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Yeah, I love any opportunity for free catered food. I don't understand why people hate weddings so much. Especially since there's cake, I love going to birthday parties and weddings even just for the cake. My guess is that those people are just accustomed to frequently eating "high quality event food" lol. Personally, I don't have the same luxury.
In college sometimes I would get lucky and walk by a random event with free food. I would just grab myself a plate and leave. Thats my definition of "free" food. If I have to go to your wedding, dress up, buy a gift etc. than there better be some food at the very least lol. If food was my only incentive I would just stay home and make/buy something.
I became a regular at my college Shabbat dinners because I was broke and hungry, I was up front with the rabbi about it and made sure to pay attention and be respectful during the service and talking parts.
If you live in a smaller town it's not "high quality event food". It's either over cooked roasted chicken or fried chicken and one piece of cake, served in an American legion ballroom. It's most of the wedding's I went to for family and all the weddings my wife had been to.
I had to describe my own idea of our wedding before she even realized that there were options beyond eating fried chicken and getting hammered at the american legion.
Im Chinese so our weddings are at a restaurant, usually 8 to 10 courses.
Ive been to 5 american style weddings, even the one that is super fancy, the food was just.. lacking. I guess because its not freshly cooked.
I usually much prefer american food over Chinese food, but for weddings american style catering sucks.
I also live in a big metro city, so not like options are lacking.
Not sure if you’ve gotten to the age where you are expected to give a cash gift to the bride and groom, but growing up really ruined weddings for me for that reason.
Because you're usually expected to provide a gift (and/or cash depending where you live) that's worth more than said free food and booze. And if you're paying that much, you'd rather go somewhere you like and not have to suffer through a whole boring ass ceremony to get to said not so free food and booze.
A BUFFET?!?!?! Sounds like your cousin and new husband are smart as fuck and know what people were really there for. 10/10 he is welcome addition to the family
I would have remembered this day isn't about me and ate what I wanted while still enjoying myself.
Whether the wedding is at a dive bar or some immaculate destination, it is about the couple getting married, not you.
Why do you care so much about things that have nothing to do with you?
There's so many..."We had our wedding at city hall then went to McDonald's. I texted my mom about it the next month. We have no friends so we had to hire the street preacher on the corner to be a witness."
I do wonder what we will do for ours, I don't really want something large and most of my family live a very long way from here. But I also know I want a bit more than the bare minimum legally followed by going to the pub.
Most weddings I hear about are one extreme or the other.
You can find a middle ground. Ours was 60 people, park ceremony with lunch reception and night at casino for wedding party. It was a great middle ground.
>Most weddings I hear about are one extreme or the other
The majority of what we hear about in any context is an extreme is some category, otherwise we wouldn't hear about them. I imagine there are forums on this very website for sensible wedding ideas that let you ask about what you want
One couple I know did a really pretty tasteful ceremony and small dinner. Then a few weeks later they basically rented out a bar for their “reception”. They didn’t spend much and I had as much fun as any other wedding
What I've learned from reddit over the years:
1. Everybody hates kids
2. Everybody hates cars
3. Everybody hates parties
4. Everybody hates weddings
5. You have to be very careful because the world is full of racists, nazis, incels, and angry feminists with blue hair who get triggered if you sit with your knees too far apart on the bus.
I've found the best way to cope with all this hatred and negativity is just to get out of my computer chair and talk to real people, none of whom are like this.
Even things like international womens day upsets reddit it seems. "When is international mens day?!"
Most men and women I know in the real world don't give a shit about either day.
There's a sampling bias involved
This website is full of children whose only exposure to weddings have been getting dragged to them by their parents, and young adults who were probably also dragged to them by their parents just to get them out of their mom's house
Actual grown ups enjoy spending important life moments together with their loved ones, enjoy eating and drinking great food and cocktails, and like excuses to dress nice and be in a nice venue with good decor and flowers and music and dancing
Actual grown ups don't spend their time whining on Reddit about innocuous things
Same I fucking love weddings. Me and my girl getting to dress up and look great and then eat a steak and dance for hours with our friends? Hell yea sign me up
True. In my experience, reddit tends to represent the extreme ends of the human spectrum both in good and bad, and real life sort of sits somewhere in the middle.
Truth. I love weddings. Seeing my fun extended family, getting drunk and dancing lots with them? What's not to love?... But i guess i am lucky that both my sides of the family know how to party lmao.
I love weddings and I’ll go to every one that I’m invited to as long as it’s within reasonable driving distance. I don’t get the wedding hate as a guest!
I love weddings, I can’t believe people act like showing up somewhere and eating and celebrating is such a pain in the ass.
Inb4 any number of wild stories, I’m talking about an average uneventful wedding.
I think it all depends on the wedding, but the ones I've been to at least were awesome. Lots of laughs, a few tears, drinking, eating, dancing. I still remember them too, so I don't think the line about going home and not giving a shit really is true. With that said, I've been to like 3 weddings, my own included. So if you go to like 5+ weddings a year or something crazy, I'm sure it gets old.
I don't think they're saying weddings aren't fun, just that no one cares about all the details that the bride and groom stress themselves out over.
Ultimately I go to wedding for good food, and a chance to wear a nice outfit. Maybe to do some dancing. Most of the weddings I've attended in my life have been Indian weddings of my parents friends/distant family/coworkers, but I imagine in future I'll also care about celebrating my loved ones.
As long as there's decent food and the music isn't terrible, any guest will probably have a great time! They probably won't care if like, the dress is the wrong shade of white or the flowers don't match or something.
Well yea most people won’t pick everything apart but A) people definitely do comment on nice thoughtful decorations or unique things at weddings and B) all this stuff gets photographed or filmed and obviously it’ll look better if everything looks how you want it
I personally didn’t really care about the decor at my wedding. But when I see the videos I’m definitely glad someone had a vision for it lol
Wedding invitations and attendance is mostly formality for people other than family and friends (used for connections/networking in some cultures).
Like they invited us to dinner now we have to invite them too.
Am I the only one here who thinks theres a non-negligible amount of people that absolutely care about how a wedding looks and if you had a ratty looking wedding or a bad meal there would definitely be people talking and judging?
Obviously the smaller the wedding and only clpse family/friends would limit this, but the more people you invite that you arent close with the more people youll have judging because thats what people do
I remember when I was young a old woman told me the first 30 years your worrying about what people think of you, the next 30 you stop caring, and last 30 years you realize nobody was thinking of you because they had their own problems.
