Nick Douglas
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“Am I the Asshole?” is a subreddit where users tell a story of interpersonal conflict, and ask who’s in the wrong. Redditors give their opinions, and the most-upvoted comment becomes the verdict. While a crowd of 1.2 million redditors may not be the ideal jury for deciding appropriate social behavior, reading these stories is messy fun. Here are the best.
The most famous post in the subreddit. This went around Twitter and Facebook too, until everyone knew about this poor asshole, who won’t take his girlfriend out on a date. “Now that I’m thinking about it,” he writes, “she’s gotten kinda gloomy because I’ve asked her to cook on date nights instead of going out more often.” The whole internet made fun of this jerkoff who didn’t realize he was treating his girlfriend like his servant.
His updates were even better: This isn’t some early relationship, they have kids together. He took his girlfriend out for one dinner of tapas, then got so excited that he proposed to her. She said no. Then the post went viral, the girlfriend saw it, and she got mad—as we learn from an update post, in which the guy admits he’s still making his girlfriend cook every night. Breathtaking. As one commenter says, “The way you talk about being fed casserole for the thousandth time as if youre serving time in purgatory instead of being fed by a loving girlfriend is insane to me.”
“AITA for sleeping naked on top of the covers to teach my flatmate’s gf a lesson?”
Guy gets sick of his roommate’s girlfriend barging into his room without knocking (sometimes when he was still in bed, naked under the covers), even after he asked her not to. So one morning he lays on top of his covers naked, she walks in on him, and now the roommate and the girlfriend both think our redditor is a creep. (He says in the comments that his lease doesn’t allow a lock on the door, and that he’s “gay as spring.”) Consensus is that he’s the good guy here, and that he needs to get a doorstop. Seems a bit late for that.
“Aita for giving all of my coworkers a different reason for why I have missing fingers?”
Read enough of these and you’ll find one where you disagree with the majority opinion. Redditor “throwawaycwdrama” is sick of people asking about TCWD’s three missing fingers. So when each of the redditor’s new co-workers asked, TCWD gave a different silly answer. The co-workers believed them, argued amongst themselves over the real reason, and got mad at the redditor for lying to them. Commenters mostly agreed that there’s no asshole here and this is all silly—which is ridiculous! It’s rude to ask a new co-worker about a physical condition! It’s ludicrous to ice them out because they’d rather not tell you! There was a lot of controversy in the thread over whether or not the co-workers were assholes, but somehow “no assholes here” won out. UGH
Reddit has a fat-shaming problem, and it shows up a lot in this subreddit. I was ready to vote “YTA”—you’re the asshole—from this headline, but then I read the story: “She doesn’t call me by name she calls me ‘slim’ and I even heard her say one time ‘go ask toothpick’ and she has said stuff like ‘you need some meat on your bones’ & ‘you need to eat.’ I have only worked there 8 days. I have asked her very nicely to stop.”
So the next time her co-worker said “Hey Slim,” she replied, “Hey Chunky.” And the co-worker cried. Commenters widely agree that the redditor isn’t the asshole here, though a few wise ones suggested getting out of the body-shaming game and going with “Good morning, verbally abusive stranger!”—or simply replying “Hey Slim!” right back.
“AITA for not allowing my best friend to crash at my house after his wife died?”
This isn’t about a friend wearing out his welcome—this redditor’s friend is trying to raise a 3-year-old daughter alone after his wife died, and he asked the redditor to put them up for one night because he can’t sleep at home surrounded by memories of his wife. The redditor says, hoo boy, “I tell him she can stay but he can’t because he has to get over it eventually.” Everyone agreed the redditor is the asshole; some don’t believe this story could even be real.
“AITA for telling cashier that wasn’t the girls credit card?”
The mods had to tell people to stop insulting this redditor, even though she is clearly the asshole. (It’s an important rule of this subreddit: don’t be an asshole, even to an asshole.) This redditor overheard a teen girl saying she was going to buy an expensive pair of boots on her dad’s credit card. She decided this means the teen is a spoiled brat. So she followed the girl to the register and told the cashier, “That’s not her card.” Then the cashier wasn’t allowed to sell the teen the boots.
The teen cried, and the redditor took this as proof the teen was spoiled—“I don’t think she was ever told no.” And then the teen used her own card to buy the boots. Which really seems like the nail in the coffin for our redditor. Cashier and the redditor’s husband both feel that she was out of line for shaming this teen. Reddit heartily agrees.
“AITA for suggesting my 7yo name his new stuffed tiger Tig Bitties?”
Kid names his stuffed tiger Tig, asks for a last name. Dad suggests “Bitties.” Kid loves it, wife is “pissed.” The vast majority of redditors decided, “NAH”: No Assholes Here. Mom’s right, that name could cause a little trouble, but so what?
Read more of the greatest asshole stories on the subreddit’s top posts page, and follow new stories here. Remember, even when replying to an asshole, do not be an asshole. The goal is to have fewer assholes in the world, is it not? (For a subreddit with fewer rules and sillier submissions, try the spinoff Am I the Butthole?)
And think very carefully before posting your own story in this subreddit. Most popular threads have a post from the moderators up top, telling everyone to stop threatening and abusing each other. (They’re pretty good at cleaning up the bad comments, so if you get to a post after the first few days, it’s usually only appropriate comments up top.) And you’ll get lots of direct messages from supporters and detractors. The author of “AITA for asking my brother not to bring his boyfriend to my wedding?” posted an update to their legitimately difficult post: “I wanna thank the redditor that sent me a private message and said they hope a mass shooter shows up at my wedding, so thoughtful!!!”
Updated 3/4/22 with new details.
