I’ve been both Don and Dave. I’d accept the invitation and tell Don I’d accepted it, but not to teach him a lesson.
I see several different questions, horribly convoluted by the extent that people MEAN what they hypothetically said.
For instance, suppose either (a) Don had already asked her out, and she said “thanks but not at the moment” or (b) Don really fancied her, but they’d just met and she didn’t really know that yet. This seems to be close to intent of the question – assuming Dave/Jenny is a reasonable relationship, to what extent does Dave owe Don something to spare his feelings? I would say that talking to Don beforehand (whether you eventually accept or not) is in the category of things that you don’t HAVE to do, but are the sort of consideration that are a foundation of a best friendship.
I’m not sure whether “bros before hos” makes sense or not. On the one hand, if Dave has lots of girlfriends, than it’s not that big a deal to skip this one for Don’s sake. On the other hand, Don’s disappointment is already sealed when Jenny rejects him for Dave, so if Dave takes it up, that’s more obvious, but is it actually worse?
However, that’s all predated on the idea that Don/Jenny is doomed and we’re only concerned with Dave sparing Don’s feelings. But “he’s had plenty of time and plenty of opportunities and he’s wasted them all. If he doesn’t have the balls to ask me out, I’m not interested” just sounds too clinical to be something someone ACTUALLY said. People who make a conscious decision like that are, I would have thought, being really weird. Far more common is that someone is subconsciously attracted to someone because of their perceived boldness/shyness, and then retroactively imagine they always saw them like that.
It also makes a massive difference whether Jenny knew Don was single and interested. If so, then yes, it’s understandable she didn’t think much of him. But this is not stated. If she just assumed that then for all she knew he always assumed he’d marry his high-school sweetheart but they just broke up, or she died, or something, or that he’d been being pursued by lots of girls and never actually noticed her until now.
So, if Jenny indicates that she might still be interested in Don, it might behoove Dave to suggest it more forcefully, if he thinks there’s any possibility of a relationship there. Or if she was deliberately setting people up for arbitrary hurdles to win her affections, maybe he should tell her to fuck off.
And yes, Don is acting somewhat of a Putz for hanging around fancying her for ages. In my limited experience it’s possible for such a relationship to happen, but rare. Far more common is that he will eventually end up with someone where he met and got to know and they were romantic with each other from the start and it was all surprisingly easy. But the point of best friends is not to pounce on your mistakes and punish them, but to help 
+1
Been there, done this. 
Yes, but Dave has a relationship with Don that means something to him.
It’s my own fault for phrasing the thread title at odds with the poll question. Ah well.
Of course, the only person whose motives we can be sure of are Dave’s. The hypothetical never goes into Don or Jenny’s heads.
You don’t need the word somewhat in your first sentence.
I’m leaning toward this. Why wouldn’t or didn’t Dave say, “Well, you obviously don’t feel like you have to wait around for me to make a move because you just busted out the first move and asked me out. So why would you feel like you have to wait for Don to bust out a move? If you liked him, why didn’t you ask him out, like you just asked me out?” :dubious:
I think Jenny is playing games.
The very close male friends with whom I would consider this an issue, we have agreements in place.
Some men are, “Do what you can, man- it is her choice, and you are lucky to be chosen!” This is also my default stance.
Others will consider contact with you risky at best if you ever accept or make a move on someone with whom they have EVER expressed an interest.
I have friends in both camps, and I have been able to respect everyone’s wishes thus far.
It has been painfully difficult on a few occasions, and one person was specifically made exempt from the otherwise ‘forbidden’ covenant, with her express knowledge, but it gets wierd.
Relationships of all kinds get pretty complex over the years.
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/1sam/2.html
“Now the sons of Eli were sons of Belial; they knew not the LORD”?
Don is the one who would be out of line for trying to make something of it. Jenny can bang whoever she wants. It’s none of Don’s business and it doesn’t hurt him or take anything away from him if she does it with Dave. The fact that Don also wants to bang this chick does not give him ownership over her, and if Dave doesn’t bang her, she’ll just bang somebody else who isn’t Don, so Dave might as well bang her. Don’s patheticness is not Dave’s problem or responsibility. Of Dave and Jenny dig each other, who the hell is Don to get all whiny about it?
