Dear Prudence,
I was in a friend group for a while and there is this one friend, let’s call her Layna.
She has always had some problems—well, she was more causing them than dealing with them. So one day she got pissed at another girl in the friend group. Let’s say her name is Taylor. She decided to make a group chat with me and another friend, call her Maria. She names the group “Taylor is a hoe” and then proceeds to say more things like this. This is very out of line for her; we do say some “curse words,” like jerk or omg or sometimes bitch or shut up, but never calling someone in the group this. Me and Maria tell her to stop and tell her we want to leave and not be a part of this, but we can’t because there aren’t enough people. So she says she will add more. She proceeds to add Taylor and change the name, picture, and play it off. So the question is, should I tell Taylor? Months have passed and I’m a people pleaser. Sometimes I don’t want to ruin their friendship, but the toxicity of this makes me wonder if she does this to me and Maria too? Layna has done many fake friend things. What should I do?’
—Next Stop, Fake Friendville