Perhaps first ask here politlely about the seating and if she answers with something that sounds either like a hokey lie or a rude displacement then give her the big guns
Personally I’d let it go.
It does sound like you were the victim of bad planning and/or incompetence on the part of the organisers/ushers, but I’d still not attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by stupidity; Shelley and her new husband may have children soon and find themselves inconvenienced in a similar situation, whereupon you can smile knowingly.
This all sounds like a misunderstanding to me. I see no reason that the bride (or even the usher) deliberately tried to insult you, rather they tried to do the best they could for all concerned. It has already been mentioned that they may well have been trying to suit your needs (being away from the noise if the baby was sleeping etc) rather than putting you out of the way. From the way the bride acted towards you I would give her the benefit of the doubt. Obviously, she was very busy and would likely not have noticed if you were more separated than planned, or were feeling uncomfortable. Were there plenty of free seats nearer the action at the reception, or was the place packed full? If there were free seats you feel would have been more appropriate perhaps your husband could just idly mention in a nice way, “Nice wedding, how does it feel to be married? By the way, you didn’t have to make those extra seating plans for our baby, she/he’ll sleep through anything!” That will sound just like light hearted chat/joking, but you’ll be able to tell from her reaction what her intentions were. She may answer back, “Oh, were things okay there? I was very worried about you being away from the action but I was worried about the baby being disturbed, I don’t know much about young ones!” Who knows? No one really so it’s usually best to think the best. I’m assuming there were no other babies there for us to compare placings with?
I don’t like this bit at all. I, for one, never think of people in terms of race, I treat everyone the same, so this is something I would not have considered either. IMO, all this paranoia about having to treat people differently if they are of another race is what is stopping us moving forward as a species in this respect, and treating everyone the same in all situations.
I still think that it was a misunderstanding. However, given the level of anger that it aroused in you, no good would come from confronting the bride. If it wasn’t intentional, you’ll just make her feel like shit. If it was, she’ll never admit it anyway.
Let it go.
At the risk of being flamed: This is one problem with assigned seating. Someone always gets pissed off.
Always might be too strong a word…
I gotta agree that letting it go is the right thing to do, but I also think that you aren’t being paraniod or over-reacting. You certainly were effectively blocked from meaningful participation in the event, and clearly it was deliberate. You weren’t seated seperate at both the ceremony and at the reception just by happenstance - decisions had to be made specifically.
What is at question is motive. And I’m not sure that the motive behind these things was anything more than trying to suit everyone’s comfort. Clearly you were treated poorly, but I’m not sure that the bride or her mom or that usher’s goal was to do anything than to give you the space you need to attend to your baby in comfort and without disturbing others. I do have to say though that the seperate table at the reception does make one wonder - after all receptions are (ideally) noisy and fun, and not a place where a fussy baby would be a big disturbance like in the hush of a church.
Anyway I think that it is not worth persuing with the bride but I don’t think that you are way out in left field in feeling upset about it.
Twiddle
I am inclined to think the whole race angle can be dropped considering there were 2 other people seated in the same area of the wedding. tlw made it pretty clear they were the only minorities so obviously they were seated near two white people. So, either you were looking to bring race into it as part of your anger or the bride is actually racist and discriminatory against the disabled. If this is the case, I fully expect you will start assuming she is an evil Republican.
tlw, going to be cruel-to-be-kind here… Let it go.
I got married a few weeks ago.
We did not want children at our wedding: we specified it on the invitations.
Two friends with a baby called to say they were bringing it, and we grudgingly made an exception. We were really pissed off.
First: when we made the seating arrangements for the reception, we put the baby as far as possible from the ‘top table’, to give the mother an escape route to the outside, and in order that if the baby started squalling, it wouldn’t disrupt proceedings.
Next: it is absurdly difficult to do seating arrangements: someone has to go at the back. Coworkers come way down the list - after close relatives, distant relatives, close friends, and not-so-close friends.
Maybe your hosts are indeed racist - but I’m sure it’s more likely that you were seated that way because of the kid. If you’d have been at my wedding with a baby, you’d have been at the back too, and I haven’t got a drop of racism in my body.
It’s our day, we’re paying, so we make the rules.
As for racism-if they really were racist, I can’t see them inviting you in the first place.
I think what I’d do is stew over it, letting the anger simmer for awhile, now and then stirring it and thinking on the negatives. Then, I would go to a large message board and ask for peoples’ opinions, and become hostile if they weren’t ones that I wanted to hear.
Of course, this is only thinking hypothetically.
