Is it ever okay to ghost a friend?

[Anonymous]

Is it ever ok to ghost someone you're friends with? Under what circumstances? Have you ever ghosted or been ghosted by a friend? Do you think ghosting is ok?

[BlackBeauty90]

Ghosting is a form of physiological / emotional abuse. So by ghosting your friend, you're no better than they are. Potentially you're even worse than they are.

Particularly if you never told them that X or Y or Z behavior was unacceptable to you.

The ONLY time that ghosting an actual friend may be acceptable is if they have become a danger to you. Otherwise you can have the COMMON DECENCY to explain "friend we can no longer hang out, I find X behaviour of yours is too much to handle".

[Biancam13]

These are my rules: if they did something huge knowing it would hurt you (so they know what they did), then you don't need to explain to them. Likewise if they were extremely toxic/narcissistic/vindictive. You should protect yourself.

But if they were your proper friend and you just don't want the friendship anymore for whatever reason? Then ghosting is cowardly and immature. And hurtful. Don't ghost, you wouldn't want it done to you, so don't do it to someone you cared about.

[CaptainOverthink]

It's not okay to ghost. However..
A question that appears in my mind is: where is the line drawn with friends?
I mean..
You can't hold all your friends to the same standard as they are different people, all with a life of their own.
Not to mention there are different types of friends, some are good and okay with you spilling your emotions and handling ventilation of your issues and some are not. That should be respected. There's party-friends, adventure-friends, collegues, family-friends, best friends, childhood-friends and so on for whatever occations they shine..

- When you're no longer in school it becomes all the more common that people drift apart or if you will, contact might be far inbetween and plans are hard to make.
Is it ghosting to be caught up in ones own life? I think not.
- Sometimes you've had plans to make plans for a long time but haven't got around to it and so the years go by.. but then they never tried making plans either, so who is to blame? Both. But is it ghosting?

I don't know. I think you can ghost a friend if you decide for yourself that you don't like someone but still don't give out the signals to show you feel that way. That'd be ghosting in my opinion.

[Starbers99]

A work 'friend' (my manager) made a work decision about me based on her personal views but before I had a chance to speak to her about it when I was less upset, she spent 6 months ganging up on me with another colleague because she was an insecure mess. She knows I'm not a confrontational person and classes herself as 'emotionally intelligent' yet she didn't realise that I had slowly started to distance myself from her and her toxic strange behaviour to avoid her belittling and embarrassing me. I applied for a transfer out of my department to get away from her and she became angry. It was my fault for not establishing boundaries, something I have always struggled with but I wasn't going to take responsibility for this person taking her issues out on me. I stopped messaging her first and I stopped going for coffee and lunch with her without explaining why. I had kept it in for so long that I did not trust myself to tell her how she made me feel so I live blocked her out of my life. I think you can ghost people who treat you badly and take advantage of your nature. I always felt like she knew she was hurting me but enjoyed belittling me because it made her feel better about herself. I got my transfer, we no longer talk and I feel so much better. I learnt a lesson though, establish boundaries early on and call them out on their behaviour then there's no need to ghost. I don't like ghosting and I don't agree with it but I don't like talking about my feelings or letting people know they upset me but I should be upfront so people know where they stand with me.

[oh_k789]

The hardest thing to believe is... how unaware they are, during all the process, from when we start being unable to withstand their behaviour, to when we literally can hardly breathe in their presence :).

They don't know it's the least reaction one can have to how they behave.

[Screenwriter]

Ghosting leaves a person wondering what they did wrong, unless it's a person who you barely know. Nothing's great about handing over that feeling.

But, because people aren't good about confrontation or can't even verbalize their feelings, they resort to easy ways out. Ghosting is one of those "easy" ways.

I was ghosted by a longtime friend because she was dying of cancer and I believe she didn't have the energy to do anything other than tend to her family. One other friend, someone I've known for more than 30 years, ghosted me. I have guesses as to why, but am still unsure.

In both cases, the losses were deep and I was sad. But there's nothing you can do when someone makes a one-sided decision.

[Sorrento-Sun]

A so called friend of mine was lying to people about me. It was malicious lies. She also disclosed personal things about me. Things I confided in her about , because I thought I could trust her. It broke my heart , because I thought she was a genuine person and loyal friend.