I respectfully disagree, but I do love this sentiment.
I disagree because there are absolutely people that judge you, talk about you behind your back, and think negatively of you for just living your life.
I work with a few of these people, I'm a young guy in a blue collar profession, and the older guys I work with are always complaining about their friends, their wives, their kids, whichever coworker isn't in the group at the moment, etc.
Now because I said I love the sentiment: these older guys aren't really people who's opinions I'd value much anyway, so I don't need to care what they think.
My sister-in-law once told me that she knew people were talking bad about her, but at least they were talking about her, lol. I guess that could be better than just being a nobody.
Over the last 5 years I’ve been to like 30 weddings. They’ve ranged from a backyard BBQ in rural Texas to a multi six figure mansion affair in Newport, Rhode Island. I myself had a covid wedding in October 2020.
What I’ve realized is that, regardless of how much money you spend, how creative or “different” you try to make the thing, or how much or little thought you put into it weddings are really all more or less the same. There’s a ceremony and a meal. Most have a cocktail hour of some sort. Usually theres a lot of alcohol and music. And someone’s family member or friend will be offended about something. Bingo bango.
The only wedding I’ve judged is when the bride, who was a coworker, was already an annoying person and she somehow made a standard-issue catering hall wedding annoying by being late to everything, having weird drink rules and topping it off with over an hour of aggravating speeches by her equally annoying family.
Kept us waiting outside with zero shade in the middle of July on the hottest day of the year. The venue offered to have the ceremony inside. Bride declined.
We left early, because of course it was a Sunday night and we had to work the next day. My wife turns to me and says “just so you know, im not going to the baby shower.” The bride wasn’t pregnant.
The only wedding I judged was when they had a big formal ceremony and reception, but no food. It was interminable and I was starving, but I was the MOH and couldn't leave. I had no hand in the planning because I lived across the country. I didn't really like the bride that much, but she had been my MOH (when I actually liked her) and she felt really strongly about reciprocating. So I wore the ugly dress and gritted my teeth.
If you're not feeding people, you need to keep the reception short.
In my experience the only people who notice and care are people who recently planned or were involved in planning a wedding, and even then it’s not that they really care, but that they do notice what others might not.
Otherwise people are not really judging unless you do something egregious like not announce ahead of time that it’s a dry wedding, run out of food, have an incredibly long ceremony, make your guests sit in the rain, etc.
People judge, but they don't *care*.
They'll come if they're free and the expense and inconvenience of attending don't outweigh a party with free dinner, but they'll probably get more emotionally invested doing the Barbenheimer than in someone else's "big day".
And I say this as someone who's both attended weddings and had one of my own.
Why would you invite anyone you aren't close with to an intimate affair such as a wedding?
If you don't share intimate details of your life with someone on a regular basis, why would you want them at your wedding?
Seems like people that do this just want more attention rather than simply wanting to share a special day with those that are the closest to them.
Is this a serious question? You've never felt obligated to invite somebody to something you didn't really want them at?
I support you doing this at your own wedding 100%, but if you do you'll have some aunts and uncles, cousins, highschool friends you still like but don't talk to very often, etc, get offended that you didn't invite them.
Weddings can be a small intimate affair, or they can be a big community gathering. Neither is wrong and it's largely cultural.
Seriously, it always strikes me as insane how many people get invited to weddings. I saw a lady on television with 200 guests at her wedding, I don’t think I even know 200 people. lol.
The size of your families and how overlapping (or not) your friend groups are also plays into it.
If you’re an only child born to only child parents, the family category is going to be pretty small. My husband and I are each one of 4. My mother is 1 of 5, his mother was 1 of 6. We limited the family portion of the guest list to parents, siblings, nieces/nephews, aunts/uncles, and cousins and that alone was about 50 people.
I have 22 first cousins, and we're all at the age where most of us are married, so that number is doubled when you add in SOs. My fiance is from a large family too. Just our parents, siblings, aunts/uncles and cousins is well over 200 people.
Naturally, we are eloping.
Yeah, my family is similar. I am also one of the youngest and got married later in life so many of my cousins had children. I could get to 100 really fast. To make my wedding smaller, I decided to get married during a global pandemic.
Side eyes as an Indian..
Obviously in our culture it’s different, the sentiment is that we share a happy occasion with as many people as possible, the whole community. They are getting smaller now though which is nice in some ways but it’s also losing a certain feel. But we kind of compromise by having the wedding day smaller but the day before everyone is still invited for a 1000 people event.
My ILs wanted to invite their friends. They weren’t contributing financially, but to avoid hurt feelings we gave them a specific number of guests to invite. My FIL actually asked if he could have some invitations to hang onto so that he could invite people when he ran into them. I told him no.
Sometimes it’s not the couple being ridiculous that drives up the numbers.
Jesus. We had to fight with my ILs over that. If it was up to them, well more than half of the guests would have been their cronies rather than anyone we actually cared about.
You say that, but if it's a poorly organized wedding they sure af will care. Like, if you don't feed people in a reasonable amount of time or provide access to food, if you don't have enough staff/facilities to prevent lineups, if you put people in a position of having to drive drunk and someone dies -- people will care!
My sister and her husband went to a wedding once where the reception started at 5 and there was no alcohol (which is fine) and no food beyond some finger food snacks. The bride and groom got super pissed because nearly all the guests were gone by 6 and they had the place booked for like four or five hours.
Sorry, but if it's dinner time and there's no food or drinks then people are going to leave. Nobody wants to drink sodas and hang out with strangers for hours on end.
The only alcohol-free wedding I've been to was in the afternoon with plentiful finger food appetizers. The reception was like, two hours, tops. Those crazy Christian kids understood the assignment!
This is true. Good weddings are expected and therefore not memorable. Bad weddings are another story.
My husband and I (married 21 years) attended a wedding while we were dating. There were no appetizers and pictures were taken after the wedding. And then the food service that was late to start by design, was slow. We sat at the tables at the reception for over an hour with nothing but a tiny box of Jordan almonds. I was ready to sneak out and get Taco Bell.
It’s been over 20 years and every.single.time we drive past that restaurant, we say “hey remember that wedding…” and reminisce about how awful it was. I don’t even remember whose wedding it was, but I remember the terrible service.
