"This tradition always felt frankly gross to me, deeply rooted in patriarchy, and the notion that a woman must belong to a man."
Said Lauren Nolan, a recent bride, quoted in "Walking Down the Aisle Alone/Meghan Markle did it. Many other brides choose to do the same, often because of the sexist origins of the tradition."
In the case of Meghan Markle, she was estranged from her father. Is there a trend of women who love their living, ambulatory father choosing to walk down the aisle alone?
Instead, Ms. Nolan said, when she met her fiancé at the altar, she was making a joint decision to combine their lives, rather than participating in a handoff between men.
If it's a matter of the man and woman in exactly the same position, fully independent human beings joining their lives together, why is he standing at the altar while she takes a long, slow walk for the assembled crowd? Isn't that also a relic of the sexist tradition?
If you keep the bride's walk and the groom's positioning at the altar, why are you excluding your beloved dad from the old-time-y spectacle? What does it mean for the groom to stand at the altar and watch his bride slowly approach? Is that really devoid of sexism? But you want to deprive Dad of a profound moment that he may have dreamed of all your life? Why?
If the honest answer is that you don't have a sufficiently worthy dad, fine. Do your solo walk. But don't make other women feel they need to sideline their dear dad to prove their feminist mettle. Your solo-walk wedding isn't solidly founded on feminism. It's selective feminism — cafeteria feminism. Show us a sacrifice you're making for feminism, and maybe you'll have some moral standing. Even still, people putting on the theatrical show that is their wedding should figure out their own values. They don't have to put feminism first.
But if they're going to preen about putting feminism first, they'd better actually do it. Let the bride and groom walk separately down the side aisles and meet in the middle. Let the groom wear an outfit as gaudy and eye-riveting as the bride's. Let petals be scattered in his path. Give him a veil too. Let them lift each other's veils simultaneously. And so on.
१३९ टिप्पण्या:
All feminism is selective feminism. You would think after 60 plus years that would be self-evident by now.
Maybe she can join a different species that had a different course of evolution and a different history. Maybe a species that was created out of clay by a loving and fair minded god who created each sex in absolute equality only excepting those attributes which are visually obvious, a species with no evolutionary history prior to that moment of creation.
American feminism is mostly selectively complaining about superficial and flumerous institutions while simultaneously still believing men should remain responsible for 'making the world safe' for women...and doing a million other things as well.
It's about having one cultural cupcakes and binge-eating them now that you're married and can get fat too. It's about being the most privileged creature in the history of females and being a victim.
But sure...fuck daddy right? Oh sorry. Wrong 'daddy issues'.
This is why grok is a good word, feminists purport to believe in evolution, but they don’t grok it. They just like to pretend to believe in it as striking a blow against the 'patriarchy.’ They certainly are in deep denial about many of the ramifications of the fact that our species, well, hominids, have spent six million years or so evolving in a harsh and uncaring wilderness, where each sex had to carry its weight for us to have made it here.
Show us a sacrifice you're making for feminism, and maybe you'll have some moral standing.
You know, like not having dear old dad pay for the wedding...
It's selective feminism — cafeteria feminism.
That makes more sense than accepting someone else's encompassing philosophical definition.
Show us a sacrifice you're making for feminism, and maybe you'll have some moral standing.
How does that work? What if the sacrifice is just busywork or makes things worse?
I wanted my father to walk me down the aisle with my Mother. He was in the hospital, so he wasn't able. Do whatever YOU want, but don't take away tradition for people who love and believe in tradition. Leave the rest of us alone
It takes a creative hardcore feminist to discover more and more axes to grind.
On the flip side, as the fathers of two daughters, I would have favored scrapping the "dad pays for the wedding" tradition. I could have retired a bit earlier.
My first reaction was, "who asked you?". As you say, if that is her choice and her husband to be agrees then have at it. Just don't try to dump it on the rest of us. As for her sacrifice, please, what so many these days call sacrifice or courage is just moral preening. Other than opening themselves to ridicule they risk nothing.
Belonging to a good man is a blessing for a woman.
Cafeteria Feminism = virtue signaling
And always with the left, it’s not enough to just do your thing, the left has to insist everyone else do it too.
The walk is symbolic of leaving one family to join another. I can phrase the groom waiting as feminist—she’s the one choosing while he stands passively, awaiting her choice. Maybe it is sexist that the person walking the bride is the father—the man as head of family giving his daughter to another man, who will be head of the new family. You don’t have to do away with the walk, just do away with the requirement that it be the father. How about both parents? To show that the entire family supports to bride’s choice and they all embrace the new formation.
Let's take a closer look at those principles.
You hit the nail on the head, right away: “Is there a trend of women who love their living, ambulatory father choosing to walk down the aisle alone?”