Rather than confront her, i ghosted her and changed my number. I totally cut her off

The reason why is becauase she didn't deserve an explanation or closure. I didn't confront her , because I didn't want to listen to her lies, reasons or explanations. No matter what she said, I'd no longer remain friends with her.

If a person is being lied to or manipulated, I believe that's good cause for ghosting them. People like that don't deserve anymore of your time and energy. They don't deserve a reason why you no longer want them in your life. That just gives them leverage, because they'll just lie and manipulate you again.

[BlueScorpio]

No I don't like ghosting, if a relationship isn't working out it's best to end it face to face unless you know the person is a danger to you. Ghosting doesn't give you closure and makes you wonder what you did wrong, if you did do something you won't know how to improve or fix it cause the person never told you. Plus as much people hate ghosting, they still try to excuse it or do it and it doesn't make sense to me.

[Anonymous]

Usually friends ghost friends if one of the friend is bully or toxic.
I did this to a friend I only knew from college for like a year but she was extremely toxic and bullying lowering me down because I was better than her physically face wise. I realized wth am I doing why am I even talk to this specie.
And yeah I stopped talking to her. She tired messaging few times like hey hey what’s up? But well it died quickly thankfully


Ghosting your boyfriend or girlfriend or partner it’s a very different topic. I don’t recommend it at all. Just say the truth that you aren’t looking for a relationship or whatever the reason is

[Kori1236]

People aren’t owed an explanation as to why. I personally haven’t ghosted a friend but I did limit contact and created boundaries. Now if you have a toxic friend that takes any opportunity to hurt you or degrade you they’re not a friend to begin with. They don’t deserve an explanation. But if you have a friend that hasn’t done anything and you’re just bored of them that’s an asshole move.

[Telekinetic-Potato]

I don't think it's OK, but I have one friend I ghost because he calls me a million times a day and when I finally answer, it's to just be like "hey, what's up, what are you doing?" like my guy, I'm at work. I'm at work the same time every day! I love him but talk to me about nothing every once in a while, not 50 times a day every day.

[DCowboy4747]

I think it would have to be something very serious like him/her stealing your partner or something. I am not comfortable around large amounts of people so I can count my friends on one hand. One I have known since high school and the other I have known all my life. The internet makes it so much easier to disrupt someone's life and people nowadays can hide behind a screen and have never learned how to handle problems face to face like us old timers, lol, had to do growing up.

[CallmeTheKnight]

Ghosting is not abuse, I don't care what people say. If someone ghost you, they don't want to talk to you or they aren't in the best mood to chat.

If a friend ghosts you, then don't talk to them. That simple. If it's an important matter and they are aware of it, then you see they didn't give a crap or they could've been unavailable.

[Haha456]

I have a lot of experience with bad friends. I would only ghost someone if they did something terrible and inconsiderate to me. I have no remorse because there are a lot of very inconsiderate people out there.

[Rania05]

I can accept being ghosted lightly, I can understand impluses to mess with your friends after all, but a whole set stage just to ghost? I'd be offended and question our friendship if they don't reflect within 2 days

[Guy13]

Can we get a GRIP of REALITY here. If one is Ghosted one is NOT a Friend. Stop lying to yourself and complaining about absurdity !!! That is definitely F-U and the horse you rode in on move...

[Luopio27]

Sad but true.

[Guy13]

@Luopio27 The poor little me protected babies mindset is what is sad to me. Make better choices and be responsible for your decisions. Everyone knows the truth...

[HippieVeganJewslim]

Only one thing I can think of is if a friend is being very toxic and better to ghost them than not.

[LovingJo]

Yes, but I wouldn't just do it out of spite, unless they had really betrayed me.
I would at least tell them that I was in fact ignoring them!!

[FilmGuy93]

It’s only okay if you have explicitly spelled out exactly what is wrong, asked the person to change their behavior, and they have repeatedly refused to do so.

[Sour-rose]

I would think not... buuuut if the mofo ain't getting the hint or accepting the truth... welp. No other choice now

[UniquelyBasic]

I really dont care that much. I can not talk to people for a long time then talk with them like nothing happened.

[aaron210419]

If they were truly your friend show them enough respect to let them know why your paths are leading away from each other. Ghosting can be physiologically damaging, and is cowardly.

[Tina19]

I was never ghosted but i have ghosted lot of people in past since the time when ghosting was even a common on social media