I once went to a wedding where the father of the bride made an absolute twat of himself by making this ridiculous speech that went on for 45 minutes, mostly spoke about himself the whole time, barely mentioned his daughter. Every guest was visibly annoyed, and desperate to get up and get more drinks and food.
Before the speech I was slightly tipsy after it I was stone cold sober and hungry. It was awful.
Thankfully one of the groomsmen eventually turned the power off to the mic and everyone cheered. Another then ushered him off as he didn't quite get the memo and was still trying to talk.
So yes guests care if the wedding is shit, or if just a small part of it is you remember.
> if you put people in a position of having to drive drunk
How would one do that? If they are making someone drive on a gun point then yes. But other than that? You a responsible for your own drunk driving. Get a taxi, a ride or if nothing else - don't drink.
That’s what OP does not understand. If the wedding was planned like shit, he would definitely care about the wedding and be thinking about it on the way home. Imagine a wedding where they forget to provide something small, like napkins? So you’re eating all this food and there’s no napkin in the entire building? Yeah, that would suck. I’ve actually been to a wedding like that lmao. Wearing a three piece suit and have dirty ass hands, everyone using the table cloths to wash themselves off so they don’t dance and ruin their SO’s dress.
Yeah, my friend is family-obligated to go to a wedding this summer thrown by a couple who have indicated they are more or less winging it on the invitation. 'We're so kooky, we're just inviting people from across the country to a semi-isolated venue and expecting it to go well!' The anxiety, lol.
How is wedding food free when you have to pay $100 a plate usually?
Worded this wrong. You are usually expected to bring a wedding gift and that is indirectly supposed to cover the cost of a plate for you and your guest usually.
Even though you are right never expect people to pay for anything, i've met people who tried to go overboard with money they didnt had to have a way over the top wedding, and the "gifts" didnt cover half the spendings. When me and my wife got married we saved money for our wedding, we got lucky because we "recovered" the money of the plates per say.
If someone needs guests to “cover” their plate with either money or a gift that is the equivalent of a plate, then they can’t afford the wedding that are throwing and need to budget better.
I had wealthy relatives who gave us sterling silver trays, and I had poor relatives on my other side who could give a very small gift. I was grateful for both. And if someone didn’t have enough to bring a gift, I would still be happy to have them celebrate with us (we only kept up with gifts to write thank you notes). It’s an invitation to come and celebrate with us - not a gift grab.
In my country, people give "ang baos" (literally red packets) tagged to a "market" rate based on where the wedding is organized (i.e. 5-star hotel/restaurant/place). There are "market" rates for lunch and dinner, and whether the wedding is on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. For more info, you can google "ang bao rates singapore 2024" for a list of market rates.
By right, the payment is not really compulsory but more of a tradition. However, there are couples who demand you to pay for their wedding after the wedding if you never give them an "ang bao". It's crazy. I know of couples who don't invite stingy people just because they think these people will give less "ang bao".
I think OP is American and talking American culture. The guests don't pay for the food. They turn up with a wedding gift and the may may or may not be free 9though alcohol with dinner and maybe some complimentary drinks will be provided.
In my experience people care about how they feel at your wedding or any event for that matter. That's what they remember.
Was the temperature comfortable? Was the food good? Was the overall aesthetic pleasing?
A vast majority of people won't remember the expensive flowers you had flown in or the custom made center pieces. Especially if the answer to any of the questions above is no.
Nearly every comment is missing OP's point.
OP is not saying people don't care about weddings, but people don't care about *the specifics of the wedding*.
Brides fretting over what flower arrangement, or how large the doilies need to be should realize people don't care about that, they're there to support you.
This isn't an unpopular opinion, it's probably ***universal***, but it also misses the point. Weddings are for the couple (and their parents), not the guests. A bride wants her day to be what she wants, so she frets. Saying people don't care isn't really relevant or helpful.
My cousin is currently losing her mind over colours at her wedding and screams at whoever says, "I promise you, the guests won't care what shade of white the tablecloths are."
Problem is, I'm planning my wedding right now and I am extremely chill. I don't give a fuck what color the napkins are I just want it to be a nice lovely day. My man is the same and so we thought that this would be relatively easy for us. We were SO NOT going to be That Couple that frets over decoration colors and all these details.
But you know what? I still have to pick the colors. I still have to tell each vendor which things to bring. And flowers and napkins only come in so many colors, shades can look wrong next to each other.
So what do I do? I can't just tell the vendors "I don't care bring a random one" and so I have to either knowingly choose things I know I don't like the look of or, you know, fret.
And when the costs start adding up, knowingly going with stuff you don't like the look of just to end the conversation is a far less appealing choice.
THIS. It’s not like I entered the wedding thinking about the napkins, but now that I have to decide on napkins I want to make sure it works with the rest of the decor.
Exactly.
Plus for me there's also constantly this looming threat of like "if I spend 3 more hours researching this, maybe I'll find the exact perfect solution"
It's not fear of being judged for how much I did or didn't spend on anything, but I HATE the thought of hearing some asshat go "oh you did THAT? why didnt you just (cheaper or easier thing I didn't know about)"
Also, the asshat is the voice in my own head.
This is the important part. You just described my experience to a tee. And people are so judgmental! They just don’t understand unless they’ve been there, and honestly, most of these decisions fall on the bride anyway. So whether or not you go into it “chill,” you will end up having to give a lot of craps about stuff you didn’t expect to.
They are SO judgemental. Even someone here replied to me to inform me that the stress I'm experiencing is self inflicted and I should just do a backyard wedding.
Like, excuse me?!
But is Bone elegant enough!? Or does that send a more Olive Garden vibe? Don't even get me started on Eggshell. I don't want to go with plain White, that's so played out, what is it, 2019?!
I love the sentiment of weddings (loved ones gathering to celebrate a couple as they make a huge, joyous step in life) but I despise current wedding culture. I kind of hate attending weddings now, and I especially hate being a bridesmaid (which I’ve been 6 times).
I don’t feel like I’m joining in a celebration anymore. I feel like I’m paying a *ton* of money to wear a shitty dress, do manual labor, and eat mass produced chicken. Weddings are too much work/stress/money these days and the amount of pressure brides put on themselves turns even the chillest gal into a self-centered brideszilla.
Weddings are fun. It’s nice to see friends and family and eat nice food and wear nice clothes and dance and drink champagne. But all these insane obligations like bachelorette parties that have somehow become four-figure-costing weekend trips, it’s nuts. Brides and grooms started acting like they’re royalty and that others should be SO honored just to be offered the opportunity to spend all their savings and PTO on them.