Almost certainly not; we would see it on our own, over the years, without the need for such a story. Social conventions have meaning to people, which is why they keep them, and also why the NYT sees its mission to overturn all of them.
It’s the drip, drip, drip of ripping society apart, day by day. Hot garbage.
Serious Question
isn't The ENTIRE PROCESS of marriage a sexist relic?
Womyn need a husband no more than a non distressed fish needs a bicycle
Since ALL HETEROSEXUAL RELATIONS ARE RAPE, the only legal marriage should be between lesbians
marriage leads to children, and nearly HALF of all children are MALES... EVIL MALES!!!
It's a transfer of duty to protect from father to groom.
It's not ownership, just the possesive. My father, his daughter. With such possessives, there are always reciprocal responsibilities.
It's broken with disowning, if you want to terminate it.
I’m glad that you pick apart such stories, and see through a lot of their agenda, especially as a traditional liberal and original 70s feminist (putting you in very exclusive company among their readership, no doubt).
It’s the other 99.9% of their readers who still think “... but it’s in the New York Times, surely it must be true!” that are the issue for me, and for us as a culture. Lots of them get energized by this propaganda to keep pulling at the thread ...
@gilbane
"Doing away with marriage"
Whoa whoa whoa! That's taking it too far! Come on, we're talkin about selective feminism here. We can't trample all over little girls princess fantasies now can we.
Sheesh. We feminists were only talking about daddy walking us down the aisle, not remaining single for the rest of our lives.
People have been doing weddings different from the traditional (sic) for decades - centuries. It’s a celebration and ceremony of two people being married, however you choose to do it, traditional or otherwise. Don’t drag it down into the propaganda debauchary.
This move by Markle was an early “tell” to her hapless groom and his family that she was Bridezilla. He should have run, not walked.
Don't worry. Nobody is going to marry these women anyway. And if somebody does, may God have Mercy on their immortal Souls.
Of course, given the divorce rate, it would be just as fitting for the woman to be led down the isle by her newly engaged divorce attorney who would hand her off to the hubby-to-be with a sideline glance that says “I’m waiting...it won’t be long”.
- Krumhorn
http://ace.mu.nu/archives/meme%2020210319%2008.jpg
It wasn't Ace, but the man who did that is a genius.
The proper way in the Catholic Church is actually the bride and groom walk together, as it is a Sacrament they are receiving. The father with the bride or the bride walking alone are not within any Church teachings.
My wife lost her father when she was just 20 years old, to cancer. She was 31 when we got married, and of course because she’s a normal person who loves both her parents dearly, she greatly missed her father’s presence there, and in other ways across time.
Other family members (a cousin and two uncles) died at even younger ages — far younger — and so her experiences wired her much differently than the subject of this story.
My own family experience has been nearly free of such tragedy, but through her I can relate to what that must be like, and how it would shape your worldview forevermore.
I get that some people are estranged from family and often it’s a tragic and intractable situation. My heart goes out to them. But the media does stories like this all the time: pick one example to tell a heart-tugging story and imply that it respresents a much wider trend, even though it’s an outlier. It’s highly manipulative.
Another option is to ignore the whole ridiculous spectacle and do what my wife and I did and elope (we went to New Orleans and got married in a church down there). We came back and had a big reception where the parents could have their moments. Sure, some feelings were bent out of shape for a brief moment, but in the end it was the best thing we ever did.
Dad should lasso her ankles and drag her to the altar with a Dodge Challenger SRT Super Stock.
Love “cafeteria feminism”. Will be appropriating immediately, including for use in “cafeteria anti-racism”. Getting started immediately.
She didn't have to wear a $2000 dress, either, but I'll bet she did.
Yeah, and this idea of you having to come to him. How about him coming up the aisle to meet you? Or each one of you having to walk to a mutual location, like the church's boiler room?
Ah, man, I love your take on this. The veil, the dress, hell, the actual ceremony. If she's going to take the high ground, take the whole thing.
A breedable woman is vulnerable. She goes from her father's protection to her husband's. Is that really so awful to admit? Breeding is scary and primal. I guess we can't talk about it anymore.
Isn't the father of the bride the poor shmuck who's paying for the wedding? Maybe that tradition needs to go as well.
Renee said The proper way in the Catholic Church is actually the bride and groom walk together, as it is a Sacrament they are receiving. The father with the bride or the bride walking alone are not within any Church teachings.
What Renee said is correct.
People should just decide to get married in the way that THEY feel best. Religious ceremony or no religious ceremony...or just elope and be done with it. Save the money. Go on a vacation aka Honeymoon.
Kowtowing to SJW or Feminazi thinking or "traditions" established by your family is all the same. If you WANT to have Dad walk you down the aisle...do it. If you don't then don't.
