Want to play Miss Manners? Who is in the wrong here?

In My Humble Opinion
21

If he’s a Jain then that would explain a lot. Jainism requires an extreme philosphy of non-violence (called ahimsa) which forbids the harming of any living thing (including killing bugs). This would also forbid something like paying for meat. It’s more than just an ethical thing, Jains believe that such things bring bad karma and will affect them down the line.

Is this guy of Indian heritage? Was he born into this religion or converted to it. Jainism tends not to be a religion of conversion (because it’s practices are rather extreme) so there may be a cultural factor playing into this. He may have been sincerely offended, not just being sanctimonious, but that’s partially because you did not understand the extent of what this kind of thing means in his religion. He should have explained it to you before you went to dinner.

This changes it a bit for me. What I would do is ask him if there is any way you can help to balance out the bad karma he probably believes that he incurrred by paying for the meat (essentially, he truly believes he committed a sin).

Your husband still does not owe him an apology since he didn’t know what was going on with this guy’s faith, but it might be helpful to find out if there is some way you can help him do something good to make up for it. It’s not about the money, it’s about the bad karma incurred by paying for meat. Repaying the money will not offset the karma. Talk to your friend or to her husband directly and explain that your husband simply didn’t understand the religious signifance of charging meat to a Jain’s bill. It’s not your hubby’s fault, nobody told him, but this is more than just a self-righteous PETA jerk, it’s a legitimate religious problem in Jainism. It wasn’t about being offended by your husband eating meat, your friend’s husband thinks he had to commit a sin.

This can probably be repaired, but your friends are going to have to be more careful and more upfront about what kinds of things this guy’s religion will permit him to do and not do. Like I said, Jainism is a rather austere religion. It’s tough not to break any rules. I don’t think he’s going to get too upset about what you guys do as long as he isn’t forced (in his mind) to do anything sinful, himself.

22

I really don’t see what the big deal is here. Technically and common-sensically, your husband is right. But so what? My impression has been that the paying for meat issue was a religious one for your friend’s husband rather than simply a “moral” one. Is that correct? If so, I can see how he would feel an objection to paying for your husband’s dinner containing meat. And if he is from another country, his ccountry’s customs and modes of behavior may have led him to believe your husband would honor his vegetarian stance. And the fact you and your husband ate non-meat dishes when you had your more intimate dinner with them probably made him feel that you were aware of and willing to honor his beliefs in this regard. (As for the buffet, he may have felt you were trying to accomodate other guests by serving meat, but were willing to honor his beliefs when it was just the four of you as you had done before.)

In other words, I don’t think your friend’s husband is without his own legitimate point of view here. This could be a situation where two reasonable civilized people are simply caught in an inadvertent mutual faux pax.

If I were your husband, I wouldn’t hesitate a second to call or go visit the guy and explain that I understood my ordering a meat dish at dinner had caused him offense and that I wanted him to understand that no offense was meant by it. He could then offer to return the favor (the favor being the dinner that caused the problem) by offering for the two of you to take him and his wife out for a genuine vegetarian meal. I think this would be a much better resolution to the situation than offering to pay for the meat dish.

Unless this guy truly is a jerk, I would think he would be very gracious and delighted that your husband had made this gesture and it would go a long way toward putting your friendship with your old friend back on its previous footing.

This would require some maturity and high-mindedness on the part of your husband, and a willingness to acknowledge his actions had caused a problem, inadvertant though it may have been. But he sounds like someone for whom this wouldn’t necessarily be a problem, and I think it would be a small sacrifice to make for the sake of his wife’s relationship with her long-time friend.

Good luck to you. I hope it works out well.

23

Uh, yeah…what Diogenes said. Obviously his post came in while I was composing mine. Perhaps in light of the sin/karma aspect to this situation, offering to buy dinner wouldn’t necessarily set things right. Could you ask your friend for advice as to how to recitify this situation so that her husband would feel absolved of his sin?

24

Holy crap, SA, we agreed on something. Is there a blue moon tonight? :wink:

Yeah, I think this is an inadvertant religious offense. It’s sort of like if you don’t know anything about kosher laws and you cook something with pork in it for an Orthodox friend. It was an accident. There was no intent to make the guy commit a sin, but when you figure out what you did, it’s not a bad thing to apologize and say you didn’t know any better.