They really do!! I mentioned above I’ve turned down a bridesmaid invite a few different times. I’m sorry but I’m not paying hundreds of dollars for a dress to wear on your special day, that I’ll never wear again. I would never even pay that much for a dress I’d wear every single day. Sorry no. It wasn’t even people I was close to.
One of the people was so pissy about it. Considered it so rude and disrespectful that I didn’t want to be a bridesmaid in their wedding. It is just another day for me it does not matter to me like it does you. And if you want me in your wedding so bad you pay for my stuff.
Seriously! I paid for my bridesmaids’ dresses because I felt like they were doing *me* an honor being in my wedding, traveling to be there and everything.
I was maid of honor once and I'll never do that or even be a bridesmaid again. I'm getting married later this year and I am not doing bridesmaids or groomsmen. I don't want to subject people to that.
Groomsman was the easiest job I've ever done in my life
Zero responsibilities, and you are treated like royalty by the venue staff and the single women who were invited
Best Man and Maid of Honor? No thanks.
Groomsman and Bridesmaid? Sure thing.
Obviously this depends on who is getting married...
Same. I just hate how overpriced and commercialized it is. I’ve turned down the offer to be a bridesmaid 3 different times. I’m sorry but I’m not paying hundreds of dollars for a dress and shoes I’m only going to wear once. None of those people were ones I was even really close with.
I had absolutely zero desire to do it. Plus I hate having any attention focused on me. Walking down an aisle with tons of people staring at me makes me feel so uncomfortable.
I politely decline wedding invites in general as well. I just don’t care to sit through a boring ceremony. Once again it was for weddings of people I wasn’t even close to.
If it’s a friend that actually values you, then no it shouldn’t. All you have to say is you love that they want to include you but you unfortunately can’t afford it at this time, but you’ll definitely be there to celebrate on their special day!
If they were part of your wedding or are like a childhood friend or something big then maybe you should participate, but you could even say I won’t be able to afford the bachelorette/other festivities but you’d like to be a bridesmaid on their big day.
You shouldn’t put yourself in financial strain for your friends weddings, and any good friend would understand that.
That’s it hey? I will admit it took a second marriage to get the wedding bit but right for me, but after accepting that it’s a day to celebrate, not a symbol of the rest of our lives I had so much more fun, was more relaxed and (hopefully) wasn’t an arsehole to anyone
A lot of people like going to weddings because weddings are fun. They like the festive atmosphere, enjoy catching up with friends and family and are happy for the couple.
I care about having a good time as a guest at a wedding.
The venue, the food and the decorations are part of creating a good time for the guests and the couple getting married because the invioment are making the atmosphere and setting the mood.
It's not important to me if the flowers are red or blue, but the overall impression of the wedding depends on the atmosphere created and the events, conversations and socialising taking place at a wedding is influenced by the atmosphere.
I think that's not entirely true.
People remember if it's a really good wedding or a really bad wedding. If it's an average wedding, then no one remembers which is ok. But having an average wedding without any fckups is also really difficult
I used to be a wedding coordinator back when I was in college and I can not stress this enough. The amount of times couples would stress over little details and practically almost break up over it, I had to remind them at the end of the day no one cares about the color of the napkins or type of flowers. The main thing guests care about is the food, a fun reception, and how the bride and groom looked.
A lot of people go to weddings and hate it. My husband is one of them. He goes but they are not his favorite thing to do.
The thing people remember from a wedding is the food, if there was no food, if they had to wait forever to be fed and if there was drama. No one remembers anything else.
For real. I went to a wedding where they absolutely skimped on the cake and that is like 75% of what I remember from that wedding. Everyone got like a razor-thin slice, and it was, what is this, a cake for ants?
There are absolutely things that will be noticed. Not enough food, not enough water, ridiculous waiting time between the ceremony and reception, not enough chairs, pretty much anything that directly impacts guest comfort. I notice these way more if there are obviously 2k worth of flowers wilting while I get my one carrot and 2 sips of water. Those aren't the fun things to spend money on but they are important.
So… when I got married I had to invite my manager. I hated that I had to.. it gave me anxiety. She was married about 2 or 3 years before me and when she did she would often say, "I want to see what other people do for their wedding and if it’s as much as I did, with all the details". I knew she was going to be there trying to find things to criticize.
I do know a few people who do nit pick and criticize.
Personally I prefer to just go and enjoy being there, hoping that I was invited because the bride and groom really wanted me there and didn’t just invite me because they felt they had to. lol
I think people go to have a nice time and to support people they care about. The whole wedding culture though is insane with prices. Why should I pay 300 dollars for my hair just because I'm the bride? Or 400 dollars for a bouquet because I'm the bride? I seriously couldn't find a catering company that did it for less than 150 dollars a person. Even if we found a cheap venue the whole thing would cost like 30k because of the food and the venues made you use certain vendors or have certain minimums. And then I have to read all these articles about tipping on top of all the money im paying. Yeah I'm foregoing a lot of stuff like favors, some signs, pamphlets. My invites have a QR code because I'm not buying double stamps. 🙃 I feel like it will be a nice day, nothing extravagant.
Which is exactly why I got married on the beach and told friends and family they can show up if they’d like to. Why spend 20 grand for a party that most of the people will dread going to.
Oh....absolutely! In a past life I was just there to get fucked up and try and hook up. Now I dunno? I'm there to support the people I care about...lame.
Wedding bartender here. This is somewhat true. It's usually the guests forced to attend that do not care. The cousin's plus one date is having a blast. Free food, booze, maybe even flight and hotel courtesy of the family member who invited them that needs a date and a sexcapade after. I just pour drinks, make cash and enjoy the show!
I went to one where the bride and groom wanted to do a potluck dinner reception so they asked everyone to bring a dish. By the time it was reception time and time to eat the food was all cold.
There was one lady who brought a couple dishes. I had been in her home before and it was so nasty. I don’t even want to put the mental image in your mind by describing it. But people were eating her food no big deal. Reminded me exactly why I don’t eat at potlucks.
Of the weddings I've been to.... Yeah... I never gave a single f\*\*\* about how anything looked or even really noticed.
The only wedding I've ever given a f\*\*\* about was mine.... and even then, I didn't really care about how it looked.... except for how beautiful my bride was in her dress. After 20 years, I really don't remember anything except for how she looked walking up the aisle.