WHY is everything today such a big effing convoluted deal. WHY can't other people mind their own business.
Hi Ann. How'd the vaccine thing go? Day 2 went OK, I'm assuming?
Anyway...as we all know, once upon a time, when there were two-parent families, the man typically was the one who supported the family. The man was public head of the family, while behind closed doors the woman was often the head. Not always, but often. That's not a social stance- that's just the reality of how the world has worked for eons.
Then we come to today when we have reached the pinnacle of sophistication and have finally realized that all men, especially those of the color white, are evil and should be put down. So, today's professional, degreed women do not need or may not want a male member of their family handing them off as if they were a bag of pork rinds.
I get it. But there's another way of looking at it. Maybe...I'm just saying maybe. Maybe the father IS a key member of the family, and he loves you dearly. More than anyone in the world, fathers love their daughters. And maybe- just maybe- the father feels so much love and pride in his daughter, but that he also feels like his baby- his little girl is leaving him. Let's just call it doing a nice thing for an old guy who is losing his little girl to the world. In another time, and indeed in many cultures today this still exists: the father represents the family. Like it or not. And the father has the HONOR of escorting his loved daughter down the aisle to hand over to some Beta guy with a nose ring. Fuck. Imagine being the dad having to hand off your daughter to one of today's shining examples of manhood. On second thought, I'm not sure any dad deserves that much anguish. I'd sit that one out.
If they want to do it, great.
What's the point.
My wife's dad was an alcoholic wife beater. He wasn't at the wedding and her mom walked her down the aisle (15 feet between two rooms in a lovely Bed and Breakfast). It never occurred to us to have no one walk her down the aisle. Women are to be protected. The man protects the woman, and the woman protects her womb, from which springs new life. That's the template. So transferring protection of the woman is the proper symbol of marriage.
When women have completely made over the world to suit their preferences, will the bitching stop?
One day God and Gabriel were discussing whether there was any end to a women’s ability to find fault and claim grievances.
So they invented feminism to settle the bet.
Blogger tcrosse said...
Isn't the father of the bride the poor shmuck who's paying for the wedding? Maybe that tradition needs to go as well.
When brides start paying for their
own weddings, there's your REAL feminist step forward.
And stop wearing white dresses and making us buy you big diamond rings. Both are sexist too.
I don't think Meghan Markle walked herself down the aisle, at least not the whole way. Prince Charles met her at some point and escorted her to the altar and handed her off to Harry. But then people have been improvising this particular part of the ceremony for decades now, a bride comes down on her own, the couple comes into the church together, the mom escorts, a brother, close family member, children of one or the other or both. There is no set way and this is yet another example of a feminist who needs to get her head out of the 1970s and get current with modern times.
“ The proper way in the Catholic Church is actually the bride and groom walk together, as it is a Sacrament they are receiving. The father with the bride or the bride walking alone are not within any Church teachings.”
In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the temple marriage ceremony has no procession or handing off by the father, and does not contain any language of a father giving a bride. The bride and groom kneel across from each other at an alter and take each other’s hand. In short, each are asked individually if they agree to give themselves and take the other. This is grounded in the key principal of free will. All attendees to the wedding sit around the alter. They are both dressed similarly in white except that the bride can elect to wear a wedding dress but it has to not have a lot of excess material because her temple “priestly robe” must be able to go over it.
@Dou
"Will the bitching stop"
No. Drama makes women horny. Ask me how I know. Sad and weird, but that's the lay of the land.
I thought the LDS Bride was led to the alter by a white salamander.
Meghan Markle alienated the rest of her family. Plus, they weren't exactly palace people and presentable at court.
There's a kind of dialectical movement with customs like this. People reject them with anger or bitterness or a feeling of liberation. Then they want them back, because they feel nostalgic or sense a void because they don't have anything to replace them with. It's likely that the two alternatives will co-exist with people able to choose between the two, but young people who rejected marriage and wedding fuss in the '60s and '70s had children who were all about big, fancy weddings in the '90s and '00s, so a wide swing of the pendulum back to the traditional way isn't out of the question.
Tough final exam question:
What is the difference between "feminism," narcissism" and solipsism"?
(It's a trick question. There is no difference.)
People who make these judgments are simply power hungry and should be ignored. Make your own decisions, be strong and be well.
For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. Gen 2:24 NIV
Seems people have had this backwards for some time.
"Meghan Markle alienated the rest of her family. Plus, they weren't exactly palace people and presentable at court."
I don't know about the first part, probably blame all the way around there but, oh yes on the second part, her family not being "palace people" and certainly not fit to be mixing with the likes of Prince Andrew.
Thank you, Althouse. As a step-dad that walked his daughter (that's how I see her) down the aisle in 2020; that's how I see it as well. I would have understood her decision to walk alone or, as we were doing this a bit ad-hoc in May 2020 pandemic scare, something less traditional. Heck, we even suggested the couple elope, and we could have a party later.
