Here’s To The Bride
By Sally Bishai (03/17/06)
Weddings these days are ridiculously expensive. And just plain ridiculous. Call me a kill-joy, but I have a real issue with the almost-requisite wastefulness, materialism, and sexism that’s rampant in the modern-day wedding ceremony.
In proper Sally fashion, let’s begin with materialism, backpedal into wastefulness, and then bunny-hop into the sexism of it all.
According to a 2002 study done by The International Institute of Weddings, a wedding’s average cost (in the States) was $21,300.
A site called Random Musings (http://macg.metcorp.com/?cat=35) gives the following financial estimates on the frippery that goes into a modern wedding “with all the trimmings”:
Reception Site $8,000
Engagement Ring $3,000
Honeymoon $3,000
Wedding Rings $1,100
Photography & Video $1,500
Rehearsal Dinner $800
(Where did the food at the reception go?)
Bridal Gown $800
Bridal Accessories $200
(Hello, snacks??)
Bridesmaids $900
Flowers $850
Music $750 - 2,500
(What about the cake?!)
Limousines / Transportation $450
Stationery / Invitations $400
Formalwear $500
Clergy/Chapel $250
Ridiculous.
$850 for some geraniums? Who ever heard of such a thing!?
Millions, apparently. The wedding industry has been estimated as doing over 50 BILLION dollars a year.
Ridiculous!
This is horrifically wasteful. Just think... You could support an entire family in some “third-world” country for like 5 years for the (exorbitant) price of the limousine.
Why not get a cab and fork over the money saved to the Red Cross or the Christian Children’s Fund? Or Coptic Orphans, for that matter?
(Or the Tsunami? Or Katrina? No shortage of good causes, I can assure you..)
I know what you’re thinking: “But SALLY, this is supposed to be our special day! A day we’ll remember all our lives! It’s OK to go a little wild and spend lots just this once!”
My responses to this—and you’ll notice the mind of the girl (me) who got a perfect score on the logic section of the GRE (but managed to fail her statistics exam last week, but I can’t think about that now)—include the following:
1- Where does it say that $400 invitations and a thousand-dollar-cake automatically constituted a “special day” ?
2- Why does one need to conform to one long-dead wedding planner’s idea of “a beautiful wedding” for it to have been a memorable success?
3- If you’re rich enough to pay for a $20,000 wedding without having to use credit cards or “scrimp” for the next 2 years, then far be it from Moi to stand in your way.
4- It’s NOT just one day! The aforementioned Random Musings site tells me that brides take seven to TWELVE MONTHS to plan their weddings! What a waste of time!
5- Finally—and I hate to have to mention this but it’s the truth—about half the time, it’s NOT just this once! (You already said that, Sally..) No, I mean that almost half of marriages (in America, anyway) end up in divorce. Imagine having to go through this ruckus more than once!
Now that I’ve gone on about the financial end for as long as I care to, I can start in on the philosophical end of things. (Did you think I’d run out of steam and just save this part for another day? Dream on, love. I’m just getting started.)
Here are some of my biggest objections to the “white-dress-and-50-foot-cake” wedding. (I haven’t counted up how many cultures in the world subscribe to this, but it has to be more than just Canada, the US, and the UK.)
In case you’re wondering, I got in this snit after having watched one of my favorite movies, “How To Marry a Millionaire,” two times in a row as I was reading a book the other day. (No, not my statistics book.)
Lauren Bacall looked lovely as she walked down the aisle towards her husband-to-be.
I felt bad that her father wasn’t walking her up the aisle, but then I wondered why she needed anyone to walk her anywhere? Although, since it’s really her and her family marrying him and his family, wouldn’t it make more sense that both of her parents (and all of her siblings, for that matter) would walk her up the aisle?
Then I started thinking, why does she have to go to HIM? Why couldn’t he have walked over to her?
I can just see it now—the rich millionaire striding up the aisle with his entire nuclear family, to Lauren and her family, who awaited at the altar.
But then I wondered why anyone had to march down any aisle in the first place? I mean, I fully realize that to get from the back of the church to the front of the church, one has to actually walk, BUT, why can’t the spouses-to-be just march in together? (Ok, they can leave their respective families in the audience for that.)
The last major issue I have with weddings is the fact that the woman has to wear white. Or eggshell. Or even “antique ivory.”
Do they do it out of tradition? I know that many—if not most, sadly—of the women wearing white today don’t deserve to be doing so.
Meaning, they’re not, as the dress implies, virgin at that point. (You’ll be glad to know that I’m not going to bring morality into today’s lecture.)
While my faith (Christian) and my culture (Egyptian) both dictate that virginity is a desirable (and almost mandatory, really) thing for an unmarried woman to have, I must again raise the question of, “Why the woman?”
Meaning, why does the WOMAN’S virginity, signified by the white dress, have to be on display? Does the man’s black tuxedo mean he’s been a player since he was 9-years-old? (If white and black are opposites, I mean.) Does anyone even care whether the guy’s had a physical relationship before?
I mean, thank God it’s not a common practice (anymore) to come out of the bridal chamber waving a bloody sheet (don’t ask), but at the same time, I really think that a white dress—whether deserved or no—is just one more thing that needs to go. (On the other hand, I think that every woman should strive TO deserve the designation of “white” rather than the just-as-genteel, but less-than-morally-sound “off-white” or “elegant bone.”
So, what’s left, then? I’ve done away with the limo, the invitations, the dress, the rings.. oh, I didn’t bring up the rings yet, did I?
Very briefly put, I think it’s silly that the man has to “buy the woman off” with an engagement ring. Why doesn’t he get a ring? (And furthermore, why does it have to be a ring? What if I want a new camera?)
The only logical thing I can think of is that the woman gets the ring so that she can hock it if her husband turns out to be a shylock, but that’s less-than-helpful to the cause of women’s rights.
My friend Canadian Sam and I once discussed his impending wedding, and came up with an interesting plan: men should give women a piece of string to tie around their finger until the Big Day, after which the man would go to the store and get a real ring.
But then I wondered why the man had to do the giving, and why there had to be a trading-in, and then I got to the point where I wondered why there had to be a ring in the first place. Sam agreed. “I’m enough,” he said, and that was that.
Is there anything I DO approve of in a wedding?
Well, yes. It could be said that the only convention I agree with is that it should be in church, before God. (Obviously, if you’re not a Christian, this doesn’t apply to you, but at least a person’s faith should be brought into it, since most belief systems have some form of an almighty creator.)
I hope you don’t think me a rabid feminist, or else the worst form of cynic.
The truth is, though, that the state of the nation—and, in fact, the world—is such that so expensive a day is almost a sin to contribute to.
Furthermore, while I have a problem with the frippery of today’s weddings, I think my biggest problem is that these things are done out of a desire to follow “convention,” rather than following one’s own desire.
So don’t be surprised if you read that I suddenly got married in a $100 ceremony in a local church, carrying an $8 bouquet of orchids, wearing a formal dress of deep purple, and sitting in the back seat of a taxi on the way to Taco Bell, with a befuddled groom and a new, $5,000 Nikon.
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