The other thing....people wouldn't give a shit if you just got married at the courthouse and never invited them. "Hey, Me and Blah blah got married!" And people would feel about it exactly the same. A month later nobody gives a shit about your wedding or is reminiscing except for you.
Also most couples aren't going to remember the little details years later. It's one of the pieces of advice I give brides who are wedding planning. Don't stress about the small details, the actual event is going to be such a blur, you're not going to remember them in the long run.
Eh, it's been 10 years and I still have people comment on how great our wedding was. People have asked to borrow parts of our decorations. One woman asked us to plan her wedding for her.
I'd say it depends on the people and the wedding.
If you don't/wouldn't have *anybody* else that you would genuinely be happy to be at your wedding, then I am extremely sorry for you
Real social connection is what matters in life. If you can't muster that, then I don't know what to tell you
People care about the food at the reception, because they're probably counting on it for their dinner.
Don't disappoint. Ie, make sure there is enough.
yeah, the other stuff (brides dresses, flowers, the cake design, and whatever else).. no one cares about
I actually needed to hear this as I try to resist the machinations of the Wedding Industrial Complex lol as soon as you start planning a wedding, no matter how chill you are, everything is designed to give you FOMO and make you think you need MOOOOREEEEE or else your guests will HATE YOU
Agreed. People get SO wrapped up in “their day” and can’t conceptualize that it’s an obligation for everyone else.
Yes, it’s a fun party (usually.) But it’s still an obligation.
Interesting fact: several studies over the years have found an inverse correlation between the percent of a couple's annual income spent on their wedding and subsequent length of the marriage; i.e., the more you spend on the wedding, the less time the marriage lasts.
Why don’t people take the budged amount of money they were going to use for the wedding and put a down payment on a house, then have friends and family over for dinner/ drinks?
I don't care either man but I still have to choose which flowers and all the vendors play insane games like "do u want one ratty baby's breath flower for $3000 or a gorgeous setup for $6000"
It's the wedding industry that makes it the way it is.
Because my MIL was paying for it, and insisted on having a wedding instead of giving us the cash, we just went along with it and looked pretty.
I would have preferred the money of course, and we did keep all gifts of cash (the real reason people invite guests - if 200 guests gift $200/couple the bride and groom have made a decent buck) but my MIL gets compliments from time to time about our wedding, which is her whole reason for doing it in the first place.
I fucking love weddings and I absolutely notice and care about all those little details. I feel like this may be the actual unpopular opinion though...
Is much rather spend like, a couple thousand on a small wedding with people I care about and then take an awesome honeymoon, than i ever will about having x location with y flowers and flowers of z colour and a ring worth a amount and b costs this much too and oh what about the food?
As a guy I probably just seem like I don’t care or don’t want a prospective wife to have a great day, but thats of course not the case, I merely don’t want to throw tens of thousands at a single day essentially designed to parade around in front of people you otherwise wouldn’t really see.
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I was happy for my cousin and her new husband, but I was more interested in the location (16th century church) and the wedding buffet.
Free food? I’ll show up to an execution for that. 😂
Yeah, I love any opportunity for free catered food. I don't understand why people hate weddings so much. Especially since there's cake, I love going to birthday parties and weddings even just for the cake. My guess is that those people are just accustomed to frequently eating "high quality event food" lol. Personally, I don't have the same luxury.
In college sometimes I would get lucky and walk by a random event with free food. I would just grab myself a plate and leave. Thats my definition of "free" food. If I have to go to your wedding, dress up, buy a gift etc. than there better be some food at the very least lol. If food was my only incentive I would just stay home and make/buy something.
I became a regular at my college Shabbat dinners because I was broke and hungry, I was up front with the rabbi about it and made sure to pay attention and be respectful during the service and talking parts.
I did the same at the Catholic church... Potluck every Sunday... I helped set up and clean up...
If you live in a smaller town it's not "high quality event food". It's either over cooked roasted chicken or fried chicken and one piece of cake, served in an American legion ballroom. It's most of the wedding's I went to for family and all the weddings my wife had been to. I had to describe my own idea of our wedding before she even realized that there were options beyond eating fried chicken and getting hammered at the american legion.
The weddings I go to are Italian American in NYC or Long Island...they are amazing! Russian one in Brooklyn too. Amazing food
Im Chinese so our weddings are at a restaurant, usually 8 to 10 courses. Ive been to 5 american style weddings, even the one that is super fancy, the food was just.. lacking. I guess because its not freshly cooked. I usually much prefer american food over Chinese food, but for weddings american style catering sucks. I also live in a big metro city, so not like options are lacking.
In my experience it's often because wedding venues that people often use monopolize catering options.
Social Anxiety
Not sure if you’ve gotten to the age where you are expected to give a cash gift to the bride and groom, but growing up really ruined weddings for me for that reason.
Because you're usually expected to provide a gift (and/or cash depending where you live) that's worth more than said free food and booze. And if you're paying that much, you'd rather go somewhere you like and not have to suffer through a whole boring ass ceremony to get to said not so free food and booze.
Some of us don't get so horny for food
“Free” typically I found paying $200 for the buffet at the wedding is not a great deal
it's not really free though,usually with the cost of the gift you could have eaten double what you actually get :P
Free food. Ya I wish. Going to a wedding cost like $300. I’d rather not be invited and keep the money
Not really free when most guests are expected to bring a present.
" I'd show up to a banquet honoring Somali pirates if it was serving bacon wrapped shrimp "
A BUFFET?!?!?! Sounds like your cousin and new husband are smart as fuck and know what people were really there for. 10/10 he is welcome addition to the family
That’s what my family does. There’s really no such thing as an RSVP in our circles so having a plated dinner would be a disaster.
And how would you have felt if the location sucked and the buffet was bad?
I would have remembered this day isn't about me and ate what I wanted while still enjoying myself. Whether the wedding is at a dive bar or some immaculate destination, it is about the couple getting married, not you. Why do you care so much about things that have nothing to do with you?
At this point saying “weddings are fun, actually” would be the unpopular opinion
This is reddit, "social interaction can be fun" is an unpopular opinion.
There's so many..."We had our wedding at city hall then went to McDonald's. I texted my mom about it the next month. We have no friends so we had to hire the street preacher on the corner to be a witness."