To me, it was my honor to be in that moment with her. For certain, I wasn't passing her from man to man. Indeed, I answered the question, which I admit has sexist roots, "Her mother and I". But I thought of the exchange as more a blessing for the new couple rather than the historical concept that we were giving her as part of a dowry to a man I needed as part of the family.
I do agree with one concept Ms. Nolan mentions; "she was making a joint decision to combine their lives". That's very true and hopefully the most important aspect of the marriage. But considering her other views, I wonder how long her husband will fill like the decision is truly shared.
I love this. Thank you.
"she was making a joint decision to combine their lives" is awkwardly written. Needs to be "they were making a joint decision to combine their lives." The "bridezilla" lurks within this lurch toward feminism.
Dust Bunny Queen said...
WHY is everything today such a big effing convoluted deal. WHY can't other people mind their own business.
This correctly identifies the problem and solution to damn near everything going on in this country today.
I'm so glad to have married a traditional, educated, beautiful woman 43 years ago, before the apparent breakdown and insult to these traditions by these woke little monsters. I would no more deprive my wife's father, who I deeply loved, of the honor of walking his beloved daughter down the aisle in the presence of God, family and friends. After all, *He Paid For It*...
So much narcissism, so many statements to be made. Just go to Las Vegas, get drunk, wake up married. Lotsa people do.
I kind of prefer the tradition where the bride is obviously pregnant and her father totes a shotgun in his free hand.
:@7:52
Indeed.
What is the point?
This is how cancelling works. Create the illusion of opprobrium, then use it to shame those of less enlightenment into submission.
As already noted, people have been getting married to the beat of their own drummer for centuries. What twaddle.
"Let the groom wear an outfit as gaudy and eye-riveting as the bride's. Let petals be scattered in his path. Give him a veil too. Let them lift each other's veils simultaneously. And so on."
Don't give them ideas, Althouse!
selective feminism - description
Choosing only the component of feminism that benefits the woman at the moment.
examples:
Refusing to let you father accompany you down the wedding aisle because patriarchy.
Rejecting women for the draft or in combat because women are special.
"she was making a joint decision to combine their lives" is awkwardly written. Needs to be "they were making a joint decision to combine their lives."
It's possible that she alone was making the decision for both of them, and he acquiesced. That happens a lot.
Big Mike said...
I kind of prefer the tradition where the bride is obviously pregnant and her father totes a shotgun in his free hand.
I don't remember you being at my wedding. You must have been drunk. It was a pistol.
sexual ownership - description
The belief that a phrase that can be construed to mean actual chattel ownership actually means chattel ownership.
examples:
That's my wife.
That's my husband.
@Browndog, I wasn’t. It’s an old tradition with Appalachian roots.
A father should be the most important man in a young woman's life. He raises her, provides for her, and should be the role model for how she should expect men to behave. When she marries, her husband becomes the most important man in her life. It's only fitting then that her father walks her down the aisle, as it symbolizes those last moments and that transition.
Mustn’t have anything distract from the bride as she walks down the aisle.
Selfish bitch.
Personally, we were married with family and close friends only. Best man, Matron of Honor parents and siblings. My bride's Father was in hospital, so mom did the ceremonial handing off.
That's it. 41 years later it seems to have stuck.
Big blowout at the VFW, where my two Great Aunts were as tipsy as they had been in decades.
To cap off the event, we visited the hospital at 1:00 am to see Dad, Us, in full wedding attire. The floor nurses were in on the visit, and kept sleeping medication from him until we departed.
This Groom is in for a very tough, and most likely short Marriage.
It’s frankly gross, outdated and patriarchal sign of submission to even invite the father to the wedding at all. A wedding should be an opportunity to demonstrate a commitment to progressive values. It’s a major public event, and if a person‘s moral and political standards aren’t on display then, when should they be? White dresses symbolizing virginity are also outdated and patriarchal, suggesting that a woman’s sexuality is the possession of her family, or that she had “saved herself” for somebody else, instead of her being a free autonomous individual able to express her own sexuality with anyone she wishes, consensually, in a fluid and open way. White dresses need to go. Large cakes are simply carbs and processed sugar, and should be replaced with something composed of cauliflower and other nutritious vegetables. The whole ritual of the cake needs to end. Pretty much everything about if additional “wedding” is problematic, and maybe it’s time to just draw a big X through the whole idea.
What about the matriarchy? One of my childhood friends told me his marriage was effectively arranged by the women of the local Chinese community.
In a modern progressive wedding, the bride's husband leads her down the aisle to where the other members of the group marriage are waiting. The wife's bull officiates the ceremony.
