You can be my Yoko Ono

Group dynamics are funny things, and when you change them, that can be good or bad. I was watching the first The Hangover the other day, and Stu's girlfriend - while clearly an exaggerated character - resonates with a lot of guys.

FOCUS: Have you encountered a Yoko Ono that broke up or otherwise utterly disrupted an otherwise happy group? Note that Yokos can be male or female.

 

My best friend's girlfriend was our Yoko. He was the anchor of our group - I was the high school friend, one guy was a college buddy/workout partner, another guy was his biker buddy, a married couple were his bodybuilding friends, and his brother was... Is his brother. We were a motley crew, and quite happy as such.

Once my friend's girlfriend entered the picture (originally as a fuck buddy), the group fell apart. I've stayed in contact with the brother; strangely enough, I talk to him more often than my friend. The rest of the group has faded into the woodwork, and since the girlfriend now lives with my friend in every sense but sharing his mailing address, I doubt a reunion is anywhere in the near future.

 

How about a Yoko that was somewhere in between? Once upon a time, between 4 and 7 Princes lived in a castle, aptly named the House of Stink. These princes were the best of friends, bound by their mutual disdain for the outside world and their love of intoxicants. They were inseparable, going everywhere together - the lounge room with the computer games, the deck with the bong, back to the lounge room, etc. Then one night, the brave companions headed to a local entertainment spot, and they consumed the potions that the wicked witch had made for them. This witchy brew rendered them susceptible to glamours, and when the portliest of the fellows attracted the interest of a slightly broad-shouldered, thin-hipped Asian women, all were delighted at his good fortune. None more so than he, for as the weeks passed, he did declare that "he never thought it would be possible to get sick of blowjobs, but he'd had so many that they were becoming commonplace".

But then, questions began to be raised. In a most unlikely coincidence, one of the House of Stink's visitor's wive's had worked with the Asian Princess - when she was an Asian Prince. This was vigorously and sometimes violently denied by he of the excess blowjobs, but the damage had been done. Eventually, a confrontation was had, everyone was told to mind their own business, and that might have been the end of it.

But of course it wasn't. One of the other inhabitants was previously a simple lad from the country, beset by all manner of homophobic prejudices. He was also perhaps not in the best mental state, being a 20yr old virgin who's Uncle was in prison for attempting to kill his mother at his Dad's funeral (seriously. His family was fucked. up.). As a result of this family discord, he had been staying with the central character since early childhood, as his own mother wasn't particularly scrupulous about feeding or generally caring for him. He took exception to the presence of a pre-op transexual in our midst, and made increasingly snide comments about her. She, in turn, grew to dislike this gentleman, and sought to provoke him, (despite essentially living rent-free in his house). One fateful day, she emerged from the bedroom in nothing but a man's shirt, and attempted to sit on his lap while he was baked out of his gourd. He flipped, grabbed a butcher's knife from the kitchen and brandished it in her face, threatening to kill her if she ever touched him again. She ran and locked herself in the bedroom, while her partner came out for an afternoon of shouted threats, rants, and profanity-laced diatribes.

In the end, the transexual and the prince moved out and into a different place, and after a few more quarrels, never spoke to any of us again. And they all lived happily ever after.

 

It's kind of hard to call her a Yoko since it's mostly due to my friend being a pussy than her influence but since dating his GF about two years ago he has undergone a complete personality change. She's very conservative with partying so he never gets super drunk anymore and will usually go to bed early. She invites her group of friends to every function, and she, my friend and them will essentially break off and go do their own thing, the weird thing is that they fit into our group well enough but still just break off.

The biggest thing though is that he use to be the least PDA friendly person I know, not standoffish, but more calculating than emotional. This doesn't bother me so much, but any females we hang hang out with find it so disgustingly over the top they can't stand it, they constantly refer to each other as pet names, tell stupid inside jokes (I get the jokes, they're still stupid) and are WAY overly affectionate. They won't say ANYTHING even remotely negative about the other, even as a joke. If one of them makes a very obvious dumb mistake the other will play dumb and say they would have made the same mistake and console them while we mock them ruthlessly.

I know why he's doing this, it's because he was too standoffish in his last relationship and she dumped him for it, but he needs to grow the fuck up and realize there's a happy medium.

 

FOCUS: I think I was potentially a Yoko Ono for a group, but, unlike Yoko, I was slowly excluded from the group because of one incident. I've described what happened before, but I'm too lazy to look up that post... What happened was a girl who was with that group that night acted like she was into me, and kissed me. The guy she was with (that I didn't know she was with, and he didn't tell me she was with him either) was across the table and part of the group. From that moment, all I got from that group was disdain until I just left the group. Just last Saturday, I got a call from the friend who introduced me to that group, but I didn't answer it. That ship has sailed.

I've also excluded myself from a mutual friend of the previously mentioned group and her group of friends after a drunken incident just before my birthday last year.

There was also a few groups from high school, but I was always part of the periphery with those, more an object of mockery than anything else. At least I wised up and don't really have any contact with those people anymore. Or anyone, really.

Some people are just not capable of interacting with others in a social setting, without wanting to claw the walls and escape - that'd be me. I used to try, often too hard, to just fit in with others - now, I know I'm an outcast and don't bother interacting in the first place.

