Engagement rings

[PerverseConverse]

I've just read this and found it interesting. I'd never thought of engagement rings from a feminist point of view.

I'm divorced but still wear mine because it's something I wanted from the moment I went into Tiffany's in New York with my mum and said I'd buy myself one one day. It has no sentimental attachment to it from my exH but it means a lot to me. I've tried wearing it on my right hand but it doesn't fit as well and gives me an itchy rash. I think soap gets stuck under it. Maybe I should have it resized.

I've no intention of ever getting married again and don't care that people will think I'm "taken" as I wear it because I love it and I paid for it.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-45797780

"Of course they are - the woman wears one, the man doesn’t. The woman wears one as a visible symbol to show she is taken off the market, the man doesn’t. OK perhaps that’s not exactly why most women wear one these days but that is the origin of an engagement ring and therefore can’t be ignored."

I thought it is supposed to be a sign of commitment by the man, hence the 3 months' salary.

"Why do women want them?
Because they're purdy"

There are some amazing instagram accounts for engagement rings. Mesmerizing.

Historically, marriage and weddings were part of the patriarchy. These days it is a choice. You can choose a traditional wedding with the bride given away etc, or you can have a marriage of 2 people where there is no inequality.

Engaged men never wear them
My DH did.

You can't wear one and have a non-sexist wedding.
WTF does that mean?
My wedding was not sexist!

MrGHardy or is the man purchasing something so that it becomes his property?

Disclaimer: I am referencing the olden days way before any of us wonderful people were probably even born!!

Women wear more jewellery than men generally.
Is that sexist?
Maybe women get a ring and men don't because jewellery is generally worn more commonly by women.

Is everything women do but men don't sexist?

I wear a lovely diamond ring my DH bought me for our 25th anniversary.
I didn't buy him one.
Is this sexist?

pigisinarow i don't know. it's just as plausible, but that also sounds a bit like the opposite of a dowry, I didn't know we had that. Or maybe this was the sly way of putting it. I just heard that about commitment and it made sense to me.

I think engagement rings and weddings are linked to male control - I personally don't believe in either of these practices but don't care if others do.

I think it's interesting that engagement rings were once seen as a form of insurance for women- I think I remember reading about that once, and will look it up again.

Like another couple of posters, I have an engagement ring but my partner also started wearing a plain band at the same time. I understand some people's distaste at the thought of outwardly displaying your relationship status, especially if it's only the woman that does it (that's why I'll always be a Ms!), but I think it's also important to recognise that wearing rings often has a personal emotional significance to the couple between themselves, rather than primarily functioning as a signal to the wider world.

I've found the article about engagement rings as insurance against being jilted. Interesting!

I must admit I did find it useful and liked having a visible sign that I was unavailable to applicants, as it were. At that age I still used to go out dancing a lot and I found I got hit on much less. I was also able to point to the ring as evidence of not being interested. I've read some accounts of women buying themselves a cheap ring to put on the ring finger purely to get bothered less by men. Which says something very bad about the society we live in that any woman might deem this necessary, but I'd defend any woman's right to wear whatever she likes in order to make herself feel safer and more comfortable.

DH did also specifically say he wanted a ring when we got engaged as a visible sign that he was off the market. I don't think he was getting much unwanted male attention, but it's interesting that he wanted that display.

I'm always interested in how these discussion go. We have people forcefully stating "It's irrelevant! It doesn't even matter! You're overthinking!", but it seems to me that they're the ones getting het up more than the people who just want to discuss what the origins and meaning of the thing under discussion are

Anyhoo, I wear two engagement rings. The one from my first husband (which i bloody well paid for - don't start) on my right hand, and the one from my second husband on my left hand with my wedding band. I wonder what that says about my feminism? I don't get defensive about any of it - I thought carefully about which aspects of my feminism were important for me to protect when I got married, and which were less so. So I wear traditional rings (not diamonds - fuck off de Beers with your price fixing), but I kept my own name and my father didn't walk me down the aisle, for example.

I think the discussions of why we do these things and what they mean for our feminism are important and interesting. I'm not much interested in benchmarking other people's decisions against the feminist handbook though - others will come to different decisions and that's fine by me. The important part is the acknowledgement that the choices aren't made in a vacuum.

This is from someone who sat at the LAWS meeting on Friday while Sheila Jeffreys waxed lyrical about the imprisonment of women in makeup and heels, while wearing a full face of makeup and heels

I find it weird something like an engagement ring can be seen as sexist. I always associate sexism/feminism with negative things towards women.

I don't think many women are forced to wear engagement rings or unhappy about it...

I think in their current form they’re a feminist issue along with the whole wedding industry - get a man to spend a fortune on you or you’re unsuccessful as a woman. Then occupy yourself with planning a wedding for the next two years - taking up all your time and money - spend a fortune on a pretty dress that you’ll wear for one day - and all your friends and family will really think you’ve made it. You should be dreaming about this since you’re a little girl or again you’re not a real woman (you may be a crazy feminist!).