Some people might like the tradition.
If you don't - fine - but why ruin it for those who do like the tradition.
You don't like it - fine - make your own rules and traditions. It's your wedding. Shut up and do what you want. but stop with the lectures.
Let the woke-scold get her own separate shower of tar and feathers.
The father stands guard over his daughter. The mother stands guard over her son. The parents stand guard over their respective son and daughter, or mix it up. The family, friends, and well-wishers stand guard over bride and groom. Each individual stands guard on their own. Then comes baby, or not and evolution stops, or a choice to stop evolution. You have passed the point of no return. You might have been a beautiful baby. Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha.
Big Mike said...
@Browndog, I wasn’t. It’s an old tradition with Appalachian roots.
It was a joke.
A real feminist would marry another woman.
Prince Charles walked Meghan down the aisle. That's pretty piss-poor for the NYT to print that.
The father stands guard over his daughter. The mother stands guard over her son. The parents stand guard over their respective son and daughter, or mix it up.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
“LDS Bride was led to the alter by a white salamander.”
Yes. Absolutely. The white salamander leading the way, forging a happy future for them.
The bride and groom kneel across from each other at an alter and take each other’s hand. In short, each are asked individually if they agree to give themselves and take the other. This is grounded in the key principal of free will.
That sounds about right. Equal in rights and complementary in Nature.
That said, it also compensates for the average height differential between males and females. Blame the supreme Matriarch: Mother Nature a.k.a. Gaia.
So many variations, traditions, conventions. Perhaps a jumpsuit, and masks, at 16,000 feet. Don't forget your oxygen.
What was the last year there were strict rules about how a wedding had to be performed?
For me personally, I don't like the father daughter trope (the dance itself is great!) at the reception where the dad and daughter are sobbing with emotion. That always seems like parental fantasy to me, like it's so hard for a daughter to leave home that she would be weepy at her wedding over this dance with her dad. No! She's happy to be marrying the man she wants to live with! It's similar to the parental fantasy we see on tv of kids being weepy when leaving their moms as they go off to college. Parents may not like it when kids leave the nest, but kids are usually pretty ok with it.
But then, I left "obey" in the vows because my grandmother and grandfather had obey, and while I don't think my grandmother actually did "obey" my grandfather, they had the happiest love story and they were both gone by the time I married, so it was my little tribute to them/her.
You can do whatever you like in your wedding. Seriously. The recent weddings I've been to were officiated by loved ones/friends. How dumb to have a whole article trying to kind of push onto others whatever your own hang ups are. And why are so many people so protective of Meghan Markle?
DBQ - beat me to it.
Being serious for a moment, the wife and I had sons, but something I noted in the families of friends who had daughters is that there is often a special bond between father and daughter. The tradition acknowledges and even celebrates this relationship. But if your family is disfunctional (e,g., Megan Markle’s family) then, hey, do your own thing, baby.
My younger son was married in a Catholic church. The bride’s father walked her down the aisle, lifted her veil, kissed her cheek, and placed his daughter’s hand in my son’s. Very lovely part of a lovely ceremony.
anyone who uses the word "patriarchy" = automatic woke lecture nag.
Bride was led to the alter by a white salamander.
Spaghetti Monster, covered in a fine Italian... tomato sauce, in the Secular Colander. The meatballs are optional. The bread is not. The Fork ran away with the Spoon, so use your fingers as Evolution intended.
Performance > People
"Renee said The proper way in the Catholic Church is actually the bride and groom walk together, as it is a Sacrament they are receiving. The father with the bride or the bride walking alone are not within any Church teachings."
There are parts of the marriage ceremony and all the other sacraments that are cultural and have nothing to do with universal Catholic teaching on the sacrament of marriage. The walk down the aisle with the father is a cultural tradition here; the walk down the aisle itself is cultural. In some Catholic cultures, the bride and groom greet everyone at the Church door. As for Meghan Markle's attitude toward Harry, I think she regarded him as the leading man in a production starring herself and filmed on location at Westminster Abbey. That the production is now over. Soon she will star in a production filmed on location in Hollywood where she explores the heartbreak of finding out that her husband is just a duke, not a prince and, what's more, he is white and a guy. Weeping by the sea at Malibu, she sees a rider on a horse ...
@Browndog, yes, I knew that.
Shakespeare would have called it The Propitiation Of The Shrew.
A real feminist would marry another woman.
That's true. A male or female are equally capable of taking a knee to their chauvinistic: masculinist or femininst partner. That said, would the feminist or her inferior, male or female, take the knee? And would it be a persistent, perhaps progressive condition? And what about Stork? With two females, would Stork deliver in tandem? You know, to keep things perfectly equal.
Dear Megan Marketable,
Anyone who says "Megan Markel did it" = the groan factor is off the charts. There are not enough spoons on earth for gagging.
