A lacy white dress. Walking down the isle with perfectly perfect bouquet in hands. A soon-to-be husband, watching your approach. Family crying crystalline tears of happiness.
The big day.
YOUR big day. The day you are a bride.
Reaching the point where you settle down, where you take the next step... It's every woman's dream, right?
Have you ever considered why?
No, really, I'm asking you. Why do you want to get married? Why do you want to have a wedding?
So many people I've asked cannot easily answer this simple question. I mean, I think if you're spending tens of THOUSANDS of dollars on something, you should be able to answer why. Especially if you aren't in that elusive stratum of society that can just blindly piss away money (and let's face it, most of us are NOT in that layer)
But more often than not, my question is rewarded with strange stares, as though I've asked something odd, and my favourite - and most common - answer:
"Because that's what you do. It's tradition."
I love that answer. Tradition. Really, that means you just don't know, do you? You just know you have to get married, because... well... that's what everyone does. People get engaged, and then they get married, and then they have children.
It's a formula that often works, I can't deny it.
But I have this pesky need to question things. It's really a curse. Especially when someone says it's traditional. So let's look at some elements of a marriage/wedding that we all tend to blindly accept without thinking about it.
Diamond engagement rings: made popular by a 1920's DeBeers advertising campaign. A brilliant advertising campaign that has changed the entire way we progress as monogamous couples in our culture.
Not going to go into this too much, as this "tradition" was called into question by a recent College Humour skit that is gaining attention.
White dresses: they mean purity right? Nope. Mary Queen of Scots has been held up as the first famous woman to wear a white wedding dress (back when white was the French colour for mourning) but no one really knows why she wore it - in a time when other colours for wedding dresses were more popular.
But it was truly our media-obsessed culture that fucked us in this regard. Through much of the twentieth century, wedding outfits were just fancier versions of current trends. But from the 1950's white wedding dresses that were only worn once grew in popularity. Why? Because we started watching movies! Movies with weddings in them! And we accepted that a "white wedding" was normal.
The garter: Have you ever wondered why brides wear a garter? Have I made you wonder? Well, I'll tell you. This is actually IS an old tradition, unlike the white dress and the diamond ring.
Women and men had to consummate the marriage after the vow, so members of the reception would witness the consummation and take the garter as proof they were there.
So romantic!
I'm not even going to go into the sexist events like a partner asking your father if you can get married, or your father giving you to another family (Why do women agree to this? It's 2014, I shouldn't have to point out that your father doesn't own you and thus cannot GIVE YOU AWAY like a old sweater).
That's a whole other post.
So instead of digressing into things that infuriate me, let's delve more into answers that confuse me.
I'm not even going to go into the sexist events like a partner asking your father if you can get married, or your father giving you to another family (Why do women agree to this? It's 2014, I shouldn't have to point out that your father doesn't own you and thus cannot GIVE YOU AWAY like a old sweater).
That's a whole other post.
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| You don't own me... |
So instead of digressing into things that infuriate me, let's delve more into answers that confuse me.
Some other answers I get to the question "Why do you want to get married?":
"Because you want to make a commitment, and I want them to make a commitment to me." - I understand commitment. Commitment is important. But what I question is: why do you need a marriage to make a commitment? What about the marriage is going to enforce commitment? The sacred vow isn't so sacred anymore.
What is it that marriage gives you that you can't do by yourself? A marriage doesn't automatically mean that your partner won't cheat on you, or that you won't get bored of each other's bits.
Also, in this day when most couples live with each other before marriage, I think... isn't living together a commitment by itself?
"Because it's romantic!" - Well I don't see it. Honestly, the most romantic I am is when I'm alone with my partner, not sweating in a big frothy dress in front of my uncles and cousins and rushing off my feet so I can get photos in the perfect light of me and my partner almost - but not - kissing. That's not romance. That's pantomime.
"Because it's a big party!" - Again, another thing that could be done without a wedding or a marriage. With much less expense.
"Because I want everyone to know I love my partner" - uh, why? Why isn't your love enough by itself? Why do you need Great Aunt Beattie and your third cousin to witness it? Is love not real until your entire circle of friends and family sit around at alternate plates of chicken and fish? I weep for love.
"Because I want my day of being a princess" - I've never actually heard this outside television and I hope I never do. Cause seriously, play Mario Kart and stop wasting everyone's air. (bit judgmental. It's just I get annoyed when women want to be princesses but never queens)
So some of you might be thinking I'm nitpicking. Some of you might be asking "Well, why DON'T you want to get married?"
And my answer is: I don't see the point. Marriage seems like a whole big bit of nothing. Such pressure on women to get married when in the end, it doesn't change you. You remain the same person, your partner remains the same. Signing a piece of paper doesn't change the way you feel either. It's a lot of expense, months of planning, wasted hours trying to pick what colour my friends should wear ...and for what? What is the gain? What do I get?
Love? No I already had that.
Commitment? No, I had that too.
Photos of me dolled up ... ah, I see now! You want the photos! The whole wedding, all the money and all the effort, and all the time all come down to that because that's the only thing you get from it all!
The photos are definitely something you walk away with. I can't deny it. Wedding photos will look amazing.
But they will be completely staged.
Your hair may be fancy, your makeup flawless and your eyebrow game beyond compare... but you will be wearing a variation of a white dress that everyone wears in a pose that the photographer has photographed with tens of other couples.
Why is that special?
My advice?
Buy a camera. Go to photography lessons with your partner. Take your own photos. They'll mean more in the end and cost you a lot less.
