Woman tells best friend his proposal was 'disrespectful' after he gets rejected.
Proposing is terrifying in and of itself. Add a judgmental friend who criticzes it, and you have yourself a messy Reddit post.
Such a friend came to the AITA forum to see if she had actually been a jerk.
'AITA (Am I the a-hole) for calling my friend's proposal disrespectful?'
pokemonkandy writes:
Alright, so here's the deal. My friend (m27) decided to propose to his girlfriend of 3 years, Dina. (F26). The two met at a bar pre-COVID, and were just chatting at first but it quickly led to more and eventually the two of them moved in together and discussed marriage.
Personally, I think they're a great match, and my friend, Stephen, has never been happier. He told me that he was planning to propose to Dina, and I was ecstatic.
Well, the day of the proposal hits, and I called Stephen the next day, which was last night, to congratulate him. But he wasn't happy. He told me that Dina had said no. I was shocked, and asked if he knew why. He said that she didn't like how he proposed.
Now here's the thing. I knew he was going to pop the question, but I didn't know how he was going to do it. He thought it would be romantic to propose at the place they met...yes. A bar.
Already I could kind of see why she might not like that, but I decided to ask her privately because she and I have gotten to be close.
She confided in me that it's because she told Stephen multiple times that she didn't want to have a public proposal, and that she was horrified he would do it at a bar of all places and that she felt disrespected that he didn't accommodate that.
I told Stephen that his proposal was honestly really disrespectul and seriously kind of messed up, to which he told me I was being an insensitive AH and should be supportive as his friend rather that talking down on him, but I don't know if I'm wrong here. AITA for calling my friend's proposal disrespectful?
Here's what Reddit thought about the whole thing...
concernedreader1982 says:
Stephen is the a-hole. If his GF told him NOT to propose in a public setting, he should've respected that. The bar thing doesn't bother me b/c it's their first date. Whats bothersome is he did something she specifically asked him not to and now his feelings are hurt b/c he didn't listen to her. NTA (Not the a-hole).
Even_Supermarket_629 agrees:
I would have said YTA (you're the a-hole) had they not discussed the proposal before. But she told him MULTIPLE TIMES to not make it a public proposal and he did the opposite of that. I would be pretty pissed too. She had one request, and he couldn't even deliver that.
Passive_Menis_Energy writes:
Soft YTA because you are inserting yourself in a couple's problems. I totally agree his way to propose was disrespectful. My fiance told me she didn't want a public proposal, so I didn't. On the other hand, you shouldn't be digging into it. You should have just told your friend to talk to his gf about why she rejected his proposal.
OP takes it in stride:
In retrospect, yeah. I think it was wrong of me to insert myself as much as I did. You make an excellent point.