"sexist origins" - oh do shut up. If you don't want any "sexism" you need to abandon all men from your life completely-- Otherwise, you're a woke hypocrite. You don't want to be a woke hypocrite.
We are all shocked to hear Merkel is estranged from her father.
What's the over/under on bets for the length of the Disneyland royal marriage? I give Harry and Megan about 2 more years.
The Jewish wedding tradition is for both parents to walk in with the groom, and both parents to walk in with the bride, each whole basic family coming together.
If you don't like your inherited traditions, of course you are free to make changes. But when you make changes, it's good to ask yourself about your motives and reasons, and question them rather deeply before plunging ahead. (And definitely, before writing about them for publication!)
It's a good thing she didn't sound off on Jumping the Broom.
I am 68, and have been hearing this since my William and Mary days. I admit I start with annoyance when young people make strong declarative lectures to the rest of us as if this is some new thing that they have to inform us of. So I'm a little sour. Son #2 is about to have covid wedding with couple, pastor, and witness, so no one is walking anyone anywhere. That still works. What they will do for the parties later will be different.
But to the main point It's a wedding. Every corner of all ceremony is packed with symbolism - baptisms, funerals, coming-of-age. With weddings, the groom removes the garter. That's pretty clear symbolism. (We have a young friend who attached a long string of objects to the garter, which the groom pulled out one-by-one to the amusement of the guests. The symbolism played out accurately. He's getting a lot of it, but there's a lot of junk he has to take with it.) He throws it to the single men, and the bride throws a bouquet to the single women, continuing the image. He feeds her cake, she feeds him cake, and the politeness versus energy and force of this can be read as sexual, or power expressions, even if it is disguised humor.
The friends of the bride on one side, friends of the groom on the other. Two communities, because marriage does not belong only to the couple but to the society at large. To the village, if you will. We Americans don't like that, preferring it to be an arrangement between two people. That is closer to the truth now, but the older form is not devoid of power. When you marry someone, you marry their whole family. If the family is dead or estranged, you are marrying their ghosts. The blessing of the community still has power. Father-daughter dance, mother-son. Hearkening to a tradition of nurturing families releasing their children to become one-flesh.
So people don't like this part of the symbolism, or don't like any of it, and want to do something different. That's fine. It's a free country, as we used to say. But whatever you choose to do will also be packed with symbolism, and you don't have anywhere near the awareness nor control of that that you think you do. If there is a default symbol in place and you change it, you are making announcements about your values with trumpet blast. Trouble is, it won't be quite the values you intended.
Most people just prefer to get married, rather than using the occasion to lecture their friends and family about what they believe.
Does she say if she carried the groom over the threshold?
Whether it's feminism or masculinism, in the history of humanity, it's always back to basics: man, woman, then comes baby, the human equivalent of the pride parade. With social progress, the former can donate in abstentia (the secular variant of immaculate conception), and the latter can be replaced with a stand in (rent-a-womb). So, this is how traditions, conventions, this chaotic order, in a mad, mad, mad, mad world, are realized, liberalized, and progress.
re: tomato sauce
Perhaps a mushroom sauce. Yum.
Does she say if she carried the groom over the threshold?
I suggest a fireman... firewoman... fireperson... whatever carry, which is easier on the back. Perhaps a wheelbarrow construct, where the partners, do-si-do, grasp a wheel and are pushed in tandem into the Colander of the Secular Spaghetti Monster. Let us bray.
I would advise caution. Many wedding traditions are said to be rooted in keeping away demons and evil spirits. What we see when divorce happens is that those demons rush into the breech created by the rift.
In any case, the walk down the aisle with the father/patriarch came about as emulation of noble/royal weddings where the merging of the Houses, very publicly, is the purpose. The "handoff" happened in front of all in attendance to show the political affiliation being created witnessed by the political factions.
AHA!! Clown Suits next!
Northofthe 101 pointed out...
Prince Charles walked Meghan down the aisle. That's pretty piss-poor for the NYT to print that.
WAIT a MINUTE? The WHOLE thing;
is that Megan was TOO BIG A FEMINIST to have her estranged father walk her down the aisle...
And, so she had her future father inlaw (the Prince of Whales!) do it?
In the interests of "feminism" did she allow Prince Charlie Droit du seigneur too?
I've been to some fabulous weddings after which the marriages didn't survive a year. Some families are big on tradition and some are big on expensive displays. Weddings are cool if you like the pomp, ceremony and romanticisms involved.
My sister confessed to me minutes before her wedding ceremony that she didn't really want to marry B***. I told her to just call it off and she said, "Not after Mother has gone to all this trouble". At the part where the minister says, 'if anyone here knows a reason why this couple should not be united', I did so want to jump up and object but didn't. They weren't even together two weeks. Her second marriage has been a success for 45 years.