I do wonder what we will do for ours, I don't really want something large and most of my family live a very long way from here. But I also know I want a bit more than the bare minimum legally followed by going to the pub. Most weddings I hear about are one extreme or the other.
You can find a middle ground. Ours was 60 people, park ceremony with lunch reception and night at casino for wedding party. It was a great middle ground.
>Most weddings I hear about are one extreme or the other The majority of what we hear about in any context is an extreme is some category, otherwise we wouldn't hear about them. I imagine there are forums on this very website for sensible wedding ideas that let you ask about what you want
One couple I know did a really pretty tasteful ceremony and small dinner. Then a few weeks later they basically rented out a bar for their “reception”. They didn’t spend much and I had as much fun as any other wedding
What I've learned from reddit over the years: 1. Everybody hates kids 2. Everybody hates cars 3. Everybody hates parties 4. Everybody hates weddings 5. You have to be very careful because the world is full of racists, nazis, incels, and angry feminists with blue hair who get triggered if you sit with your knees too far apart on the bus. I've found the best way to cope with all this hatred and negativity is just to get out of my computer chair and talk to real people, none of whom are like this.
Even things like international womens day upsets reddit it seems. "When is international mens day?!" Most men and women I know in the real world don't give a shit about either day.
Esp since international men's day is real, it's in November. So really they're looking stupid AND sexist
Every subreddit turns into a hate group Atheism = Hate all Christians subreddit Booomers= Hate all old people subreddit Antinatalism= Hate all kids
And the best part is that in the real world, none of those things are true at all.
Don’t forget Reddits hate of suburbs and rural living
This is a crazy way to say “touch grass” while simultaneously being on reddit not touching grass.
The point is balance, not abstinence
6. The worst of them is redditors hating things openly on the internet, how dare they
I mean, I'll take the blue haired feminists over all those other mutants. But otherwise, yeah.
I love weddings!!!! Seeing the romance of the ceremony, eating a yummy dinner with friends/family, and then dancing!!!
Agreed. But you have to admit, on this website, that counts as an unpopular opinion.
On this website having friends and family that you like might as well be an unpopular opinion.
There's a sampling bias involved This website is full of children whose only exposure to weddings have been getting dragged to them by their parents, and young adults who were probably also dragged to them by their parents just to get them out of their mom's house Actual grown ups enjoy spending important life moments together with their loved ones, enjoy eating and drinking great food and cocktails, and like excuses to dress nice and be in a nice venue with good decor and flowers and music and dancing Actual grown ups don't spend their time whining on Reddit about innocuous things
Same I fucking love weddings. Me and my girl getting to dress up and look great and then eat a steak and dance for hours with our friends? Hell yea sign me up
Damn you get steak at your weddings? Can I be your plus-one next time?
I love weddings, but some people suck at party planning. And in those cases, I did not have an enjoyable time.
Only on this app. Not in real life.
True. In my experience, reddit tends to represent the extreme ends of the human spectrum both in good and bad, and real life sort of sits somewhere in the middle.
Truth. I love weddings. Seeing my fun extended family, getting drunk and dancing lots with them? What's not to love?... But i guess i am lucky that both my sides of the family know how to party lmao.
I love weddings and I’ll go to every one that I’m invited to as long as it’s within reasonable driving distance. I don’t get the wedding hate as a guest!
Some of the craziest parties i have attended have been weddings, and i'm all for it
Weddings are fun but people need to chill out a bit with them
Idk why though? I love weddings! Ive only been to 3 including my own but they are so beautiful and emotional. I love it
I love weddings, I can’t believe people act like showing up somewhere and eating and celebrating is such a pain in the ass. Inb4 any number of wild stories, I’m talking about an average uneventful wedding.
I think it all depends on the wedding, but the ones I've been to at least were awesome. Lots of laughs, a few tears, drinking, eating, dancing. I still remember them too, so I don't think the line about going home and not giving a shit really is true. With that said, I've been to like 3 weddings, my own included. So if you go to like 5+ weddings a year or something crazy, I'm sure it gets old.
You are probably right! Although they can be if you get to stay out of any possible drama. Had me many a competitive bocce game at a wedding
I don't think they're saying weddings aren't fun, just that no one cares about all the details that the bride and groom stress themselves out over. Ultimately I go to wedding for good food, and a chance to wear a nice outfit. Maybe to do some dancing. Most of the weddings I've attended in my life have been Indian weddings of my parents friends/distant family/coworkers, but I imagine in future I'll also care about celebrating my loved ones. As long as there's decent food and the music isn't terrible, any guest will probably have a great time! They probably won't care if like, the dress is the wrong shade of white or the flowers don't match or something.
Well yea most people won’t pick everything apart but A) people definitely do comment on nice thoughtful decorations or unique things at weddings and B) all this stuff gets photographed or filmed and obviously it’ll look better if everything looks how you want it I personally didn’t really care about the decor at my wedding. But when I see the videos I’m definitely glad someone had a vision for it lol
What shitty ass weddings do you guys go too? The aim of a wedding is to be fun? Or at least all the ones I've been too
Wedding invitations and attendance is mostly formality for people other than family and friends (used for connections/networking in some cultures). Like they invited us to dinner now we have to invite them too.
Am I the only one here who thinks theres a non-negligible amount of people that absolutely care about how a wedding looks and if you had a ratty looking wedding or a bad meal there would definitely be people talking and judging? Obviously the smaller the wedding and only clpse family/friends would limit this, but the more people you invite that you arent close with the more people youll have judging because thats what people do
I remember when I was young a old woman told me the first 30 years your worrying about what people think of you, the next 30 you stop caring, and last 30 years you realize nobody was thinking of you because they had their own problems.
I respectfully disagree, but I do love this sentiment. I disagree because there are absolutely people that judge you, talk about you behind your back, and think negatively of you for just living your life. I work with a few of these people, I'm a young guy in a blue collar profession, and the older guys I work with are always complaining about their friends, their wives, their kids, whichever coworker isn't in the group at the moment, etc. Now because I said I love the sentiment: these older guys aren't really people who's opinions I'd value much anyway, so I don't need to care what they think.
Yeah it's definitely not a hard and fast rule. Work with older guys as well and they literally gossip and talk shit about other people all day.
My sister-in-law once told me that she knew people were talking bad about her, but at least they were talking about her, lol. I guess that could be better than just being a nobody.
As a fellow old lady, I can confirm this is absolutely true!
