Why do women still get "given away"

A white wedding dress is not a symbol of virginity, it just became fashionable after Queen Victoria wore a white dress when she married.

So you need never fret again about the purity of a woman wearing a traditional dress. Although that does seem like a weird thing for a feminist to be worrying about.

A white wedding dress is not a symbol of virginity, it just became fashionable after Queen Victoria wore a white dress when she married.

So you need never fret again about the purity of a woman wearing a traditional dress. Although that does seem like a weird thing for a feminist to be worrying about.

It is all down to personal choice and feelings-it is just as valid to not see it as sexist-I certainly don't.
I would agree that the huge day and all that expense is ridicuous, I have never known why you need over a year to plan for it, but each to their own and if they want to do that I can't see the problem.

Well it's all personal choice, obviously, but still, judgemental as I am (although I would not say so on someone's wedding day out of politeness-but I'd still think it), I think the whole white wedding thing to be ridiculous when the couple have cohabited beforehand. Absolutely nothing against cohabitation at all- lots of advantages and, yes, disadvantages, too. Swings and roundabouts and all that.
But I do think, 'for fuck's sake' when I have to watch a bride who has been presumably having sex and living together with her husband-to-be go through all that white wedding shit.

The whole country is seriously screwed up about marriage, anyway, and this giving away nonsense is just part of a bigger picture.
In the past, getting wed was seen as important for religious and/or legal reasons and not really the most important day of a woman's life- that was probably the birth of child/ren- it was a necessary rite of passage but not afforded the hoo-ha and fuss that it is today. Yet, society thinks having a child outside of wedlock and living together are OK. If they're OK- which they are to my way of thinking (although such couples seriously need to think about the legalities of their situation)- why the heck is there so much fuss about weddings these days?

Well said blackcurrants - I agree entirely.

I find the suggestion that people who see sexism and call it sexism "insecurity" pretty fecking ridiculous.

The idea of being given away is sexist. The practice is sexist. Some people, for their own reasons, do it. As it happens, I'm one of them. There were a few things about my wedding that I didn't want that badly, but also couldn't face the hurt feelings and general drama if I refused them, so having accepted that I was embracing a big patriarchal experience that day (white dress and all!) I held my nose and got on with it. It made my Dad, who is a loving, if patriarchal old fella, very happy. And that was nice, since I'd agreed to let him pay for the party, I had ceded a bit of control - so there you go. I didn't really mind. But I'm not for a moment going to pretend that it's not a tradition routed in real sexism - it is!

It's not insecure of me to see what's actually there.

"I just remebered the really funny symbolism of our wedding - DH really didn't want to do the "light a candle" thing where you each light a candle at the start and then at the end you light one candle together using your candles of individuality. But our priest (old family friend) showed all excited about it, and my aunt had bought us candles (for this very purpose) as a gift."

I didn't do any of that, but I got married in a C of E church.

Oh no, my Dad went the full way down the aisle. He just didn't say anything about handing me over or do any weird hand over thing.

TBH this thread is the first I've heard of that. Dad would have been very non-plussed had he been asked if he was giving me away. He and my Mom are constantly amazed by how many sexist traditions they thought their hippy generation had done away with have come back.

He was happy to walk into the church with me, but only on the understanding that we were walking together and he was emphatically not giving me away.

Still, you can slice it any way you want, but we went along with most of the tradition.

I just remebered the really funny symbolism of our wedding - DH really didn't want to do the "light a candle" thing where you each light a candle at the start and then at the end you light one candle together using your candles of individuality. But our priest (old family friend) showed all excited about it, and my aunt had bought us candles (for this very purpose) as a gift.

I insisted we did it, despite the naff symbolism, because their feelings mattered more to me.

But the priest got it all confused - instead of having us light one big candle from our two smaller ones, he had us blow out the small ones and then light a big one with a taper.

So at our wedding we extinguished our former selves! :o

There's a fab photo (in our album) of us doing just that. Still makes me laugh when I think of it.

oh so we agree then!!

I did the whole giving away thing, I thought my Dad would like it; but as I was 35 when I got married and had lived alone for 15 years holding down several jobs and owning several houses; I didn't for a second think that people would see it as my dad really 'passing control'

and I agree that your dad only going half way down the aisle is the same thing as the full giving away

I wasn't "given away". My dad died when I was a child so couldn't have done it anyway, but I do remember there being the assumption that I would ask my Grandpa/brother/uncle instead. I didn't, I walked in flanked by my two best female friends, one of whom read a poem during the ceremony and the other gave a speech and proposed the toasts at the reception.

My in-laws were horrified. My mother was very proud

Nope, I'm not a moral relativist.

And nice, another suggestion that feminists are insecure. FFS.

Sorry, Shecutofftheirtails-probably rural Ireland and catholic church give you a different outlook and I might feel the same in that case.

How wonderful to have some sanity Bunbaker. I had no idea there were so many women around who don't feel equal and have such insecurity about it.

Actually, slovenly I initially came onto this thread to talk about that kind of thing, but got irritated by the "stop thinking, women" posts.