Maybe hubby would be more inclined to apologize if he understood the religious sugnifcance. He still didn’t do anything wrong, but it would be polite. I’ve changed my mind on this. The religious aspect would make me a little more sensitive.

25

LEFT HAND says –

And STARVING ARTIST says –

I just have to post to say, respectfully, that I totally disagree with these statements.

It is impolite to impose your moral or religious beliefs on other people who do not share them. You can limit their options so that your beliefs win out by default (by, say, not serving alcohol at your wedding if you’re a teetotaller, or going to a vegetarian restaurant if you are vegetarian), but if you leave open to them the option of making their own choices, consistent with their own morality, then you have to live with their choices. You can’t ask other people to keep kosher just because you’re an observant Jew.

IMO, it would be the heighth of impoliteness to invite someone to dinner, with you to pay, and then at the restaurant announce that you’ll only pay for some entrees and not for others. If that is in fact a person’s position, then he or she needs to take people to a restaurant at which he or she is comfortable with all the entrees – in this case, a vegetarian place. But for this guy to say he was “manuevered” into paying for a meat meal, when he took you to a place that served meat – my response to that is WTF? So I think the guy was correct to not make a stink about it at the restaurant, and I think your friend was wrong to admit her husband was offended by your husband’s entirely reasonable actions, which were obviously not intended to offend.

So I don’t think your husband’s actions have caused a problem; I think your friend’s husband’s expectations caused a problem, and more particularly I think your friend caused a problem by telling you about her husband’s pique. I don’t think it is an example of “maturity” or “high-mindedness” to expect someone to apologize for something that was not incorrect or offensive, and that was not intended to offend. He didn’t do anything wrong; why should he apologize?

If this guy did not want to pay for a meat dinner, he shouldn’t have picked a restaurant that served meat. Simple as that, IMO, and no one’s fault but his own.

26

Any suggestion that your meat eating husband kowtow to this passive agressive ass is absurd. Jainist or not, he’s a full grown, assumedly intelligent adult who is offering to treat a non-vegetarian couple in the United States to a meal in a non-vegetarian restaurant. That there is some insanely precious expectation on he and his wife’s part, that sans any predicate explanation of his moral position on paying for a partially carnivorous meal, that the omnivorous husband is going to read his mind and go for the greens is beyond nonsensical.

You husband was set up by this pair of manipulative doofs, and now you’re running around all stressed and worried and trying to figure out some way to make nice to them. Think about what you’re doing. It’s not a mis-understanding. There never was an understanding, and now Mr. Petulant is doing his "little “Dance puppets dance!” routine.

God Bless your hubby for refusing to cater to this obnoxious nonsense, and shame on you for not taking his side from the beginning. How far will you abase yourself to cling to this friend of yours, and her questionable choice in a partner?

27

So…he takes you to a restaurant that serves meat and offers to pay your bill, knowing full well that you’re carnivores and that like most people you know very little about his religion. He never says a word about having religious objections to paying for meat, even when your husband orders lamb. He never rescinds his offer of payment, asks you to order something else, or otherwise indicates that there is any sort of problem. He instead knowingly and willingly commits what he considers to be a sin, and it’s all your fault that he’s now got this sin on his soul? Uh-huh.

It sounds to me like he needs to grow up and accept responsibility for his own actions. He knew exactly what he was doing when he chose to pay for that lamb, and he did so of his own free will. He weighed the temporary awkwardness of speaking up against the permanent repercussions of sin and decided the awkwardness was worse. His decision, his sin, his responsibility. His fault, if you must assign blame. Blaming this mess on your husband is just a way of not taking responsibility for something he freely chose to do, and that’s just horseshit.

If your husband apologizes in this case, he’s essentially taking responsibility for someone else’s decisions and actions. Frankly, Adolph Hitler would be practicing his triple-lutz before I’d do that, so in that respect I think your husband is absolutely right.

If somebody doesn’t say something, things are likely to be a bit strained between you and your friend, and it sucks for something like this to come between friends. So in that sense, you’re partially right. I say partially because anyone who would keep quiet while you accidentally offend their husband and then hold a grudge about it like this isn’t much of a friend, so I doubt you have as much to lose as you think you do.