Jjimm, what you’ve described is a different situation than what tlw described. In your case, you said “no babies,” and two people said “we’re bringing our kids anyway.” That’s rude.
In tlw’s case, they had already RSVP’d that they would come, before they had a baby. Then they had a baby. So they called the bride to inform her that they would now not be attending, because they had a baby. This is exactly the same thing I would do. I would not expect the bride to change the rules for me. I would not expect the bride to allow me to come anyway out of politeness. I would only call (as I expect tlw called) as a courtesy to let them know that two people who had previously RSVP’d yes would now not be attending.
It was the bride’s choice to allow them to attend anyway. She easily could have said, “Oh, that’s too bad,” but she chose to say, “No, my goodness, please come anyway.” Nobody was pointing a gun at her head forcing her to let them come. It would have been perfectly fine even in the realm of bridal etiquette (a scary, forbidding place) for her to have simply said, “Thanks for letting me know that you won’t be there.”
Being seated at a card table at the reception does seem kind of insulting to me, especially after having been segregated at the ceremony. However, I would wait to have a polite chat with the bride to find out what, if any, her reasoning was, before flying off the handle. It might have been the result of a misunderstanding, or a misguided desire to place you conveniently next to the door in case the baby needed to go outside, or something like that.
In short: I think you were completely justified in bringing the baby, considering the bride’s response. You could possibly be justified in being upset at the seating arrangements, if the bride’s motives were less than honorable, but that’s something you can’t know until you talk to her.
MsWhatsit - I agree that our situations aren’t exactly the same. However, if it’s anything like my situation, (possibly) the hosts felt obliged to allow the baby to come, and like we did were agreeing out of politeness - they, like me, had clearly specified ‘no children’. That was done for a reason. BTW, we didn’t let the couple in question know how annoyed with them we were.
I can.
Especially since Mr. tlw is the bride’s superior. I can see the couple inviting the tlws and grumbling about it the entire time. Or the bride and the bride’s mother deciding that someone was racist, so in the interest of harmony, keep the black family away from them and pushing the tlws into a corner for that reason.
In the end though, I think that you just have to let it go. Perhaps the bride really didn’t want the baby there, but felt forced the way that jjimm did, so she decided to punish the two of you for bringing him. Perhaps she was trying to be helpful and missed. It was not right to treat guests like that, but you don’t know why she did so, and bringing it up later is not going to make anything better. Put her on the “people not to associate with outside of work” list and move on.
I doubt that anything posted here will change anything. Seems the die has already been cast, the feelings hurt, the conclusions drawn, and the payback is in the process.
Your question was, "What Would You Do If You Were Treated This Way?’ To begin with I would have stayed home with the baby. Of course the bride was going to insist that you come anyway when you told her why you weren’t going to the wedding. Have you ever heard of manners before? I also would have insisted that you come if I had been her, hoping against hope that you would have the good manners NOT to accept. What was the purpose of that? Sounds like you don’t particularly care for the woman to begin with. The whole point is, you wanted everyone to see your new baby. But it was a wedding, not show and tell time. So you were offended that you weren’t given a place of honor. Any new mother needs an escape route, and that’s what the bride tried to provide for you.
I’d let the whole matter drop. The longer you stew about it, the worse it will taste. You are the only one that seems to be bothered by it, no one else seemed to notice or even think that you had been slighted. Being black has absolutely nothing to do with it.
There’s no taking it back, let it go. Next time, if an invitation says no children, then stay home with your child if you don’t trust a baby sitter.
JMHO
I don’t see where tlw said anything about planning to use the wedding as a place to show off her baby. And her reason for not leaving the baby with a sitter was not a trust issue, but because she is breastfeeding. I think that tlw acted correctly in declining the second invitation, and it sounds to me like the bride was sincere in urging them to come with the baby. (If she wasn’t, well then that’s HER problem if she didn’t really want the baby there. As MsWhatsit said, she would have been completely justified etiquette-wise to say, “Oh, so sorry you won’t be able to come – we’ll miss you.”)
So I agree with MsWhatsit. I suspect the bride was simply clueless, and I don’t think there was a race issue here. The card table and distance from everyone else were rather odd; after all, the point of attending a wedding is to interact with other people. But if it were racially motivated, that would be pretty damn blatant, and that doesn’t seem to match with the bride’s other behavior. (The church thing I can allow a little leeway, chalking it up to a clueless/rude usher – you’re not supposed to visit with people DURING a church service anyway, and perhaps he was allowing you room to leave, but it would have been nice to have a better view of the ceremony and still be on the outer aisle in case the baby acted up. His rudeness may have been because he knew children were not invited and didn’t know you had permission from the bride.) Best to speak with her non-confrontationally and clear the air, one way or the other.
