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Recently my wife was invited to a social gathering of about 15 coworkers that was being held at the home of a coworker. She agreed to come and then made absolutely no effort to actually attend. I felt compelled to ask her about it. In my discussion with my wife she said that had she gone to the gathering she would have been the only black female in attendance and she would not have been comfortable. She said it wasn't a company event, it was a private party, and the invitation was not a serious invitation.
I pressed my wife on the point of it not being a serious invitation and her reply was most revealing. She said, "The invitation was merely so she could feel good about herself for having invited me and my acceptance of the invitation was merely so she could feel good about extending the invitation. She really didn't want me to show up and I really had no intention of doing so. We're just playing the invitation game."
I must admit that as a guy, and even as a black guy, I would never extend an insincere invitation to anyone nor would I ever accept one that I intended to back out of. I've been told on more than one occasion that I don't "play the game" and I an only imagine that "the invitation game" is yet another that I just don't play. Is it really important to the social fabric to delude ourselves by making insincere invitations or by accepting them insincerely? Is it important to lie to ourselves as well as others by making invitations we truly don't want to be kept? Is this something that only women do or do guys play "the invitation game" too?
Perhaps most importantly, am I wrong for not playing the game?