28

Oh, and I think the Miss Manners-sanctioned route would be for you and/or hubby to express your regret that this situation happened, then never eat out on their treat again.

29

Her husband isn’t the one being self-righteous. And it’s absurd to say it’s a pissing contest. Her husband doesn’t need to apologize because he did nothing wrong.

Your example about giving money to the restaurant is invalid, because it doesn’t matter whether or not someone at the table bought a dish with meat in it. If you have such a problem giving money to a restaurant that serves meat, don’t go to that restaurant. Even if you’re just ordering vegetarian dishes, you’re still giving them money and paying for them to serve meat. It’s simple.

Err,no. It’s like if an Orthodox Jew offers to buy you dinner, you order pork, and then he gets all sulky and acts as if it’s your responsibility to apologize.

I hate to keep beating a dead horse, but I also hate to see people act as if religious tolerance gives them an excuse to be inconsiderate of others. Even if this man’s religion is a strict one, he still has to function in our society, and it’s not at all inconsiderate to expect him to.

30

And I forgot to actually try to be helpful…

Exactly. The relationship with your friend is the one you want to keep, and you can keep that by making it clear that you’re aware of the situation and explain what happened, without taking sides.

31

No, I chose my analogy deliberately. It’s not about anyone else at the table eaing meat, it’s about sticking it on his tab. That creates bad karma for him. Putting meat on his tab is like putting pork on a rabbi’s plate.

The Jain is not neccesarily trying to make anyone conform to his religion. He’s just upset that he himself was forced to commit a sin by paying for it. That’s really all it is. If the OP’s hubby had paid separately for the meat there would have been no problem.

I realize that the OP’s husband had no way of knowing that, and that the dude should have explained up front that his religion did not allow him to pay for meat (yes, he’s supporting the restaurant, but since when do religious laws have to make sense? They are what they are). maybe he thought his wife had already explained it. In any case, this had nothing to do with watching someone eat meat but about incurring the bad karma by paying for it. He feels like he committed a sin. Do you understand the difference?

32

I’d only take issue with the above to the extent some seem to think it would have been okay for the guy to take them out, at his treat, and then announce at the restaurant “Well, I’m not paying for that!” IMO, that would have been rude as well, and the only “out” for the guy at that point would have been for him to be enormously apologetic and up-front about the rudeness: “I’m so sorry. This is terrible. It’s just – well, you served us vegetarian fare at your home, and I thought you two were vegetarians as well! I’m afraid I just can’t pay for a meat meal; my religion doesn’t allow it. I’m happy to pay for any vegetarian thing you might order or, if you prefer the meat dish, please let me buy you dessert and an after-dinner drink. I know it’s awful to say I’m treating you to dinner and then try to limit what you have. I just hope you understand how awkward this is for me.”

IMO, the guy can only make this speech if he thought you and your husband were vegetarians too (so that the thought that you might order meat never crossed his mind) and if the prohibition is a deeply held religious or moral dictate, as opposed to “I’d just rather not pay for meat, even if it means embarrassing my friends,” and if he is abjectly apologetic, understanding that the awkwardness is entirely his fault. If he can’t pull all that off, he needs to just pay for the meal as he promised, keep his big yap shut (or complain only to his wife – totally legitimate – with the understanding she’ll keep her big yap shut), and resolve to take you guys out to a vegetarian place next time.

None of which is your husband’s problem – or yours. I also 100% agree that if he is this big of a tight-ass on food issues, then your socializing should be limited to non-food events, or to just you and her, leaving your husband and Ol’ Poopface at home.

33

It obviously is not. If he doesn’t want meat stuck on his tab, and he knows he’s with people who don’t share his beliefs, then he needs to pick a restaurant where there’s no way his beliefs will be violated – i.e., a vegetarian restaurant.

Just as an observant rabbi would not go to a pork barbeque, leaving open the possibility that his beliefs would be violated by his own consumption of non-kosher food, so this guy should not offer to treat people at a restaurant where the people he’s treating have the option of ordering meat. Again, the appropriate thing is to take away the objectionable option, not to place on anyone else the onus of living their life according to your beliefs.

