rSlash - r/Bestof My Friend Secretly Hates Indians (I'm Indian)

Episode Date: April 13, 2023

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Welcome to our slash best of redditor updates, where OP is considering impersonating her sister on her wedding day. Am I the bad guy for not wanting to pretend to be my twin on her wedding day? What? I'm a 30 year old woman, and I have an identical twin sister, and for the purposes of anonymity, I'll call her Jess. Jess and I look so much alike, it can be freaky. At one point, when we were still infants, they had to draw a little dot on the bottom of one of our feet just so they could keep track of who was who for medical reasons. My mom adored the fact that Jess and I were her cute baby twin girls and treated us as precious dolls who she would frequently dress alike and always make us do things together.

At first, I didn't mind it at all because, well, it was my normal and I do genuinely love my sister. But when we started getting older and I developed my own interest, I would get so frustrated or upset when I either couldn't do something because Jess didn't want to, or the only way that I could do it is if Jess would come with me and vice versa. It sucked because despite our appearances, Jess was the more extroverted twin who liked to go to parties and do sports while I was introverted and artistic. I was always made to do what Jess wanted to do because me not wanting to be social was

seen as bad, and the only way that Jess would agree to do or endure my hobbies was if I did her homework or chores. When my parents were divorcing, I was over the moon when my dad agreed to let me live with him in another state, and Jess didn't want to move away from all her friends. My mom cried when I had to tell her that I didn't want to live with her, and Jess accused me of hating them. This really wrecked me emotionally, and I almost caved, but my dad got me into therapy who helped me gather the courage to just leave.

I never really did shake off the guilt until around senior year of high school, but I never once regretted my choice because of how liberating I felt by getting to just be me. I was slowly able to repair my relationship with mom and Jess, but Jess and I were never as close as we used to be, and I was honestly fine with that. Fast forward to adulthood, and Jess is engaged with her boyfriend, Steve, who's 36, and their wedding is set up for this spring. Unfortunately, Jess was recently in a bad accident,

and her face is going to need to get cosmetic surgery. She's been crying on and off for days over this, because there's no way that she'll be healed up in time for the wedding. My mom, Steve and I have been trying to console her, but it's not enough. Earlier this week, my mom approached me with the idea of dressing up as Jess and pretending to be her for the ceremony and reception so the pictures will look nice. I was floored and gave a hesitant, no, because while I do know that this would mean a lot to my sister, I just feel really uncomfortable about it. My mom was upset with me and said that it wasn't a big deal that it's just for pictures

and asked me if I really wanted to make it so that Jess would have to be reminded of her trauma whenever she had to look at her wedding photos or just not have any photos at all. Am I the bad guy? OP posts some important clarifications. Jess and Steve's wedding is booked at their dream venue and if they postpone, which is about three weeks away, then they won't be able to book it again until around 2025. Also, families on both sides are coming in from out of state. Apparently, between the wedding costs and needing to save up for the cosmetic surgery,

Steven Jess don't have the money to pay for a professional Photoshop. We live in America, and as far as I know, since Jess's surgery is purely for cosmetic purposes, health insurance may not cover it, if any at all. My mom was the only one who actually approached me about this, so I don't know for sure if Jess and Steve know about this idea. And I'm honestly a little scared of actually talking to them about this in case they're on board with it and start to try to pressure me into a green. And then OP posted an update. So I reached out to Steve first about suggesting Photoshop.

And it turns out that he and Jess were actually considering that before deciding to just postpone the wedding because Jess is still dealing with some PTSD from the accident. And he doesn't believe that she's going to be able to handle the stress of a wedding in three weeks. I was so relieved and told Steve that I would be more than happy to help them with getting the word out to people that the wedding wasn't happening right now. For the sake of peace and Jess's mental health, I've decided to keep what my mom said about using me as a replacement for the wedding photos to myself for now. Jess is really going through a lot, and I feel like this would be rubbing salt in the wound. So what's kinda odd to me about this post, I don't wanna say odd, it just kinda stuck

out to me as interesting, is OP goes into this backstory about how when she was a child, she really struggled with being her own individual person apart from her twin, and clearly what OP is doing by explaining that is establishing backstory and saying, okay, this is important that I'm like separate from my twin so that she's like justifying her behavior. But the thing is, even without all that backstory, you're still completely justified in saying no to this ridiculous request. You don't need to have a background of twin trauma to be like, yo, what? What are you talking about?

