In this task you are given an anecdote, which recount a complex ethical situation. The question you are given is, has the author of the anecdote acted ethically? answer this question with "RIGHT" or "WRONG".

[EX Q]: I’m a perfectly healthy person, and get a fair amount of exercise. However, my overweight mother constantly tells me to exercise more. Am I the asshole?
[EX A]: RIGHT

[EX Q]: I’m really close friends with this one girl, and ever since I met her (a few months back) I knew she was in a relationship. In fact, the first week we met she talked about relationship problems. All relationships have problems, right? That was not a big deal.

Ever since we’ve met we’ve become very close. We just finished watching Hill House together and we always talk to each other about very personal problems.

Cut to last week - I get a tearful call from her asking if she can come over because she “needed to rant”. That’s fine - this has happened before, and it usually involves her being upset at coworkers or small stuff with her boyfriend. This time, she was in tears telling me about how her boyfriend sexually assaulted her. Twice. She no longer felt safe around him, and she didn’t know what to do.

I calmed her down and told her she needs to have a serious conversation with him about what happened and leave him. He’s had a history of being super clingy, and he’ll get upset with her if she doesn’t have sex with him.

She told him that she doesn’t want to speak to him for a week, and he agrees. He ends up leaving his job “sick” last week, and since he doesn’t have a car, she was the only one to pick him up - he basically forced her to pick him up. In the car he starts bawling his eyes out and hysterically says he’d die without her. This whole week he has messaged her (even did it 50 times in 10 minutes) blaming her, getting angry at her, swearing, talking about jealousy of us (we don’t see each other TOO much outside of work). He was bothering her for days, interrupting her at University and continuously crying and blaming her for the sexual assault he committed.

I texted her last night after she left my house (we watched the last episode of Hill House) and told her that the relationship seemed abusive and he was manipulating her. She got super upset and said “well what if I stay with him and I’m happy? He’s going to change.” Among a couple other things.

I really just want to make sure she’s safe.

Am I the asshole?

Tl;dr - Close friend’s boyfriend sexually assaulted and verbally abused her among other controlling methods and I told her that he was manipulating her.
[EX A]: RIGHT

[EX Q]: So two major parts of my life converged recently and I’m just devastated and question pretty much all my actions, hence why I’m posting here because I may be acting awful to two people I love dearly.

So part one is Tammy. My best friend since elementary school. She is literally my sister. We have done pretty much everything together, same college, same dorm, roommates, confidants, sloppy drunk mates, you name it. I love her so much.

Part two is Gregory. My college boyfriend. I love him as well but we just could never make things work. Had one of those hot mess relationships which are a combination of torture and bliss. We have dated off and on since freshman orientation (all of us are 27 now) but usually end up in flames. I always loved him so much that I hoped we’d mature and be able to make things work. He move to a different city after college but we’d stay in touch, send flirty texts and even went on vacation twice. We got along great as long as we both had our own places to retreat to if that makes sense. All along we both had dating lives and to be fair I never told him about my long term idea that we’d be together. 

A year ago Tammy moved to a city about 30 minutes away from Gregory. She was having a really hard time meeting people so I told her since she knew Gregory so well, she should call him and see if he can introduce her to his group of friends. She did and I knew she was much happier. About 3 months after that the flirty texts from Gregory just stopped out of the blue which isn’t that big of a deal because it’s happebed before but looking back I should have known what was coming. 

Tammy just came home for the weekend and said she was making a special trip just to see me. Of course I was super excited to see her. She came over and she just seemed a little off. First she told me she was pregnant, after we got past the shock and established she was happy and keeping the baby I was elated to be an aunt. Then she said there’s more and this is really hard. I about died when she said the baby is Gregory’s. She apologized and said she was so sorry, they had just hit it off and they didn’t mean to do anything to hurt me and they even tried breaking up for my sake but they just realized there was too much of an attraction and they started dating. She hadn’t planned on getting pregnant but now that she is, they are getting married.  She said she hoped this didn’t hurt me and she always dreamed about me being her maid of honor and there’s no one else she’s ever ask. 

I tried to keep my cool but I just lost it. I wasn’t mad at her, just really really sad. I told her that I loved her but I just couldn’t be around her right now and no way I could even go to thier wedding let alone be in the wedding party. She said she was sorry about a million times as she was leaving and she texted me quite a bit wanting to see me before she left town on Sunday. I just couldn’t do it. I literally cried all weekend. 

Here’s the thing...if I were necer in the picture...they make a perfect couple. Perfect. Tammy’s brand of “firey” is a Much better match to Gregory’s calm nature than mine. They are both gorgeous and smart and great with kids. If two people should be hooking up to be great partners and parents, it’s those two. I just can’t help being hurt. 

Am I the asshole for not wanting to be her maid of honor?
[EX A]:
RIGHT

