The Internet Is Siding With Mom In This Spicy Mother/Daughter Wedding Gift Drama
A mother's two daughters had weddings of different sizes, which resulted in different gift amounts.
The younger daughter complained of favoritism, so the mother took to Reddit to see if she was wrong.
Most Redditors sided with the mom, though a few tried to defend the daughter.
An indignant bride. An outraged mom. A sister out here catching strays through no fault of her own. This story has everything you could want from a piece of Internet drama, so strap in, and get ready to get aggressively angry at people you've never met, in a scenario that could very well be entirely made up for Reddit karma!
Newsweek recently took notice of this post in the r/AITA subreddit, a section of Reddit wherein posters pose a conflict they're having and ask "Am I the A**hole?" because if there's one place to turn to for moral clarity, it's Reddit.
Posing the question, "AITA for telling my daughter she shouldn't be shocked at getting less money gifted for her wedding than her sister received?", user u/Busy-Fall-4184 starts by introducing our cast of characters:
"I have two daughters, Maddy (30) and Jess (28). They're both beautiful young women with a lot going for them. Maddy got married in summer 2021 while Jess got married this past December. Maddy always wanted to traditional large wedding with the whole extended family and the big reception. She ended up having about 150 guests attend and it was a blast. Jess however always wanted something more low key, which suited her personality better. She doesn't love being the center of attention and said many times how she thinks spending a ton of money on one day is unreasonable, which is fair."
Considering this story is now being blasted across the internet, seems like Jess's plan to not be the center of attention backfired. Why? Because Maddy's large, lavish wedding with 150 guests meant nearly $25k in wedding gifts, while Jess' "just drinks and hors d'eourves" low-key wedding with very few guests resulted in a smaller financial windfall. Jess reportedly decided this was indicative of "favoritism" toward Maddy, and it was "proof that the family doesn't care about her."
👰♀️ Fun Wedding Fact: In 1736, Augusta of Saxe-Gotha was forced, at age 16, to marry Frederick, Prince of Wales, whom she had never met. Not speaking the language, and being forced up the aisle the moment she got there, Augusta couldn't understand a word being said during the ceremony. She became so terrified that she actually threw up on her own wedding dress, and the dress of her future mother-in-law. All of which is almost as bad as only getting a few thousand dollars at the small wedding you asked for!
When Jess raised her righteous indignation to her mother, the poster says she responded by noting that "...she shouldn't be surprised that people she chose not to include in her actual wedding weren't willing to travel to the other event or be as generous," and that "...she should be grateful people came at all and that her parents paid for everything."
If you're guessing Jess took that rebuttal well, you might want to sit down for this one. Apparently, she "did not take that well," called her mother an a**hole, and "has been very very upset." Maddy, who mind you is only guilty of "getting money at her wedding," apparently tried to mediate, telling her mother that the rebuttal was "being a little harsh even if what I said was true."
Naturally, this post is fairly one-sided, as any r/AITA post can be, but commenters overwhelmingly came to the poster's defense. "Why would your family give money to a couple who didn’t even invite them to the wedding?" one commenter wrote. "The cash gift was just that—a gift. They are lucky to have received more than they spent on the wedding (which was paid for by parents.)"
Another pointed out, "Jess doesn't understand that when people are invited to a wedding, they want to be a part of the actual wedding. They want to be a part of the actual exchange of vows. And traditionally, people do the vows and celebrate them right away in the form of a reception. Guests want to witness the vows, feel a part of them."
Still, some came to Jess's side, defending her for choosing a small, post-wedding "celebration dinner" rather than inviting people to see the vows.
🤵♀️ Fun Wedding Fact: In 1572, Marguerite de Valois was forced to marry Henri de Navarre by her mother, Catherine de' Medici. Henri's own mother, Jeanne d'Albret, couldn't see their vows due to having just died two months prior. Many, including famed authors Christopher Marlowe and Alexandre Dumas, believe d'Albret was actually murdered by Catherine de' Medici. Six days after the wedding, instead of a sparsely-attended "celebration dinner," the violent St Bartholomew's Day massacre broke out in the streets of Paris, claiming at least 5,000.
"Someone being an introvert doesn’t mean they should get less $$," one commenter responded, "YTA if one daughter received a significantly larger amount of money from you than the other just because the second didn’t want as big of a party." (Elsewhere in the post, the mother clarified that they paid for Jess's wedding in full, while they only contributed partially to the larger cost of Maddy's.)
Another commenter insisted there was "obvious favoritism" and added, "Your family enabled one kid to put a downpayment on a house. The other kid barely got enough for a downpayment on a used Honda Civic. This is justified because one threw a better party?"
So, what do you think? Is Jess being a bridezilla? Is Mom playing favorites? Are we all squandering the precious gift of life on petty squabbles that are like specks of dirt on a fingernail in the grand cosmic ballet of our universe? Let's let Reddit decide!
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