'AITA for telling a coworker to stop brown-nosing by going to a funeral for someone he didn’t know?' UPDATED

"AITA for telling a coworker to stop brown-nosing by going to a funeral and mourning somebody he didn’t know."

Last week a long retired former coworker passed. He was very popular and well-known in our company. I have worked with him in a close team setup for several years and was really sad when I learned that he passed away.

Next week is his funeral. Me and some other coworkers who worked with him wanted to attend. Now the issue: We have one coworker who has severe FOMO and is kind of a brown-noser to the higher ups. He only knows the deceased from the stories we tell about him and he met him only once at a company function where they talked for about 5 minutes in a group setup.

He is now running around the company and tells everybody how tragic the death is and how affected he is. Also when I told my boss that I need PTO to attend the funeral I was told that it would not be possible as at least one team member has to be present in the company and said coworker already asked for PTO so he could attend the funeral.

When I asked him if we could switch he told me: no be aide he wants to join the funeral as it would be good tone to join and management will sure appreciate it. That’s where I lost it and I told him to stop brown nosing and making the death of a coworker he didn’t know about him. He since then complained to our boss that I was rude to him but most of our coworker are on my side. So AITA?

Not long after posting, OP shared a small update.

I just had a meeting with our local and regional managers. They understand my point of view but asked me to use some maybe more diplomatic tone to voice it. They will shut down the local office for a few hours on the day of the funeral so everybody who wants can attend.

The regional manager who also knew the deceased hinted that he also doesn’t like the grief tourism (I really liked this name) of this specific guy. He just isn’t allowed to voice it directly for HR reasons.

The comments quickly rolled in.

Effablefonent wrote:

NTA.

I loathe grief tourists. It's revolting behaviour. It's one thing to attend to support friends, but to attend to grease up the managers is vile behaviour. I would take to the manager again or go to HR if possible.

Wanderingstorm wrote:

The fact that your coworker is using a FUNERAL to make himself "look good to upper management" is disgusting and I hope your management realizes it.

Tammary wrote:

My FIL died and my coworker insisted on going to his funeral. I was told I couldn’t go unless I could find a replacement. Tried to talk to coworker ( who barely knew him, met him a few times and complained about him). Coworker literally said ‘I’m not missing out’. Like it was some party.

Eventually one of my FILs friends heard and volunteered to take my place so I could go (I was doing a reading and my husband was understandably devastated). At the wake coworker behaved atrociously, to the point my MIL and everyone else, complained.

Coworker got blindingly drunk and tried to hit on other men attending (in front of her husband). When confronted, the trainwreck said she was mad because she ‘wasn’t getting enough attention’. At someone’s funeral.

At that point I was so disgusted in her, and in my employers, that I started looking for a new job.

Funerals are for paying your respects. Not brown nosing or partying and networking. NTA.

Desperatebook3686 responded:

Did your FIL work at the same place as you? Why do your coworkers know him?

Tammary responded:

No, small community, but she wasn’t a local… she knew him as my partner's father and that he was a respected local.

It was nothing about him. Just that it was going to be a huge funeral and she didn’t want to ‘miss out’.

She was pissed after the service because she thought she’d get attention (she wouldn’t have, and my MIL and SIL made sure everyone knew what was going on… so she got royally ignored), then she spent the wake bitching about how I didn’t want her there (could have cared less…I just wanted to be there), then got incredibly drunk.

My MIL was furious and banned her from ever darkening her door or attending her funeral. She and her husband eventually divorced, and she left, but still pops up like the occasional bad smell.

Ornery-Willow-839 wrote:

Different take: maybe you have a manager problem. Unless there is some life or death situation, you can actually close business to moment the death of an employee, if boss actually cares.

And if you know you work in this kind of cut throat environment, with a boss who doesn't care, I guess you should have put in your request earlier. Your co worker is entitled to take his PTO for any reason he wants - including to suck up to the boss. I'm sorry this happened to you. NAH.

Organized_Khaos wrote:

Frankly, the business itself is kind of TA for not shutting down for two or three hours to allow everyone to pay their respects. You shouldn’t have to use PTO to go, another AH move from the business.

As to the question, NTA. I think it’s kind of bold to not allow people who actually knew the deceased to attend, in favor of those who did not. The manager should be smart enough to look at the roster and leave behind the person who was hired long after the deceased person retired. Instead what OP got was a “Well, he asked first” situation, and that’s some BS.

flatgreysky wrote:

ESH. Assuming you are right about the coworker, it sounds like he’s being manipulative. The boss is an AH because he should be allowing the place to close for a day to honor this person and let everyone attend.

I work as a nurse and when one of our nurse techs died unexpectedly, our boss sought help from the entire hospital to cover the unit so we could all go if we chose to. And I’m sorry for your loss, but your failure to plan and ask for PTO before the entire group of coworkers asked is not the coworker’s fault.