Lauren Nolan dad wasn't going to carry her down the aisle. Neither was her fiance. Maybe both. Maybe.
My Dad's rule was that the length of the marriage was inversely proportional to the cost of the wedding.
I kind of prefer the tradition where the bride is obviously pregnant and her father totes a shotgun in his free hand.
Seems like this is the place, for a Georgia Satellites link
I Always thought the Best part, was the Grandmother and younger sister chasing the chicken..
Then the sister smiling as she carries a plate of fried chicken out to the table
"Prince Charles walked Meghan down the aisle. That's pretty piss-poor for the NYT to print that."
The article has this:
"Ms. Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, entered her wedding ceremony solo in 2018, walking halfway down the St. George’s Chapel aisle before joining Prince Charles. Then, the prince stepped aside and the duchess completed her journey to Prince Harry, whom she married."
Yes, my favorite part of sealings in a Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is how there is no extra pomp given to the bride.
This BS is just another reason for me to be thankful I’m the age I am. One of my treasured memories of out wedding day is my father in law walking his beautiful daughter toward me with a tear or two wisecracking to his Italian buddies. That was almost 57 years ago. Her dad and my dad set a standard for me to live up too. My guess is Lauren needs, like a lot of young folks these days, some time in the peach orchard.
Many Feminists prior to WW2, considered marriage "patriarchal" and "Petite Bourgeoise nonsense". Martha Gellhorn, for example, on got married to Hemingway and later TS Matthews because they wanted it, not her. She was perfectly happy to NOT be married.
Similarly, what is "Feminist" about a wedding? You know who created "Marriage"? Men. Just get rid of the whole thing.
"why can't people mind their own business?"
Because they don't want to. Sorry, either shut up and accept or fight. Whining about "Why can't they leave us alone?" accomplishes nothing. "They" aren't going to leave you alone, because "They" want to change society.
Leftists INSIST on seeing ugly in everything.
"Ms. Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, entered her wedding ceremony solo in 2018, walking halfway down the St. George’s Chapel aisle before joining Prince Charles."
That's because Mr. Markle couldn't be counted on to not get drunk or do something embarrassing or stupid. Typical white man.
Not many men look forward to the pomp and ceremony, etc. like many women do...just a fact.
So I say let the bride do whatever she wants.
It really is her day.
Oh, and it's not so much 'giving her away' as it is symbolically saying 'I have loved her and cared for her for her entire life, and now I expect you to do the same.'
At least that's how I've always thought of it...
Don't get me started on weddings...I cry like a baby...
The couple of times I've ushered at a wedding, the women guests -- even those with husbands/male companions -- refused to go down the aisle to their seats without a male usher to latch their arms on to. They would walk in and just STOP. The younger guys I was in charge of just kind of looked at each other stupidly, not knowing what to do, until I told them that they had to escort the ladies to their seats.
Of course, there is not just the matter of walking down the aisle for a wedding. There is also getting to the church/hotel conference room in the first place.
Does uber-feminist insist on driving herself? Or would she appreciate if her family drove her from home to the front door of the church?
A real feminist would marry another woman.
Who's to say that Mrs. Mountbatten-Windsor didn't marry another woman?
Mark said...
A real feminist would marry another woman.
Who's to say that Mrs. Mountbatten-Windsor didn't marry another woman?
****************
Yes! What if Harry "feels" that he's a woman? VOILA! Woman s(he) is!!
SNORT
I bet it was once a tearful and choked up moment for the dad in the days when his daughter lived with him up until the wedding day, and she was heading off to be de-flowered and to only return for visits.
Hey, no problem!
You don't ask dad to pay for any part of the wedding, and he doesn't get to walk you down the aisle.
Oh, you still want daddy to pay? Then fuck you, you evil bitch
Lucid-Ideas said...
http://ace.mu.nu/archives/meme%2020210319%2008.jpg
It wasn't Ace, but the man who did that is a genius.
That is awesome!
“You know, like not having dear old dad pay for the wedding...”
At my first wedding, the bride to-be never asked her parents to help with the cost. Instead, the cost was split between the couple and the groom’s parents. She walked down the aisle by herself. Yes, she is a feminist, but mostly, I think that it was because she never got along with her father. He didn’t help matters a bit - when she was with her previous boyfriend, whenever she called her parents, he would just immediately hand the phone to her mother. Second one was tiny, just the minister, a good friend as witness, and the two of us. She would love to have had her father escort her down the aisle, but wasn’t allowed to attend by her mother, who didn’t want any of her daughters remarrying. Plus he had Alzheimer’s and her mother had had a brain aneurysm.