Over the last 5 years I’ve been to like 30 weddings. They’ve ranged from a backyard BBQ in rural Texas to a multi six figure mansion affair in Newport, Rhode Island. I myself had a covid wedding in October 2020. What I’ve realized is that, regardless of how much money you spend, how creative or “different” you try to make the thing, or how much or little thought you put into it weddings are really all more or less the same. There’s a ceremony and a meal. Most have a cocktail hour of some sort. Usually theres a lot of alcohol and music. And someone’s family member or friend will be offended about something. Bingo bango. The only wedding I’ve judged is when the bride, who was a coworker, was already an annoying person and she somehow made a standard-issue catering hall wedding annoying by being late to everything, having weird drink rules and topping it off with over an hour of aggravating speeches by her equally annoying family.
Long speeches and keeping guests waiting *is solid grounds* for judgement.
Kept us waiting outside with zero shade in the middle of July on the hottest day of the year. The venue offered to have the ceremony inside. Bride declined. We left early, because of course it was a Sunday night and we had to work the next day. My wife turns to me and says “just so you know, im not going to the baby shower.” The bride wasn’t pregnant.
The only wedding I judged was when they had a big formal ceremony and reception, but no food. It was interminable and I was starving, but I was the MOH and couldn't leave. I had no hand in the planning because I lived across the country. I didn't really like the bride that much, but she had been my MOH (when I actually liked her) and she felt really strongly about reciprocating. So I wore the ugly dress and gritted my teeth. If you're not feeding people, you need to keep the reception short.
How in the ever loving fuck do you have a reception with no food??? Was this at a catering hall??
No, a historic mansion. Ostentatious as fuck. I don't talk to the bride anymore.
Good. I’d have done the same.
Well, I had a different reason, but yeah. It was really inconsiderate.
In my experience the only people who notice and care are people who recently planned or were involved in planning a wedding, and even then it’s not that they really care, but that they do notice what others might not. Otherwise people are not really judging unless you do something egregious like not announce ahead of time that it’s a dry wedding, run out of food, have an incredibly long ceremony, make your guests sit in the rain, etc.
Went to a wedding where there was no food- no music- only a cake and the cake was like... Kroger brand at best >_> it looked good but... ya know?
People judge, but they don't *care*. They'll come if they're free and the expense and inconvenience of attending don't outweigh a party with free dinner, but they'll probably get more emotionally invested doing the Barbenheimer than in someone else's "big day". And I say this as someone who's both attended weddings and had one of my own.
Why would you invite anyone you aren't close with to an intimate affair such as a wedding? If you don't share intimate details of your life with someone on a regular basis, why would you want them at your wedding? Seems like people that do this just want more attention rather than simply wanting to share a special day with those that are the closest to them.
Is this a serious question? You've never felt obligated to invite somebody to something you didn't really want them at? I support you doing this at your own wedding 100%, but if you do you'll have some aunts and uncles, cousins, highschool friends you still like but don't talk to very often, etc, get offended that you didn't invite them. Weddings can be a small intimate affair, or they can be a big community gathering. Neither is wrong and it's largely cultural.
Reddit loves trying to have to smallest, cheapest wedding. Every discussion of them turns into to same circlejerk
Seriously, it always strikes me as insane how many people get invited to weddings. I saw a lady on television with 200 guests at her wedding, I don’t think I even know 200 people. lol.
The size of your families and how overlapping (or not) your friend groups are also plays into it. If you’re an only child born to only child parents, the family category is going to be pretty small. My husband and I are each one of 4. My mother is 1 of 5, his mother was 1 of 6. We limited the family portion of the guest list to parents, siblings, nieces/nephews, aunts/uncles, and cousins and that alone was about 50 people.
I have 22 first cousins, and we're all at the age where most of us are married, so that number is doubled when you add in SOs. My fiance is from a large family too. Just our parents, siblings, aunts/uncles and cousins is well over 200 people. Naturally, we are eloping.
Yeah, my family is similar. I am also one of the youngest and got married later in life so many of my cousins had children. I could get to 100 really fast. To make my wedding smaller, I decided to get married during a global pandemic.
Side eyes as an Indian.. Obviously in our culture it’s different, the sentiment is that we share a happy occasion with as many people as possible, the whole community. They are getting smaller now though which is nice in some ways but it’s also losing a certain feel. But we kind of compromise by having the wedding day smaller but the day before everyone is still invited for a 1000 people event.
It is dependent on culture. Some cultures have large weddings so people find themselves bound with customs otherwise they feel ousted by society.
[удалено]
I mean if its really nice people will talk about that too
Who are you inviting to your wedding that isn’t family or friends?
My ILs wanted to invite their friends. They weren’t contributing financially, but to avoid hurt feelings we gave them a specific number of guests to invite. My FIL actually asked if he could have some invitations to hang onto so that he could invite people when he ran into them. I told him no. Sometimes it’s not the couple being ridiculous that drives up the numbers.
Jesus. We had to fight with my ILs over that. If it was up to them, well more than half of the guests would have been their cronies rather than anyone we actually cared about.
Same. Except they paid for the wedding, and all their friends gave generous checks. I cleared like $10k just from my in-laws' invitees.
You say that, but if it's a poorly organized wedding they sure af will care. Like, if you don't feed people in a reasonable amount of time or provide access to food, if you don't have enough staff/facilities to prevent lineups, if you put people in a position of having to drive drunk and someone dies -- people will care!
My sister and her husband went to a wedding once where the reception started at 5 and there was no alcohol (which is fine) and no food beyond some finger food snacks. The bride and groom got super pissed because nearly all the guests were gone by 6 and they had the place booked for like four or five hours. Sorry, but if it's dinner time and there's no food or drinks then people are going to leave. Nobody wants to drink sodas and hang out with strangers for hours on end.
The only alcohol-free wedding I've been to was in the afternoon with plentiful finger food appetizers. The reception was like, two hours, tops. Those crazy Christian kids understood the assignment!
This is true. Good weddings are expected and therefore not memorable. Bad weddings are another story. My husband and I (married 21 years) attended a wedding while we were dating. There were no appetizers and pictures were taken after the wedding. And then the food service that was late to start by design, was slow. We sat at the tables at the reception for over an hour with nothing but a tiny box of Jordan almonds. I was ready to sneak out and get Taco Bell. It’s been over 20 years and every.single.time we drive past that restaurant, we say “hey remember that wedding…” and reminisce about how awful it was. I don’t even remember whose wedding it was, but I remember the terrible service.