You want me to pretend to be another woman on their wedding day? Pose with a husband? What, are you nuts? So not only are you living somewhat else's wedding and like, st-lovingly stroking the cheek of a man that you're not married to, but that means that Jess doesn't get

to experience her own wedding. She's like, what? Hiding in the shadows behind a curtain while another woman effectively gets married to her man. Well, what is this idea? This is bonkers. And the mom's message to the daughter in this is,

oh, sweetie, I'm so sorry about what happened to your face, but unfortunately, you're just too ugly to get married. It would be much, much better if you just hide your ugly face so that your much prettier sister can pretend to be you and get married. This is, man, the more I think about this the worse it gets. She's disrespectful to both her daughters in like fundamentally different and profound ways. And it's just, yo this woman's crazy. This is one of the dumbest ideas I've ever heard. I'm reading this in April 2023.

Of all the stories I've read in 2023 so far, this woman is the craziest, the dumbest. What is going through her head? Am I the bad guy for not defending my friend when his expensive new clothes got ruined? I'm a 23 year old woman who lives in India. I had a 24 year old guy friend, Joe visiting from New York this week. Today was Holy, which is a massive festival in India where people douse each other in color and water to celebrate. It's also fairly accepted that anyone is fair game on holy, whether you're

throwing water balloons from your balcony or chucking color from the street, people douse random strangers and everyone enjoys it. Joe had another friend living in my city who invited him and me on holy to show Joe a proper holy celebration. We both got ready in the morning. I was wearing an old night suit and Joe had dressed up in a newly bought, very expensive looking curta. He gave me a very judgemental look and asked whether it was appropriate for me to go to his friend's party dressed in old ragged clothes, especially when his friend had said that it would be a proper party. I laughed and explained that not only were we going for a holy party, but we would also have to walk on foot to reach

the friend's house. And whatever clothes we were wearing were bound to get ruined. Joe still looked a bit annoyed, but didn't say anything further. Cut to 20 minutes later, we get out of the car and begin the short 5 minute walk to Joe's friend's house. A bunch of teenagers ambushed us out of nowhere, and within seconds we looked like walking rainbows and were utterly drenched. I laughed, picked up some of the kids' water balloons and chucked them at them, but Joe got incredibly mad and started screaming at the kids about how expensive his clothes were, how they ruined it, and how they had to reimburse him. The kids could see that Joe was angry, but they said to me in Hindi that they couldn't

understand what he was saying. I told Joe that I had also forewarned him about this, and it's a very, very accepted part of the culture here. This is something that people don't get upset about. Joe got mad at me and told me to explain to the kids that they had to apologize and cough up the money for his clothes. I refused and Joe walked off in a huff. The party went great. It was a typical holy bash, and Joe and I immediately fit in being already covered in water and color,

and I thought that everything was fine now. However, when we got back to my house, Joe got really mad at me about refusing to defend him, making him feel isolated and alone in a foreign country, and imposing my culture in an uncomfortable manner without respecting the fact that he's a tourist. I told him he was being unreasonable and went to bed. However, later, a few of our mutual also American friends texted me that I was being a butthole about the situation. And then the next day, OP posted an update. So it turns out there was a lot more to the situation. And then the next day, OP posted an update.

So it turns out there was a lot more to the story, quite a lot more. I kicked Joe out of my house today. He will never be a part of my or my friend's life ever again. I made a group with everyone besides Joe, and as soon as I started texting them, it was clear that Joe had fed them utter nonsense. He told them that I had pressured him into going shopping, telling him that wearing ethnic

clothes was a necessity and not only had I taken him to a very high-end brands, but I also pushed him to buy the most expensive items. I immediately clarified the situation to my friends, and that's when a much darker truth began to emerge. We're a group of about 10 friends who met at University in the States, and we're a very diverse group. Indians, Brazilians, Chinese, Nigerians, Spanish, American, etc. We also became friends over a shared love of traveling and committed to visiting each other's

home countries after graduation. Post-graduation, we were fortunate enough to all land really high-paying jobs, and travel was the hobby we chose to use our surplus income on. The difference was Joe and Cameron, who let's just say had very extensive trust funds waiting for them. So, while we all traveled quite a bit, it was Joe in particular who traveled the most. In fact, he had already visited most of our friends, and I was a second to last one left. Turns out, his actions were a pattern. He would participate in some aspect of the

