Debriefing: a wedding

[vezzie]

I went to a wedding at the weekend and ended up thoroughly depressed, as I often do after weddings. Please indulge me, because I want to talk about it.
The bride is one of the most dynamic, active, imaginative and intelligent people I know. She was patronised and belittled throughout ? ?who gives this woman ???? and during the speeches she looked very uncomfortable. I have never seen her so quiet and when it was clear that she didn?t like what was being said it seemed very strange that there was no opportunity for her to own the floor in her own style. I have never heard so little of her voice, ever, and yet she was notionally the centre of attention.
I suppose what is troubling me ? and there is no natural justice in what I am about to say - is that she is so close to the top of so many pecking orders (beautiful, clever, talented, well loved, well educated, professionally respected) that it seems obvious that her husband should be so near to the top of all the male pecking orders (tall, handsome, very rich, in a very well paying job) and yet unfair that this sort of man seems almost inevitably to bring the expectations that his wife will take a very traditional and subservient role. Without wanting to imply that anyone deserves to be pushed about, because they don?t, I suppose I am upset that this woman, who is brilliant, is now going to play second fiddle to a tosser for the rest of her life.

I hate weddings. I always start off all excited and filled with love and joy and enjoy the sentimental moment where you can look at the couple and do a mental 6-Feet-Under-like montage where you imagine them surrounded by children, growing older, surrounded by grand children, retiring together etc. Then at some point I am forced to realise that the whole thing is filling me with profound unease and it is as well if I am not too drunk or I have to find a cupboard to hide in and cry.

DP said, when I was telling him how sad I was feeling on Sunday, ?Why do you take it so personally?? I just shrugged and changed the subject. Later I thought, ?Because it is like this. Suppose you were invited to a housewarming party and you bought a present and wrote a card expressing all the good wishes that you have for the people in their new house, and you dressed up and turned up ready to celebrate and saw everyone else looking beautiful and happy and joyful, and the hosts offered to show you round and then you realised during the tour that the whole thing runs on a basement floor inhabited by slaves, it would slightly put a dampener on the occasion, especially if you were the same kind of person as the slaves.? This is of course a gross exaggeration.

We are not married. I often think we should be, and then I go to a wedding and I?m back to square 1.
What do feminists do about getting married?

Our wedding was the best day of our lives. And we both feel that way. We were surrounded by hundreds of people who loved us and were wishing us happiness.

Other days have been nearly as brilliant, and I'm sure others in the future will be too. I'm not expecting a lifetime of disappointment now because my wedding is over.

But that feeling of so many people who I love so dearly, going to so much effort to come together to wish us happiness - nothing yet has ever beaten it.

I agree that the traditional wedding is dull, archaic and slightly farcical (virginal white dresses on 35 yr old go-ers; wedding lists asking for crockery from couples who have been living togetehr for 10 years etc etc etc)

But weddings don't have to be like that.

We decided to get married (mutually - no big proposal, engagement or ring).

We got married in a registry office with our mums as witnesses.

Me and my mum made speeches at the dinner afterwards (nobody else).

Then we got pissed.

Why did you friend - this successful, beautiful, intelligent woman - want the whole meringue dress fairytale? I'd be interested to know.

Oh, and it was a great day, but it wasn't the best day of my life.

it was a pretty bloody good day - probably the best day of my life so far - because of the presence of so many friends and family and the genuine love from everybody.
sort of like christmas with family but about 10x more due to both families and all friends being there and all there in good spirits for a celebration

Well said, Annie. I had a fabulous day: got to dress up and had with a big party for all the people in my life that I loved and loved me. What's not to like?

Are you the same bunch who wonder why people today don't like to call themselves 'feminist'? If the rest of the world thinks that I am lumped in with this miserable lot then I am seriously considering handing back my membership. How can you twist such a joyous occasion into this misery-fest?

I am glad for you Annie ( i think) but I an awful lot of women who put so much in to this one day, that it inevitably dissapoints them, in a thousand tiny ways and they end up feeling let down and dispondent afterwards. Yes I had a great time at my wedding but the best day of my life, not even close

I find the whole 'wedding fever' thing really scary. Spending a year or more planning your wedding? FFS, get a life.

Harsh, but I really do feel this way.

when we got married, it was less about us than it was about our parents!
we had services that were chinese and church of England.
When we went for our marriage courses with the vicar she asked why we were getting married. I said because we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together, her answer was - you can do that without getting married
So I said, because we wanted to have children and she rather sarcastically said we could also do this without being married.
DH then pipped up - because we want to make a public declaration of our love. For our vicar that was the right answer.

I got my knickers in a twist about him being a groom and me being a bride (sounded to me like horse and rider.) I did not say obey, I did make a small speech. But for us getting married wasn't about the day, it was about living together as man and wife for the rest of our lives. Bound together in a relationship that will experience the highs and lows that we will encounter together.

sounds schmaltzy but tis true.

as far as i'm aware almost every society has some sort of celebration when people form into couples for the purpose of creating and raising children.

i think that feminism should not confuse this desire to celebrate lifelong 'formal' partnership in public with the patriarchal elements that many (most?) cultures have introduced.

misery-fest? A bit harsh methinks. I love weddings but often can't help thinking as I sit down in the country house hotel (yawn) and gaze at the 30+ year old bride on her dad's arm what on earth has possesed this normally sane woman, to go through all this at the cost of thousands of pounds, how can it be worth it ?. This isn't helped by the fact it tends to be dh's mates (male) who go in for these shenanigins

Many people don't enjoy their wedding day, and I think that it's probably because they're trying to please people other than themselves... their parents - letting them invite people they don't want there. Society - putting on the big show that's expected of them. Or just letting the minute details get on top of them and stressing if things aren't perfect. The people who don't enjoy their wedding are the ones who are too focussed on the actual physical wedding, instead of what it's about and why everyone is there.

