I just need to get something off my chest, I'm sorry in advance for ranting.
My fiance and I are getting married next month and giant Catholic families being what they are, between the two of us we have 52 first cousins, along with dozens of aunts, uncles, grandparents, siblings, etc. etc. We cut some by only inviting adults, nixing people we're not close to, all the usual methods, but we also decided not to give +1s to the truly single (with one exception - a friend of FI's who won't know anyone else at the wedding who we didn't want to feel uncomfortable.)
This hasn't been controversial except with my brother and two of my cousins, who have now for the entire length of my engagement (eighteen months) whined to me about this decision every single time they see me. The men in my family have a problem with being told "no" in general and my mother and my aunt have been on my ass about this, telling me I should make an exception, it's just three more people, etc. etc, deaf to any explanations that my family is not more important than FI's and I can't make exceptions for my cousins/brother if we're not doing the same for the other side.
A few weeks ago my aunt brought the issue up to me YET AGAIN (the day after her oldest son, the chief complainer, told me flat out he had no idea who he would bring if he had a plus one, he just wanted "the option" because my wedding won't be "fun" without it, and "none of [my] friends are pretty enough for him anyway") and asked if I might change my mind if we get a lot of no's. I told her we'd see once the RSVPs came in, which somehow turned into her telling my mom a few days later that I'd changed my mind and was now giving them +1s. Of course I told my mom this never happened, but just now got off the phone with her telling me my aunt was filling out her oldest son's RSVP card (he's 30 and his mom who doesn't live with him is answering his mail for him - noticing a pattern?) and asked my mom should she "just put four people" for her two sons and their +1s?
I'm at work so I'm trying to spare my coworkers overhearing yet another heated call with my mother about this, but it very quickly turned into "Well, I don't understand why you're so stuck on this issue" "why is this such a big deal?" "why does your aunt think you said it was okay?" "don't you know I barely invited any of my friends because we were trying to keep the numbers down" "why does your bridesmaid get to bring her roommate because her boyfriend didn't want to come but they can't have plus ones?" (the answer to that last one is because her roommate is also a good friend of ours who we would have cut otherwise for numbers, but my bm told me way ahead of time her boyfriend wouldn't make it, so we were happy to include our friend.)
I finally broke down and said she didn't understand and my aunt thinks I said it was okay because for eighteen months nobody has listened to a word I've said about it, and it doesn't matter what comes out of my mouth because everyone has only ever heard what they wanted to hear. The fact of the matter is even if I might have been inclined to find a way to make it work eventually, a year and a half of constant entitled whining, pressure from all sides, and bullshit comments like "I need a date but I don't know who I'd bring because your friends aren't pretty enough for me" have completely made up my mind not to be accommodating. I honestly couldn't care less if my cousins/brother have someone to take back to their hotel rooms afterward, which is what this boils down to, and at this point I couldn't care less if they even come. I'm so frustrated feeling like my only ally in this is FI, and not even my mom can stand with me on this.