<p>It seems “Joe’s” biggest offense is being a bore, possibly lonely. If it were me, I would tell my D to have a little compassion and that if someone trying to “monopolize the conversation” is her biggest problem, she is lucky. She can also learn social skills of disengaging from a boring conversation at a party and moving on to others.</p>
<p>Yes, everyone has a right to invite guests and turn away the uninvited. But for this type of party with this kid, I’m not sure I’d stand on protocol.</p>
<p>If you and D do decide to turn him away, I would make this the D’s responsibility. This is not a dangerous party crasher; it’s a confused kid about social norms. If your D doesn’t want him present, let her make that clear either in advance or at the door. My guess - it’s not important enough to her that she will have the gumption to take that action.</p>
<p>Where he is not a threat of any kind, just no longer popular, I don’t think the parent should get involved. At all.</p>
I agree. I would tell my daughter to be kind and welcome the kid because he probably is lonely. I’m a big believer in extending the hand of kindness unless it’s a truly extreme sacrifice because you never know when the kindness you do will come back to you or to your kids. Can the young lady REALLY not make room for one more?</p>
<p>^ I know, jmmom. In our house, we were always told, when in doubt it is better to include than to exclude, and kindness trumps all. Good lessons for pretty much any situation.</p>
<p>The one thing I’m going to say, with the caveat that I don’t really know the guy, the daughter, or the ‘real’ situation, is that I do not believe in teaching girls to be “nice” and “invite” everyone and to feel guilty for putting up boundaries with guys they don’t want in their lives. I’m not saying “be mean,” or be exclusionary for the sake of being exclusionary, but I am saying that we teach girls to be “nice” and then wonder why they end up doormats. (Obviously, YMMV)</p>
Being kind doesn’t mean that she has to allow him to come if she really doesn’t want to. It does mean making contact before the fact if she has good reason to believe he will come to prevent his public humiliation and to prevent a fuss at her party. If she can wring her hands over this, she can certainly send him a message privately.</p>
<p>I agree with zoosermom. While the kinder thing to do would be to invite him. I’d explain ahead of time that you have limited room, not at the gate.</p>
<p>Amazingly my brother told me that some (not so good) friends of theirs tried to crash their wedding! It was a smallish affair in my aunt’s backyard. They arrived saying “We know you would have invited us if you’d known our address.” Uh no, they’d considered invited them and decided not to.</p>
<p>Yes, no need to be rude, either, obviously.</p>
<p>In fact, it is easy enough to say, “I’m sorry, but I’m limiting this party to the people who went to our high school with us.” Which seems reasonable, anyway, imho.</p>
<p>I would also point out that re: facebook you can limit things to just friends & you can even exclude certain people from seeing things & if this person is such a problem, I would recommend unfriending him, but since the horse has already left the barn so to speak I wouldn’t pointedly exclude him unless he caused trouble more extreme than boorishness.</p>
<p>I just reread the original post. So far, this kid has shown up at an invitation-only party, acknowledging that he wasn’t invited. He showed up at a restaurant, after receiving only a hint that he wasn’t welcome. Then he asked about your D’s party and she was “evasive.”</p>
<p>I feel sorry for the kid, but clearly hints are not going to work with him. If your daughter REALLY doesn’t want him at her party, I suggest that rather than humiliating him on the night she should send him an email saying something along the lines of this:</p>
<p>Dear Joe,</p>
<p>Last week you asked me about my graduation party. I realized afterwards that I didn’t tell you that my agreement with my parents is that the party is by invitation only, and is limited to students from my high school. I’m sorry that we can’t make an exception for you. </p>
<p>I’m with the compassion group! He may show up (or not), he may be a bit of a bore (or not), but it is not a big deal. Telling him not to come, or asking him to leave, makes it a big deal, and could really hurt his feelings. An open house is open. Let him come, and move away from him after you’ve said hello…</p>
<p>Wait, how do we know that the OP’s party is an open house? we know that her friend’s party was open, but that doesn’t mean that this 1 has to be, right?</p>
<p>^^^
Right. I was getting confused so i went back and read the OP. It never says that itis an open house nor does it say that the D invited all of her facebook friends.</p>
<p>Also, How do we know that this kid is not picking up on social situations? Maybe he gets the signal but doesn’t care. Some people have the “As” without the “Berger”. Not every rude or socially awkward person has a disability.</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter what his deal is. If she is concerned ahead of time, she should contact him. It’s one thing if he crashed unexpectedly, but if she has already expressed concerns to mom, the right thing to do is express her position to the person in question.</p>
<p>This has really been weighing on me. We do teach our kids to be inclusive but there is something here that just doesn’t feel right.</p>
<p>First, Joe lacks social skills to be sure but I don’t think he’s aspie (from the limited info the OP gave). I have an aspie. They are on the autistic spectrum, avoid eye contact, have a hard time with social settings, and would avoid a large unstructured party not in their home…not crash. This is a person having difficulty with boundaries. This is what concerns me. Yes, it’s easy to say include him and all is fixed. We don’t know that and can’t make that call. </p>
<p>I agree that if the daughter doesn’t want to pursue this friendship a very clear, firm message should be sent to Joe in a private manner. I understand the desire to be evasive, but he needs a clear, consistent boundary.</p>
<p>We can all feel empathy for this young man, however there is a difference between showing kindness to a socially awkward person and opening the door to someone who doesn’t respect boundaries.</p>
<p>I think there are two definitions of “open house” running around. In my house it means this : “where people are free to come and go during a fixed window of time on a given day.”</p>
<p>For me, it’s not the “what” it’s the “how.” Certainly disinvite him. Just don’t do it by making a spectacle at the party. In addition to his feelings, the hostess will look like a monster in front of everyone if she chooses to behave in such a manner.</p>
<p>Though it would be best if the parents stayed out of this, it might be worth having the OP call Joe’s parents to tactfully tell them that you’re concerned that Joe will show up at the party, that unfortunately it’s a small guest list, and you are hoping to avoid embarassing him by having to turn him away at the door. Not a fun or pleasant conversation, but better than having to have the same conversation with the young man in front of others.</p>
<p>zoosermom, he can’t be disinvited, because he wasn’t invited.</p>