34

The point Diogenes, is not whether he committed a mortal or venal Janist sin by paying for a meaty meal, it that the Jainist hubby is such a craven, manipulative weasel, that instead of taking it on himself, like a fully grown adult man would normally do, and saying “I screwed up by not telling them, my bad”, he is sulking petulantly and using his wife as a passive aggressive club to beat omnivorous hubby over the head for daring to order meat on his tab. It’s small and mean and petty and repulsive that a nominally grown man would behave like this.

35

I agree that he should have told them beforehand. I SAID that. Is it possible, though, that there was a misunderstanding on his part? It sounds like his wife does most of the interacting with the OP. Maybe he thought she had explained his situation more thoroughly than she had.

SBS, is it possible that there might have been a language problem?

I think it’s possible that the Jain just didn’t understand how little the OP and her husband knew about his religion.

He should have told them he wasn’t permitted to pay for meat, but he might have thought they already knew.

36

I seriously doubt that he thought they already knew, Dio, because of this bit:

He knew they didn’t know much about his religion and he further knew that his sect is different from the one Americans are most likely to be familiar with, making it utterly unreasonable for him to expect them to know that he felt it was a sin to pay for a meal containing meat. Like I said before, he knowingly and willingly chose to commit this sin, and he has nobody to blame but himself.

37

If it truly was a matter of such great religious importance, then the onus was on Polly’s Husband the Jain (P.H.t.J.) to say something. To be snotty about it afterward and expect that Starving But Strong and her husband make some kind of amends is out of bounds. This is not Starving But Strong and her husband’s problem. They owe no amends. This whole shameful thing would never have happened if P.H.t.J. had made the wholly reasonable and practical arrangements that would have helped them all to avoid a problem that is truly his, and his alone.

And while I am admittedly no expert, it seems to me that if P.H.t.J. wants to put a chill on relations with Starving But Strong and her husband because of this incident, then perhaps he’s not terribly worried about his karma after all.

38

Gah! I hate it when people act like animal rights is on a par with civil rights!

Just wanted to say that first. I’ve read the posts about Jainism, so I know that this is a religious/moral thing, not political, and also that P.H.t.J. didn’t pull it out of his @ss. But this is a red flag to me all the same:

I just can’t help thinking that P.H.t.J. sounds like a classic controlling partner. He needs special handling because of his convoluted beliefs. He’s passive/aggressive. He plays mind games. SbS is a friend of Polly’s from way back, and waddya know, but a wedge is being driven between them. SbS, I think you’re spot-on in speculating that Polly will “need a friend”. And probably sooner rather than later. Definitely let her know that she can “call on you if anything goes wrong”.

39

Can I point out that, as far as I can tell from the OP, MrVege:

Didn’t say anything during the meal
Did, in fact, pay for the meal
Didn’t ask his wife to tell Starving (“admitted” - that sounds like Starving asked HER about it.)

Why is he such a flaming asshole? Just because he’s supervege? It’s POSSIBLE he’s being a passive-aggressive asshole, but the impression I got from the OP was that he had many friends who would understand his objection, so he forgot to say anything before hand (notice Starving chose a Vege dish, so it’s not like it was a foreign concept that it MIGHT be nice to do that) – or may have thought MrsVege would have explained it to Starving. When it happened, he was probably disappointed and shocked, and did his best to hide it, to be polite?

If he deliberately made a fuss, (as opposed to explaining politely), then maybe he is a jerk. Did he go out of his way to be cold, or did just look like it showed through?

And then, because Mrs. Vege and Starving were friends, she told her about it.

Also, however, Hubby didn’t do anything wrong, because most vegetarians accept that it’s fairly normal to buy someone a meat dish now and again, and if not, it’s polite to make that clear first.

In other words, to me, it seems like a bit of an ettiquette Snafu. My advice is stop worrying about who’s in the right, Starving ring up MrsVege, establish that neither side were in the wrong but a “Oh dear, I’m sorry, I should have said… there was no way I could no…” type apology from both indirectly might be called for. And most importantly, decide what to do next time, so it doesn’t become a big deal.

40

Exactly!