Her first wedding was relatively small, because her brother had just died. Her decision, not her parents. But her parents got their mega wedding with her youngest sister, who had one of the biggest weddings of the year in Las Vegas, with many of the most prominent political figures in attendance. The two fathers, real estate business partners, split the cost. It was an all day event. And lasted less than a year. The couple had spent a lot of time around each other as teenagers, with the constant entertaining the parents did for business, and being of an age, everyone assumed that they would get married. But she was never in love with him, so they divorced, still friends, within the year.
One of the things that I don’t like about big weddings is the bride going all out (with her father’s money) to have the perfect storybook wedding. Had a sibling of my first wife do it too. The couple paid for the wedding themselves that she had dreamed of for so many years, and again, it lasted less than a year. She apparently hadn't thought it through very well - that after the wedding, you are married. That means not going out to clubs every other night, and doing things with other couples, instead of as singles.
Sometimes, though, it can work out. A friend comes from a family of six girls. Three had starter husbands, with first marriages lasting less than a year, quickly followed by second marriages that have lasted decades.
When my husband and I married in ‘95, both of his parents walked him down the aisle, and both of my parents walked me down the aisle. It was meant to symbolize the merging of families. So, that’s another take on it, I guess.
Jackie Kennedy's father was too drunk to walk her down the aisle so her stepfather fulfilled the role
We (meaning my wife and I) are from pretty traditional families. Our wedding was held in the college chapel of my wife and father in law alma mater, now also my sons, where you have to register almost a year in advance to reserve a slot. It is a very traditional English type large chapel, stone built, very little lighting, stained glass, flags hanging from the aisle columns, etc. Ceremony right out of the Lutheran Book of Worship (minus the 'obey' at her insistence, and naturally I obeyed), took 5 minutes tops. Went to the reception in my FIL's 1950 Packard. This was in 1989, and seemed standard at the time.
My sisters successful second marriage was a Jewish ceremony and I don't recall my father giving her away. It was by far my favorite wedding, with the canopy and the crushing of the wine glass and everyone saying, Mazel-tov.
How about she dump the whole expensive wedding bit?
You do your thing, baby, and I’ll do mine. Walking my oldest daughter down the aisle, kissing her on the cheek and whispering that I loved her before leaving her standing next to her future husband, was one of the great moments of my life — and my daughter’s life, as she later told her mother, my wife.
Our daughter got married in late 2019. Her father walked her down the aisle with tears streaming down his face; she struggled not to cry too.
Considering what happened to the world two months later, that may have literally been the last, best day for her father and I.
How about she dump the whole expensive wedding bit?
Sounds good to me. Tell the kids that you'll give them the sum that the wedding would cost to spend as they see fit. Down payment on a house, maybe, or a long honeymoon.
And if they've been shacking up for years, they shouldn't expect a lavish wedding, anyway.
Dear Wife and I were married by a judge, with his clerks as witnesses. He said that he enjoyed handing out Life Sentences.
"If they are going to preen about feminism" how about taking on something really important to females like not allowing men to compete against women in athletics?
Tcrosse: My husband and I were also married by a judge in the Seattle courthouse. We did have friends as witnesses. Bought our wedding rings at a pawn shop and wore them for forty years until he died.
Ah, the latest installment of "more righteous than thou."
If her parents paid for her wedding, then she should be ashamed. Otherwise, let her do what she wants, she paid for it. As for me, I pity her. I proudly walked both my daughters down the aisle in to wonderful young men that I was proud to see them
married to.
Generally people don't need to justify how they want to do their wedding. If you are a bride-to-be and don't want your father to walk down the aisle with you then don't. That doesn't justify being an asshole about it and declaring the people that do like the tradition are systems of the patriarchy or whatever made up verbal diarrhea that person may spew to try and make their real justification of, "Blech! I don't like it.!" seem more sophisticated.
what happens when lesbians get married?
The only wedding I can think of that would be traditionally Catholic was Grace Kelly and Prince Rainier of Monaco. I'd need to watch the film to see whether they both walked together down the aisle. Being prior to Vatican II they both knelt at the altar for the full nuptial Mass. Probably a good two hour deal since the normal running time for the Latin High Mass runs 90 min.
When we got married my husband and I opted for a Medieval style wedding, castle, costumes and everything. It was a hoot. The ceremony was outside so it allowed for more creativity. I had both my parents walk with me to meet my husband where the minister was waiting. One year later we had a blessing ceremony at my Catholic parish.
the giving away part is because traditionally people belong to a family, and a marriage makes a link between two different families. In the past, a woman had to be protected, first by her father then by her husband: against starvation, against criminals, and when she is sick or pregnant and could not work.
Here in Asia, the family means the nuclear family but also the aunts, uncles, cousins etc. Just review the film "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" to see how this idea is still strong in many communities.
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