I don't think that has much to do with feminism though. Or maybe it does, since the women will generally be more invested in how the day itself goes, while the man is just there to marry the women he loves and get pissed (which imo is the right attitude!)

So patriarchal traditions aside (which I don't think anyone takes seriously any more) - why are some women so caught up in the appearance of the day that they miss out on the real meaning of it?

It depends if you confuse the cost of the wedding with it's meaning. For some, the wedding day becomes more important than the marriage, but for many more it's a joyous, happy occasion where family and friends come together to celebrate the start of the marriage.

Purit's post was spot on. Enjoy the day for what it is - be happy for your friend/s, and if the day isn't what you would want, well then do it differently when/if you decide to get married. Just remember howeverr that there will be women there who will be pulling cats bum mouths and analysing everything you do and everything you say - just as on here (albeit whilst hiding behind the veil (geddit) of feminism v. the evils of a patriarchial society which forces or brainwashes intelligent women to give up their identities at the alter)

Because they are shallow?

Agree Fluffles.

Obviously not dh's male mates in white frocks on their dads' arms. I meant their ladywives. Although it would break the patriachal model too.

Yes Maisie I have a saying the bigger the wedding the shorter the marriage. Two adults who are mutally deciding to spend their life together IMO do n't tend to make an enormous fuss. Most people will live together first so its not like the famillies don't know each other already. FWIW I think white dresses and being given away is lovely if you arse
a)less than 25

b)a bone fida virgin
and c)Living with your parents

Mine was cream, I was 26 (a mere child), I was living with DH and I was given away (although not really, as I had already scuttled off to stand next to dh as poor old dad was left still saying I do)

Do I count as lovely?

I know what you mean about feeling depressed. I have sat through a lot of awful sexist shite. The worst was a man who had two daughters who got married within a year of each other - he gave the exact same (patronizing) speech for both of them, and even kept saying the wrong name the second time round - he'd not even updated his notes. Awful, because of course many guests had been to both. It just came across very strongly that his daughter as an individual was the last thing he or the other (all male) speakers were thinking about.

I did my best to make my wedding as feminist as possible and it worked well because lots of the most important people in DH's life are women - we a best woman, and his mum gave a speech. I have to say though, what everyone still remembers and tells me about is the way the priest went completely off-piste with a load of random stuff about how many babies I should be giving DH - they all thought I was trying a new form of pregnancy announcement!

However hard you try to make it feminist, some people will always want to step in and take you down for doing that. To me, that doesn't mean weddings are inherently anti-feminist or need to be depressing. It just shows that for all the 'shouty feminist' stereotypes, it's actually the anti-feminists who can't bear to see someone else living life their way. This thought was very much in my mind reading one of the latest 'why use ms' debates on AIBU - loads of 'why do you feminists CARE so much, no one else cares' from people who couldn't seem to leave the topic alone without having the last word.

Hmmm borderline I'd say. Did you make your grown up bridesmaids wear orange/pink/substitute other unflattering shade if not i might let you off

i had been with my now DH for five years before we got engaged and it was only at that point we realised that our parents had never met.

our extended families had never met each other and even some of our friends had never met (i lived in another city a long time and DH and i see my friends from those years at centre parcs or on skiing holdiays).

what's so wrong with having a big party?? (not talking here about the 'traditions').

Nope, it was a very nice light purplely/blue colour, very simple dress that they made themselves. We had a small budget, small family wedding, then a big ceilidh in the evening. Smashing it were.

I am a staunch feminist but loved our wedding - everyone we loved together in the same place supporting our relationship.

I spoke at our wedding but my MIL heckled me throughout it (eg: when I was thanking my bestfriend/bridesmaid annouced to the room that the friend had slept with the groomsman) and then SIL gave a speech about how she had taught DH EVERYTHING he knows about how to treat a woman and I should thank her... [hmmm]

So I felt like the women there undermined me rather than the men. It was most weird.

Other than that - a great day.

vezzie What is marriage about?
OBJECTIVELY:
Two adults signing a piece of paper that ties them legally together.
This is why any wills made prior to marriage become null and void upon marriage.
This is why- unless declared otherwise- your spouse becomes default next-of-kin upon marriage.
Marriage means that your spouse, in the unfortunate event of your death, will inherit all your worldly goods unless you say otherwise via a will.

In brief, it is a legal document that provides proof positive that two people have made a legally-binding committment towards another.

SUBJECTIVELY:
Love -yes, it is (usually!!) a deciding factor in getting wed for most people, but my point is this: Love is not exclusive to marriage.

Religion: Don't have to be religious to get married.

Children: Well you don't have to be married to have kids!

Lifelong partnership: Again, not exclusive to the married.

The acid test for me is this:
What happens when a marriage breaks down and the couple wish to permanently part?
They have to go through legal process of divorce. That's right: legal process.

So, yeah, I agree that most weddings are over-the-top but what of it?
Get married for 100k or £100, you're still left in same position at end of day:
Legally bound to another adult.
All the rest i.e. fancy dress, champagne etc is just fluff (nice fluff for those that want it- nothing wrong with a big celebration but fluff all the same)

I mean this in a nice way: but don't let it get to you so much.