I like TriPolar’s suggestion to ask Jenny to get Don laid by one of her slutty friends. Everybody wins that way. Don gets laid and gets confidence, and it’s not like he can’t still try to ask her out after Dave bangs her. It doesn’t have to be an either/or situation here.
My interpretation would be that Jenny just isn’t really that into Don. If she was into him enough to ask him out, she would have asked him out. Obviously, she’s more into Dave than Don. Too bad for Don.
What would the “game” be anyway? What are you suggesting she’s trying to accomplish? Making Don jealous? Why?
Jenny’s not playing games. She knows what she wants and doesn’t want.
Jenny: “If he doesn’t have the balls to ask me out, I’m not interested. Anyway, you’re cuter.”
Seems to me Jenny has already decided she wants to pass on Don at this point and made that perfectly clear.
You looked up I Samuel; Maggie referred to II. The story she’s talking about is this:
David, king of Isreal with a couple dozen “wives” in his harem, sees Bathsheba, local hot chick, bathing on the roof. Deciding she’s groovy he sends for her, and being no fool* she makes the beast with two backs with him. This being before IUDs she gets knocked up: a problem since she’s married to Uriah, a general in David’s army, who is off at the front fighting Frost Giants or something. The Republicans have recently taken over the Israeli parliament and David’s afraid of being impeached, so he calls Uriah home in hopes that he’ll shtupp his hot wife; but Uriah feels all guilty about having sex while his men are fighting the Jotuns and thus camps outside his own house. David then arranges for Uriah to be murdered and married Bathsheba, who has a son.
Soon after this Nathan, the prophet who succeed Samuel as God’s mouthpiece, comes to David and pretends to be a tattletale. There’s a poor man in the kingdom, Nathan says, who has but a single sheep, which he loves dearly.** The poor man has a rich neighbor who has a flock of sheep. The rich man throws a party and for some reason doesn’t want to use any of his own sheep to feed his guests, so he sends over a couple of goons to take the poor man’s sheep, slaughters it, and serves it with jelly.
“What shall we do with the rich man?” Nathan asks
“Kill the bastich!” David replies. “Kill him with fire! And if his wife is hot, bathe her and bring her to me!”***
Nathan smirks. “Psych! YOU’RE the rich man, and Bathsheba’s the sheep, and Uriah’s the poor man. Except that he’s dead instead of sheep. Ah well, allegories are always inexact. Anyway, Yahweh’s pissed, so he’s gonna kill your newborn son to punish you. That’ll learn ya!”
“Wait!” Bathsheba says, weeping, “how is THAT fair? Shouldn’t DAVID be killed? My BABY hasn’t done anything!”****
“Silence, trollop!” Nathan replies. “Yahweh would kill you for your infidelity if it wasn’t for your righteous rack.”
The child sickens. David prays long and hard for mercy, but oddly enough neve says, “O Lord, take ME instead of the kid!” because he knows he’s too important to be risked. So the kid dies. David gives Bathsheba a couple of weeks to mourn and then bones her again, eventually begetting Solomon, who, as king of Israel, repeated this story, like, 1000 times.
The end.
*No, I am not calling Bathsheba a slut. I am calling David a sexual harasser at least and rapist at worst.
**Anyone who makes a Hal Briston joke at this point will be beaten with a stick.
***This particular remark was censored in the King James version.
**** Also censored. Neither the J or the P source cares what chicks think.
Reading over my OP, I see how you can take it thus. What game do you think she’s playing, though? That is, is she trying to prompt Don to get off his ass, or just screwing with their heads to assert her power as a hot chick? Or something else entirely?
BFD every which way.
Back when I was in college (early to mid 1970s), going with someone to a big-ass party of some sort was hardly considered dating. Even if “bros before hos” was some sacred rule, Dave’s going to the party with Jenny wouldn’t be a violation of it.
