A woman has sparked a debate for not telling her date what she does for a living, as she let him pay for her all of her drinks throughout the evening.
In a post shared to the Reddit forum “Am I The A**hole?,” u/Fuzzy-Pen-1457 reveals how her friend Grace had invited her to a bar that had board games. The woman also noted that Grace had invited her boyfriend and one of their friends, Nick.
The original poster (OP) acknowledged that she “had plenty of time to talk” to Nick, as there were moments throughout the night where it was “just the two of” them. According to the woman, Nick talked a lot about his career and success. However, she said that she didn’t do the same, as she never told him what her career is.
“Nick started the night by telling about his recent career change, he decided to quit his previous job, go to a coding bootcamp and he got a job as a developer one or two months ago,” she wrote. “He was very proud of himself and his new salary and told me this multiple times.”
“He never asked me what I do for work, but talked about his new job quite a lot, occasionally saying ‘sorry, you don’t understand that, haha,’” she continued. “During the entire evening, I never told him I have been working as a software engineer for the past 4 years, because he never asked and honestly, I found it a bit entertaining.”
The woman went on to note that once the night ended, Nick took out his phone to “send [her] a friend request on Facebook,” where he discovered that she was a software engineer.
When he saw what she did for work, the original poster said that he asked her why she didn’t mention job and then assumed that she made more money than him.
“He asked me if it’s true that I’m a software engineer and I answered yes,” she continued. “He asked me why I hadn’t told him, why did I let him believe I was a cashier like Grace used to be (?? I never implied that), and why did I let him pay for everything when I probably earn more than him.”
In a follow up to her post, the woman gave a further explanation about Nick’s behaviour throughout the night.
“I let a guy brag about his career change without telling him I have been in the same field for years too,” she added. “I also let him pay for my drinks, but he insisted. My friend thinks I should’ve told him about my job even though he never asked.”
As of 14 June, the post has more than 34,600 upvotes, with Redditer users in the comments coming to OP’s defence, claiming that Nick seemed a bit too self-involved and that the woman could have been judged by him for her work, since they had been in the same field.
“Just maybe, if he had bothered to [shut the f*** up] for 5 seconds, and asked what she did for a living, he would’ve found out that they had something in common and been able to have a real conversation with OP,” one wrote.
“He was so focused on bragging about his job that he never bothered to stop and ask about hers,” another wrote. “[In my opinion], paying for the drinks is just the a**hole tax for having to listen to him all night, he sounds obnoxious. (But offering to pay him back was a considerate gesture, and if it was strictly about the money, should have been enough to avoid further drama).”
A third user added: “Poor OP was in a no-win situation. Shut up and listen to him brag, or say she’s a software engineer with four years of experience and be accused of either emasculating him, downplaying his accomplishments, or having sex with the bosses to get her position.”
However, other readers claimed that the woman should have brought up her job and that there was an opportunity to.
“Yeah he never asked you what you do but if someone told me they work in the same field I do I would have said something,” one person wrote.
“Conversations work both ways and when he told you about his job your natural response should have been to say that you worked in the same field,” one said. “The fact that you found the whole thing ‘a bit entertaining’ makes you a complete [a**hole]. You were laughing at him behind his back and taking advantage of his generosity.”
