AITA for calling my unemployed friends privileged?

A Reddit user shared a heated disagreement with their artist friends, Andrew and Bianca, who criticized their commercialized art and accused them of being “rich” after relocating to the U.S. for a life-changing opportunity. When the Redditor pointed out their friends’ financial privileges, supported by family, tensions boiled over, leaving the friends upset. Read the full story below to see how it unfolded.

‘ AITA for calling my unemployed friends privileged?’

A while ago I (30F) befriended two fellow artists also in their 30s through my job.

• Andrew comes from a low income family and lives with his mom in an apartment she owns. He is unemployed and supported by her.
  
• Bianca comes from an upper middle class family and lives alone in a house her parents own. She has never had a job.
  
•  I come from a middle class family that fell into hard times and never recovered. I help them financially when I can.
• A and B both did freelance work for my boss and were not contracted again after missed deadlines and refusing to take feedback.

The tension between us started when through my job I was given the opportunity to move to America. I am gay and in my country gay people don’t have rights, so this was a life changing opportunity. Because of how expensive America is, and how much money I spent in the move, I started working extra hard to replenish my savings. My job offers a base salary + royalties for every piece I sell, so I am producing more “commercial”, easier to sell stuff, with a focus on faster production times.

Both A and B believe art should never be compromised for monetary gain, and they started to be very passive aggressive when interacting with me. They would make constant jabs at me, from subtle to straight up calling me a sellout. I take a lot of pride in my work. I won’t spend 20 hours on a piece I can only sell for $20, because I can’t afford to, but I still think there’s a lot of heart in what I do. So I got really annoyed at this.

Then last week they said something like “eat the rich. Except we would miss you OP.” I told them I’m not rich, they insisted I am because I live in the US, I own a car and I have a good job. I explained that here having a car is a necessity (no public transit) and I worked very hard to get where I am professionally. I told them their constant jabs were hurtful and made it sound like this was something I stumbled into rather than earned. But they kept escalating.

So this is where I might have been the a**hole. I told them both that of course they wouldn’t know about compromising their art for money, they’re privileged enough not to have to worry about rent and bills so they can focus on spending endless time on art no one wants to buy.

Now they’re both upset and told me I was cruel. Andrew says I’m an a**hole cause how dare I call him privileged when he has to share a very small apartment with his mom instead of living by himself and have disposable income. Bianca says I shamed her for being unemployed. They say you can’t be privileged if you’re unemployed.

They want me to apologize but I’m standing my ground. I think that while having parents able to support you is a privilege you’re either born with or not, if they want to make money from their art they can, but they need to take feedback and meet deadlines. They chose not to. Am I out of line? I don’t want to apologize, am I too angry to see I’m actually the a**hole?

Here’s the input from the Reddit crowd:

edebby −  NTA. Both A dn B are privileged and a bit entitled people. Both live comfortably without worry about a job, salary , bills or any living struggle. Their petty claim about your art is nothing more than a jealousy rant – they see someone who works hard and ACHIEVES things in her life, while they are stuck in a comfort routine that goes no where. Their comfy life made them lose the DRIVE to be better and do better at life. Don’t listen to them, and you are absolutely accurate in what you told them.

snarkness_monster −  NTA. It sounds like they’re jealous of your opportunity and are trying to cut you down. Tell them to kick rocks and find new friends.

NotBorn2Fade −  NTA. Doing some commercial art to get some footing after a turbulent period of life is perfectly reasonable. And calling those people “privileged” is not an insult, but an objective fact. Being privileged doesn’t mean having extra help, it means having less obstacles on your way. OP, good luck to you and I hope you’ll soon be stable enough to do any art your heart desires.

Tipsy-boo −  NTA. They aren’t unemployed- they are artists. They are also incredibly privileged to be living as they are. Andrew should be particularly ashamed for being a financial burden on someone who has likely struggled financially to raise him.

Proper_Rush_9367 −  You need to learn how to choose better friends.

Soggy_Dinner_8068 −  NTA. I have friends like this. I was an artist in high school going into college then I switched careers to finance. I now do my art on the side for fun and grind hard at a mind numbing job each day. I’m not friends with those people from HS and college anymore for this same reason. They got pissed and called me rich because I could afford to live without handouts from anyone.

These types of people are just leeches to your happiness, and will spread jealousy and vitriol at you because they can’t accept that they chose their path and you chose yours. People like that hate seeing others do better than them. Best of luck to you!

RaineMist −  NTA. They could’ve worked harder like what you have but they chose not to. You got the opportunity because you worked hard to get there.

CasualCrisis83 −  NTA, my knee j**k reaction was the opposite, but I feel like under the circumstances, that was a fair thing to say. As an artist in the animation industry, that will sell my whole left arm to the highest bidder to keep my family fed and comfortable, keep up the good work. Putting your fun aside to keep the lights on is noble. Mooching off of parents to be the super cool starving artist is childish.

NanaLeonie −  NTA. But may I point out that “pretentious” might be a more accurate description of your so-called friends than “privileged.”

Militantignorance −  NTA “Artistic purity” and “refusal to commercialize” are most often excuses for chronic laziness.