So Dave should go to the party with Jenny, and not bother to tell Don, because it’s of no importance whatsoever.
Now if the question is, if she puts the moves on him, should he make out with her afterwards, that’s a whole 'nother kettle of fish. But for all we know, Dave might meet some girl at the party that he decides he’s got the hots for, or Jenny might meet some guy that interests her more than either Dave or Don. At dorm parties and the like, one wasn’t normally joined at the hip with the person one arrived with.
I don’t know what game I think Jenny is playing; that thought just popped right outta my head and went straight through the keyboard.
But she seems inconsistent is all I’m getting at. At the very least, she’s not owning up to the fact that she’s just not into Don. She uses the excuse – passes the blame off on Don – that he doesn’t have the balls to ask her out, therefore, she’s not interested. If she had ever been interested at any point – as she is with Dave – then who asked whom out first would not matter to her. Obviously, because she wasn’t waiting around for Dave to muster up the balls, and he’d given her no indication so far that he’s into her. So saying she’s not interested because Don is afraid to ask her out is bullshit. She’s just plain not interested.
Not that I’d expect your average college sophomore to be completely self-actualized and self-aware either.
I suppose what I meant by playing games is that I saw chicks this age play this cat-and-mouse crap with boys all the time back in the day and it made for a much more difficult road for those of us chicks who play it straight and up front. If I were the Jenny in this scenario, I’d probably date both of 'em and tell both of them that. Hell, I might even try to get 'em both in a threesome, seeing as how they’re all tight buds. In fact, when I was a college sophomore, I did exactly that, a couple different times (dated two guys who were close friends, at the same time, and everybody was openly aware of it). ETA: I did not, as far as I can remember through the haze of booze and weed, ever embark on a threesome with anyone, I’m disappointed to report. :D)
Ah heck, this scenario crops up in the lesbian ‘community’ all the time, and given the small talent pool, standard procedure would be thus:
You say yes to Cutie, and don’t tell BFF.
BFF finds out and doesn’t speak to you for 3 weeks before heartfelt reunion.
You split up with Cutie.
Cutie and BFF hook up without telling you.
You don’t speak to BFF for several weeks before heartfelt reunion.
BFF and Cutie split up.
You hook up with BFF. Cutie doesn’t speak to either of your for several weeks.
Wash and repeat.
Skald, you haven’t given us enough information to respond. How hot is Jenny?
More seriously, I just see it as Jenny having been willing to give Don a chance, but not really that interested, and now she’s lost patience.
How hot do you WANT her to be?
More seriously, this is the rare hypothetical that had some basis in reality. Twenty years back I had a friend in college who did something like what Don did. Proto-Don got upset when he saw proto-Jenny hugging me on campus one day, as he felt I had clearly violated the guy code. I hadn’t; she and I were just buddies.
Proto-Jenny was hot, though. (Though I was not a stud.)
The scenario happens all the time. Don is going on to a great career as a Wall St. analyst, he’s going to make a ton of money, while Dave is lucky if his degree in literature gets him a job at Staples. But Jenny is a bit of fluff who doesn’t recognize this, and wouldn’t appreciate Don anyway. Going out with Don isn’t going to make her girlfriends jealous, so even if Don asks she’ll come up with some phony excuse, then try to hook up with Dave anyway. If Dave can’t get Don in the game with some other girl, he should do Jenny anyway, and tell Don about every detail, including some stuff that didn’t happen. Don will forget about Jenny. He never had a chance with her anyway.
Of course Dave could just tell Jenny about Don’s crush. Jenny may be just sorting out her social life, and not even realize a nice guy like Don likes her. It is a little difficult to tell based on the limited information. But if Jenny tells Dave she wants to hook up with him anyway, go back to the previous paragraph.
Now now. We don’t know that Dave’s getting a lit degree, just that he’s good reading Middle English. He could easily be a business or political science major. He’ll probably be a senator by his 36th birthday.