of the commenters have their own emotional baggage that they are trying to project onto my relationships.I met up with my brother and his husband a few days after he gave me the eulogy.

Thank you to those who suggested I ask about his motivations and provided alternate perspectives. We had a surprisingly brief talk. In short, Ben did not want us, his immediate family, to lionize our father. We agreed that Ben would come, but we would leave the eulogy to Dad's friends and we would hold a private wake for his immediate family only.

The funeral was mostly uneventful. A few questions were asked by the priest and my father's friends why none of his children or his wife were giving eulogies, but I just explained that we were leaving it for the wake. At the wake, we all got to say what we wanted to say. I will leave it at that.

Thanks to whoever suggested the after-funeral party. We went to our childhood home and had a great time. After the funeral, we published an obituary with sections from each part of the family. It was tacitly worded, and choosing the right words was a pain, but Ben had fun with his section.

All in all, I think the matter was settled quite nicely. Thank you again for everyone who gave advice, and everyone who provided their kind words.