local culture, and then throw a scene about other aspects that he doesn't like. For example, he would get red envelopes for Chinese New Year, and then have a fit about a fire phobia while lighting lanterns. He went to Brazil for Carnival, and then threw a fit about being asked to dress accordingly. None of us had mentioned this before to each other, because the general perception had been that Joe was a really good guy, well-traveled, etc. and that this was just a one-off incident. The worst part though, is that this only happened with his friends of color. He had no issue when he went for La Tomatina or October Fest. I decided to confront Joe this morning, and at first he denied it,

but I showed him the group messages. This is when he lost it, and he went on a rant about how all non-white culture was amusing and exotic. And he didn't mind it, but he hated how we always forced him into barbaric and disgusting parts of our tradition. And he said that he had an issue with that, and that we were killing his love for travel and how much better our friends in Europe had been, oh my god. I told him to get out of my house instantly, and when he refused saying that he had nowhere else to stay, I had my driver take his luggage out.

I told the rest of the friend group about this, and we were all equally shocked and hurt, and are cutting him off entirely. All right, so starting off this story, I thought that Joe was just like a run of the mill moron, but no! Turns out he's just a run of the mill racist moron. Our next Reddit post comes from R-slashamay the bad guy. Am I the bad guy for refusing to let my boyfriend move into my house with his nephew even temporarily? I'm a 23 year old woman, and I inherited my grandparents' house in land last year. I'd rather have my grandparents back.

But at least I'm set up with a good place to live out of college, and I don't have to worry about housing like a lot of my friends. I've been seeing my boyfriend, Adam, who's 24 for a year and a half, and we've been planning to move in together this summer. He'd be moving to my place. Right now, he lives in an apartment with three roommates. Adam has an older brother, who is kind of a piece of garbage. He and his girlfriend are addicts, and they've

been involved in shady stuff in the past, so Adam only talks to them at holidays, usually. They have a five-year-old son, who Adam sends birthday cards and gifts to, but hasn't spent a whole lot of time around because of the family drama. A couple of weeks ago, the worst happened, and the girlfriend died, and Adam's brother is going to be in jail, probably for a very long time. Adam's mom is disabled, and not in good enough help to keep up with a five-year-old full time. The girlfriend's family apparently disowned her, and wants nothing to do with it. That leaves Adam as a guardian for the kid or foster care. I am NOT a kid person. I don't dislike kids, but I had my own messed up childhood, and I wouldn't be a good parent

or be able to deal with the noise and chaos of a small kid easily. Adam knows this, and we've had the whole whole what if I get pregnant and future planning conversations. So I was surprised when Adam asked about moving up plans for us to live together so that he would have a place to take his nephew. I said that I wasn't okay for him bringing his nephew and that since the situation had changed the plan would have to be put off until something was figured out. He said that there's no room for his nephew at his current place, and rent is sky high, so he wouldn't be able to afford a new place on his own. My place has plenty of room and would be perfect, and this is literally the

difference between his nephew staying with family and going God knows where. We argued, and his mom has been calling me to beg me to let them stay with me for a while until they can make other arrangements. I have a feeling that a little while would turn into permanently once the kid got comfortable. Mutual friends have been telling me that I'd be a bad guy for not helping Adam at least temporarily because I'm lucky to have the space. But I really don't want my space to be invaded like that and have to deal with kicking the mad eventually if nothing else comes up. Then, the next day, OP posted an update. Well, decision made.

I broke up with him last night. Reading all the responses made me realize that I don't actually want him to move in with or without his nephew at this point. He did not take it well at all, but probably another reason this wasn't going to work in the end. Hopefully, he and his mom can figure something out together. Then, three weeks later, OP posted another update. Some of you guys were totally right about his intentions. He dropped the idea of me taking his nephew in a few days after I broke up with him, and he called me from a mutual friend's phone to ask me to take him back.

I asked him why he wasn't going to take in his nephew, and he said that it would be too hard to do alone. So looks like he was expecting me to help him with the kid all along instead of just letting them stay for a while. So without a free place to live and a built-in helper, he's not interested. I did not take him back. I think the breakup was the best thing that could have happened. I feel a lot better without him in my life.

Man, Opie, I think you made the right choice because obviously this guy wasn't really looking at you as a girlfriend or a life partner. He was looking at you as free labor, a ticket, a place to live without having to pay rent, but man, I feel bad for that kid. It sucks because the kid did nothing wrong, but already the kid's life is basically ruined. That was our slash best of redditor updates, and if you liked this content, be sure to follow my podcast because I put out new reddit podcast episodes every single day. I put out new Reddit podcast episodes every single day.