The OP, and many other women on this thread, had their Das walk them down the aisle, but consider that to be different from "giving away" because it seems that in England (including the registry office, which particularly appals me) traditions persist that have long died out in rural Irelan where I got married (because they were too sexist!!)

So my original post was going to be that I felt conflicted about the "down the aisle" thing because of its roots in the tradition of women being given away. In many ways I agree with exotic, but unlike her I respect other women who made other choices, and who thought walking down the aisle was too much like being given away.

Weddings are fraught with decisions like that one. The are laden with symbolism (and to a large extent submitting yourself to any of it is buying into nasty patriarchal institution). I am interested in why other people (like me) felt the misogyny and did it anyway, and impressed by the ways people have adapted traditions or changed them entirely to detoxify them.

But I am insulted by the claim that anyone who considers these things is "over thinking", or (even more stupid) hates their father.

As for "something nice for Dads" - maybe I'm lucky, but my Dad wouldn't think it remotely nice to take part in a tradition that symbolised my status as goods to be passed along to another man

He must be a barrel of laughs

I'm not disparaging your beliefs, you are perfectly entitled to them-as long as you fully realised they are right for you as opposed to right-then I have no argument. I do when I am called obtuse just because I don't see the world according to Shecutofftheirtails

If my father was prosing on about property etc I doubt I would want him walking me down the aisle. It is supposed to be a lovely, happy, family day-with a relaxed father-I doubt whether it would even have crossed my father's mind that I could be his property and he would have laughed if anyone had ever made such a silly suggestion.

Does it really matter? Perhaps I did "do it blindly", but as I said before it wasn't as issue with me. I enjoyed my wedding day because it wasn't marred with me worrying that the day was spoilt by what you perceive as man' misogyny. I don't need someone like you to tell me that it is wrong. It might be wrong for you, but I felt pretty comfortable with it.

Or perhaps I feel secure and comfortable with who I am and am happy with the way I lead my life on an equal footing with my husband.

as I said in my previous post, your dad walking you down the aisle is the same thing in my opinion, just minus the words.

why didn't you walk down alone?

It definitely counts as "doing it blindly" if you deny that those traditions have a symbolism that is as much a part of the tradition as the act itself.

If you want one man to give you to another man because it is "tradition", then the tradition you like is that women for a lot of history have been property.

As for "something nice for Dads" - maybe I'm lucky, but my Dad wouldn't think it remotely nice to take part in a tradition that symbolised my status as goods to be passed along to another man.

I went along with many wedding traditions (including being walked down the aisle by my Dad), but I still resent being told that it would have been "nit picking" had I decided that those traditions were still laden with too much misogyny.

The reason for the traditions is their meaning. The meaning of being "given away" is pretty clear - it's there in the words. Jesus, even the Catholic Church (big into tradition) doesn't do it any more because of its unpleasant connotations.

If you want to be given away as chattel because you get off on the submissiveness of the while thin, then fine. But insisting that traditions have no meaning (as though they sprang out of the earth fully formed) and yet wanting to do them anyway is pretty obtuse. If they have no meaning, why are they important? How can you simultaneously be into tradition but want to ignore history?

And how can you whine about other women criticising your choices while you disparage their beliefs?

she cut off her tails, do you not realise that your argument fails with the 'I had my dad walk me down the aisle'

so he gave you away: just didn't say the words. it is the same thing.

It aways makes me laugh that if you like tradition and follow it you always do it blindly because you haven't thought about it and you haven't been 'educated'. People never seem to make the inference that yes you have thought about it very deeply and that is your decision-there is this weird idea that there is a 'right' idea and that it should be imposed on everyone.
I wore white, my father would have 'given me away' ( had he been alive), I have changed surname and I am Mrs. I resent the idea that I got caught up in the day and didn?t think about the important stuff or that I followed blindly. I realise that dresses, venues etc don?t matter, I am fully aware of the important stuff and having had another 20yrs or so to think about it, I would do exactly the same again.
I do not need to be educated, I have no chip on my shoulder, have never been anyone?s property, am perfectly secure and happy with who I am, have nothing to prove and think it is sad to spoil occasions with nit picking because someone else has made different decisions and wants to impose them on us poor women who ?follow blindly?.

"A lot of women just blindly follow tradition without actually thinking about what it means. Being given away, promising to 'obey', wearing virginal white, not giving a speech, being 'man and wife', changing their name, sometimes not just their surname but becoming 'Mrs John Smith' for example.

I can only guess they get all caught up in choosing the dress, the venue, the flowers etc., and don't consider the important stuff at all."

Maybe people have their own reasons behind it. Just because they've chosen differently to what you would or have doesn't mean they haven't considered the "important stuff"

So, if you have something you want to say, you will say it.

But I'm not allowed to.

You get to call me unpleasant because I think a refusal to accept that symbolism matters to some people is obtuse (which it is :o).

So are you the only one who gets to be unpleasant about other women?

And your problem is a lack of consistency in the arguments of different people?

Agree entirely that coming into the feminist section and telling people having a discussion about an issue of interest that they are "over thinking" is pointless and annoying.

HRH it's late, no worries.