 

I used to have a group I did everything with, there were four of us girls and we did alot of partying. My best friend and I lived together, and the other two girls frequented our place. We truly were best friends, always had each others' backs. I'll be honest, one of the girls wasn't terribly attractive, the remaining three were quite popular with the boys.

We started a downhill slide of sorts when I quit seeing a guy named Aaron. He was too full of bullshit, trying to convince me he had an inoperable brain tumour sent me over the edge and I dumped him. For some reason he started calling the not so attractive girl in the group, and she defended his lies to the death, no matter how little sense they made. She was the only virgin in the group and she gave it up fairly quickly. I felt bad for her, as did our other friends, as she was clearly being used.

One night everyone was over for some drinks and X before we headed out into the night. Aaron was there and drinking like a fish and taking pills. I asked him about his brain tumour and he did not recall this particular fable, and verbally attacked me for calling him out on it. I started laughing in his face at his pathetic charade, which he apparently did not like. When my date arrived, he tried starting a fight with him, which ended with my date punching him square in the face.

Aaron's girl was unable to see the obviousness of the situation and was furious with me for upsetting her poor baby. My roommate and I determined that he was no longer welcome in our abode and that sealed it. My roommate got serious with some tool and moved in with him and I got a new roommate. We are all friends still/now. We have never been as close as we were though.

As far as I have heard, Aaron is alive and well. Guess that brain tumour wasn't so bad after all.

 

I don't know if this counts, but This Guy who would abandon us every time he got a girlfriend. When he was alone, he would come over every day, clean our apartment after every party, and drive us around because he was the only one with a car. But the second he was in even a FWB situation, we would see him once to meet the girl, and then he would be gone for the duration of the "relationship."

Eventually, I bought a car and we stopped talking to him altogether. I think I saw him once that entire year, and that was at graduation.

 

Ono, I didn't.

 

Ladies and gentlemen, the story you are about to [read] is true. The names have been changed to protect the innocent.

I had a close group of friends in high school (me, Eric, Dan, and Mark). There were four of us that hung out pretty much every day. Then, senior year, we all got girlfriends. Three of the four girlfriends fit into the group like a glove, and we got along great. The fourth girl, it turned out, was kind of fucking insane and thrived on drama. For instance, once I showed up at a class to see my buddy (Dan) with his head down, something very strange behavior from him. When I asked him what was up, he said his girlfriend (the crazy one) was late. Later, I found out that, for some fucked up reason, the crazy one told everyone she saw that MY girlfriend was pregnant, I guess to distract from her potential demon-spawn.

That wasn't quite the worst of it, though. See, Dan went away to college, but tried to say with her. He was gone no more than a week, when the crazy one went on a blow-job spree the likes of which was never seen in our town. She blew six dudes at a party, all in front of each other. It was just short of a gang bang. Naturally, this did not go over well with Dan, who lost his shit when he found out, and dumped her crazy ass.

Of course, this isn't the end of the story. The four of us were still close, despite being at different colleges, and we still hung out during breaks and BSed online. Crazy girl came back into the picture, because she had begun to date Eric (Dan's best friend, and another member of our group). Dan felt betrayed, and questioned Eric as to why he would date her, given that Eric was well aware of her bullshit, and also well aware that you shouldn't date a friend's ex. Arguments were had, and that was that. Eric chose crazy-chick over Dan, and Dan never spoke to Eric again.

Dan eventually went on to alienate all of us in some way or another. When my roommate/best friend in college dated not one, but TWO of my exes, Dan took the roommate's side (despite me taking Dan's side in the big Dan/Eric fight). Dan also hated Mark's girlfriend (and eventual wife/ex-wife), and was very vocal about it, so they simply stopped talking. Dan lives in the area and we've chatted a bit on FB, and he openly admits he was an asshole to some of us, but that I am the only one he'd want to hang out with. We've talked but never hung out. Eric ended up marrying crazy-chick, and she has mellowed, as the wife and I recently visited with them and Mark/Mark's new girlfriend. The six of us actually got along pretty well, although I can still tell that Mark and Eric hate Dan, as even mentioning him made them both get irrationally angry.

 

I had been best friends with two guys for seven years, until one of the guys started dating a stripper. All of a sudden, the dynamic shifted, and the guy dating the stripper was getting irrationally angry at me for nothing. When I would ask him what was wrong, he would say it was nothing, so I figured there was no problem until one day he blew up at me and decided we were no longer friends.

Apparently the stripper had been telling him that I must be a duplicitous underhanded bitch because I am a girl and could never have his best interests at heart, or I'd be fucking him and not her, and he agreed.

Unfortunately, I am still best friends with the other guy in the group, but the stripper-dating-guy is so stubborn he refuses to even see me out among our mutual friends, which makes hanging out really difficult. Such a retarded line of action, considering he's not even dating that stripper anymore (she dumped him, surprise).

 

I don't get why it's called a "Yoko Ono" and not a "Guy who gave Freddy Mercury AIDS"

 

The guy who gave Freddy AIDS intention's weren't as bad as Yoko's.

 

Deuteronomy disagrees.