I can’t help thinking that they should have been upfront, and said: “we’re giving you a quiet corner, so the baby is less disturbed, and you feel comfortable about breastfeeding.”
I don’t think it’s necessarily fair to claim racism, just babyism.
It sounds like the whole problem could have been avoided if the bride, in re-extending her invitation to include tlw Jr., had put like “Please come and bring your baby if you need to - it’s a big church and a big hall, and we can put you somewhere where you can get in and out easily if you need to and if the baby makes noise, it won’t disturb anything.”
Let it go. You’re not family, you’re not even close friends - co-workers only.
What would I have done, if I were treated that way? Bring the baby, since it was invited, but leave the attitude at home, which wasn’t.
Can’t imagine what your husband’s boss is thinking after being told “You have to do this review for my subordinate - I can’t be objective because my wife didn’t like the seating at her wedding.”
FWIW. If you would rather have your grudge, wait and see how long it takes her to do her thank-you notes, and complain about that.
Regards,
Shodan
church
From my ushing experience, it’s not distance from the action that is a factor, it’s distance from the exit.
Babies and disabled who may need to exit the proceedings are to be seated no more than three rows from the door if possible. Multiples of same are put into seperate rows so they don’t have a problem if the “inside” group needs to exit and thus get by the asile side.
Reception
The reception doesn’t seem anywhere near as clear as from your description it doesn’t sound like the table you were placed at was near the exit. That one puzzles me.
emphasis mine
Would you care to explain this little remark?
While I said that we were the only minorities in the room, I should’ve been more clear, we weren’t. We were the only African-Americans at the church. It’s very fair to say that the handicapped gentleman was certainly a minority as well. There was definitely an air of “this is where the special cases sit” about the whole thing - and it was done without ever giving a moment’s consideration of asking either of the “special cases” if the seating fulfilled our needs or not.
The convenience argument falls apart because three rows from the middle aisle of the church, I was no further from a door for fast exits with a fussy baby than I would’ve been if I’d been seated three rows from the middle aisle but in the same section of the church as the other congregants, who still would’ve been two or three rows ahead of me, more than enough space for no one to have been greatly disturbed by any possible fussing sounds eminating from a tiny infant.
As for the race issue, having lived 42 years and having experienced more than a few instances of people who have smiled in my face while simultaneously treating me differently (and substandardly) solely because of my race, it does enter into my considerations when I am so obviously being treated differently – and usually with good reason.
As for evil Republicans, I’m not sure what that’s all about. I am a Republican.
Indeed. And with that warning, I would’ve reconsidered whether or not I wanted to attend. But we were blindsided by the segregation, and in the main, it wasn’t at all to our benefit, because we were not able to participate in the activities, and (especially at the reception) we couldn’t leave “easily” if the baby started making noise.
The only attitude I went with was one of anticipation. Anticipation of enjoying a beautiful day out, a beautiful wedding (I love weddings), dressing up, socializing and seeing Mr. tlw’s co-workers for the first time in ages, all of whom, including Shelley, I’ve socialized with before and like a great deal, and having a nice day. My attitude didn’t change until all of those hopes for the day were destroyed.
There are several people on Mr. tlw’s team whose reviews he’s punted up to his boss for a variety of reasons, with no explanation given or needed. Because of the nature of the teamworking relationship, it’s often the most fair way of reviews being done. Given that his boss was there and walked past us at the wedding in our remote seats, and gave us a look of confusion as he did, I wouldn’t be surprised if he wouldn’t make the offer himself. He’s a smart cookie. That’s why he’s boss. (When I say boss, I mean President & CEO.)
She already sent them, at least for the gifts that she got before the wedding. Remember, the wedding was planned for last September and cancelled at the last minute, so many gifts were already given or delivered. (You don’t take the gift with you to a formal wedding, after all.)
It happens that one of Mr. tlw’s coworker brought this issue up in the team meeting yesterday. “What was the deal with you and Trace not sitting with the rest of us?” We were the only “work people” who weren’t with the rest of the group, and none of them thought that was right, baby or no. They were placed in the very last rows on one side, so there’s really no reason why we couldn’t been placed at the end of one of those rows. That’s at the church - I have no idea where they were at the reception. We were so far removed from them, we didn’t see them.