Same with all the patriarchal crap around asking your dads permission, the symbol of ownership, your dad walking you down the aisle, taking the surname... it’s seen as the done thing and you’d be facing at least some disappointment/ questioning/ stigma from some people if you didn’t do any of these - at least in my social circle (late twenties, uni graduate, civil servant, Midlands - am at that age where lots of my friends/ family are getting married at the minute)

As others have pointed out these are concerns that solely occupy women so I do feel they are a feminist issue. I think marketing/ films etc have a lot to blame for the way these burdens/ expectations have been reframed as ‘romantic’

I think the fact you’d feel like you were making a ‘statement’ by opting out of any of these ‘choices’ - engagement ring, white wedding dress, asking dad’s permission, surname - shows that they’re not as free a choice as we’d like to think

Warsaw0912 exactly re the "made it" rubbish. My divorce has just been granted after nearly 6 years. I'm not planning on getting married again and in fact will probably stay single now as I prefer it that way. I've had a couple of relationships since I split with my exH but I'm happier on my own. I have 3 children and enjoy it just being us. My mum is not happy about this at all and doesn't understand why I don't want to be with someone. I was brought up with the attitude of success meant marrying a well-off man. She always wanted me to marry a doctor (I'm a nurse) and always comments if anyone is in a relationship with someone with a "good" job or well off parents. I feel I've failed really. She's not impressed as it is that none of her children have stayed married to the first person they married. And to make it worse I'm now a crazy feminist!

I quite like the fact that my wedding band was actually my grandmother's and apparently bought as her first one either was lost or she didn't like it.

I have an engagement ring but it was bought pre my finding mumsnet and pre my understanding of feminism.

I have to say I do love it though and dh sort of sees it as belonging to both of us and as a promise. I fully understand they're feminist issues though. Dh has a wedding band.

When me and my husband decided it was the right time to get engaged, we decided on my ring and then we picked out a lovely watch for him to wear every day. He wanted to do the proposal so it was still a romantic surprise, but he also got something that he loved of a similar value.

I don't believe in complete surprise proposals, there needs to be a serious amount of conversation about it

Off Topic but: I used to occasionally wear a Ring that looked like a Wedding Ring in my twenties, because it spared me some unwanted attention. So I can‘t say these types of rings are all bad...

My dad is definitely one of those 'you need my permission before you get engaged' people & I am just not interested in doing that. He'll get it sprung on him like everyone else

I love that the advert on this thread is for DeBeers - on the feminist board where the women are the least likely to buy into their months/3 months salary spend bollocks! Clearly their tech only picked up on their name being mentioned in 5his thread and not the 'fuck off, price fixers' bit

Iwanna, I've got adblock, so I've not seen that, but how fab

Love that de Beers will be getting charged for me to tell them to fuck off.

Fuck off again, de Beers!

De Beers really can fuck off! You'd think they'd had enough of pilfering the world's resources and then marking them up crazy amounts but they will never stop wanting more

If I had the money, I'd buy myself a divorce ring. There's one I've had my eye on for a few years in Tiffany's. Think I'll start saving....

No time to read the whole thread right now but yes, they are definitely a feminist issue (as is marriage).

I’ve been married 3 times and never had an engagement ring - I wear a wedding ring but so does my husband and neither of us would be put out if the other didn’t want to wear one.

Going into marriage number three we were definitely aware that it was a legal contract - we looked into doing all the same stuff with a solicitor but
a) you can’t assign ‘next of kin’ for medical consent in any other way and we’re both getting on a bit
b) it wouldn’t have been any cheaper than a cheap wedding - we decided we’d rather spend the cash on prosecco for our mates than on solicitors fees.

We had no ‘aisle’ no ‘giving away’ and no mention of ‘husband’ or ‘wife’ - the registrar pronounced us ‘legally married’ instead.

We might’ve had a civil partnership instead, if that was an option for opposite couples at the time - I think there are some slight legal differences though, so we would’ve had to explore that properly before deciding.

get a man to spend a fortune on you or you’re unsuccessful as a woman. Then occupy yourself with planning a wedding for the next two years - taking up all your time and money - spend a fortune on a pretty dress that you’ll wear for one day - and all your friends and family will really think you’ve made it.
But weddings don't have to be anything like that! There is so much more choice freely available to people these days. I have been to many non-traditional weddings that bear no resemblance to that. Mine couldn't have been further from it. I've spent more on and taken more time to choose my outfit for a night out than I did for my entire wedding day. It was planned a few weeks in advance and paid for jointly. The marriage was important to us, the wedding wasn't.

Engagement rings do gross me out a bit. Especially the whole “man should spend X months salary” tradition. Definitely implying a “breadwinner-homemaker” / bride price type arrangement. Unless that tradition changes to “whoever makes more buys the ring” or both buy for the other it’s definitely sexist.

But I don’t see an issue with wedding bands. Men and women both wear them don’t they?

I was only engaged for like 4 months (we’d already been together for 4 years prior and lived together for 3 so no reason for long engagement). We ordered bands right away and both wore them since. It’s a sign we are in a committed long term partnership, nothing more.