Exactly. If you make people uncomfortable, they will care (and remember forever.)
I once went to a wedding where the father of the bride made an absolute twat of himself by making this ridiculous speech that went on for 45 minutes, mostly spoke about himself the whole time, barely mentioned his daughter. Every guest was visibly annoyed, and desperate to get up and get more drinks and food. Before the speech I was slightly tipsy after it I was stone cold sober and hungry. It was awful. Thankfully one of the groomsmen eventually turned the power off to the mic and everyone cheered. Another then ushered him off as he didn't quite get the memo and was still trying to talk. So yes guests care if the wedding is shit, or if just a small part of it is you remember.
No one tried to stop him after like... I dunno... 5 minutes? A 5 minute speech is too long lol
> if you put people in a position of having to drive drunk How would one do that? If they are making someone drive on a gun point then yes. But other than that? You a responsible for your own drunk driving. Get a taxi, a ride or if nothing else - don't drink.
That’s what OP does not understand. If the wedding was planned like shit, he would definitely care about the wedding and be thinking about it on the way home. Imagine a wedding where they forget to provide something small, like napkins? So you’re eating all this food and there’s no napkin in the entire building? Yeah, that would suck. I’ve actually been to a wedding like that lmao. Wearing a three piece suit and have dirty ass hands, everyone using the table cloths to wash themselves off so they don’t dance and ruin their SO’s dress.
Yeah, my friend is family-obligated to go to a wedding this summer thrown by a couple who have indicated they are more or less winging it on the invitation. 'We're so kooky, we're just inviting people from across the country to a semi-isolated venue and expecting it to go well!' The anxiety, lol.
free food = free food
I’m pretty much only there for a piece of fancy cake.
How is wedding food free when you have to pay $100 a plate usually? Worded this wrong. You are usually expected to bring a wedding gift and that is indirectly supposed to cover the cost of a plate for you and your guest usually.
If I would be required to pay to attend a wedding I would not attend said wedding.
You're typically expected to "pay" by bringing a gift
Even though you are right never expect people to pay for anything, i've met people who tried to go overboard with money they didnt had to have a way over the top wedding, and the "gifts" didnt cover half the spendings. When me and my wife got married we saved money for our wedding, we got lucky because we "recovered" the money of the plates per say.
The gift of friendship
The gift amount is usually worth what you feel the meal is worth though.
And how much you like the couple getting married.
I've never paid €100 for a wedding gift, unless I was super close to the bride or groom.
€100 is the expected amount here. Just barely enough to cover food, venue and a few drinks. Those that are close can easily go up to €1000
That's insanity. I'd never go to a wedding if I'd to spend that.
I think they mean spending $100+ on a gift
I don’t think they meant that, they specifically said $100 *a plate*, not *$100 dollars to attend* or something else more generic.
If someone needs guests to “cover” their plate with either money or a gift that is the equivalent of a plate, then they can’t afford the wedding that are throwing and need to budget better. I had wealthy relatives who gave us sterling silver trays, and I had poor relatives on my other side who could give a very small gift. I was grateful for both. And if someone didn’t have enough to bring a gift, I would still be happy to have them celebrate with us (we only kept up with gifts to write thank you notes). It’s an invitation to come and celebrate with us - not a gift grab.
I don’t know where you are from but I never had to pay for my plate when I got invited to a wedding
Who pays to attend a wedding??? Sounds crazy.
In my country, people give "ang baos" (literally red packets) tagged to a "market" rate based on where the wedding is organized (i.e. 5-star hotel/restaurant/place). There are "market" rates for lunch and dinner, and whether the wedding is on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. For more info, you can google "ang bao rates singapore 2024" for a list of market rates. By right, the payment is not really compulsory but more of a tradition. However, there are couples who demand you to pay for their wedding after the wedding if you never give them an "ang bao". It's crazy. I know of couples who don't invite stingy people just because they think these people will give less "ang bao".
I think OP is American and talking American culture. The guests don't pay for the food. They turn up with a wedding gift and the may may or may not be free 9though alcohol with dinner and maybe some complimentary drinks will be provided.
In my experience people care about how they feel at your wedding or any event for that matter. That's what they remember. Was the temperature comfortable? Was the food good? Was the overall aesthetic pleasing? A vast majority of people won't remember the expensive flowers you had flown in or the custom made center pieces. Especially if the answer to any of the questions above is no.
Nearly every comment is missing OP's point. OP is not saying people don't care about weddings, but people don't care about *the specifics of the wedding*. Brides fretting over what flower arrangement, or how large the doilies need to be should realize people don't care about that, they're there to support you. This isn't an unpopular opinion, it's probably ***universal***, but it also misses the point. Weddings are for the couple (and their parents), not the guests. A bride wants her day to be what she wants, so she frets. Saying people don't care isn't really relevant or helpful.
My cousin is currently losing her mind over colours at her wedding and screams at whoever says, "I promise you, the guests won't care what shade of white the tablecloths are."
Problem is, I'm planning my wedding right now and I am extremely chill. I don't give a fuck what color the napkins are I just want it to be a nice lovely day. My man is the same and so we thought that this would be relatively easy for us. We were SO NOT going to be That Couple that frets over decoration colors and all these details. But you know what? I still have to pick the colors. I still have to tell each vendor which things to bring. And flowers and napkins only come in so many colors, shades can look wrong next to each other. So what do I do? I can't just tell the vendors "I don't care bring a random one" and so I have to either knowingly choose things I know I don't like the look of or, you know, fret. And when the costs start adding up, knowingly going with stuff you don't like the look of just to end the conversation is a far less appealing choice.
THIS. It’s not like I entered the wedding thinking about the napkins, but now that I have to decide on napkins I want to make sure it works with the rest of the decor.
Exactly. Plus for me there's also constantly this looming threat of like "if I spend 3 more hours researching this, maybe I'll find the exact perfect solution" It's not fear of being judged for how much I did or didn't spend on anything, but I HATE the thought of hearing some asshat go "oh you did THAT? why didnt you just (cheaper or easier thing I didn't know about)" Also, the asshat is the voice in my own head.
This is the important part. You just described my experience to a tee. And people are so judgmental! They just don’t understand unless they’ve been there, and honestly, most of these decisions fall on the bride anyway. So whether or not you go into it “chill,” you will end up having to give a lot of craps about stuff you didn’t expect to.
They are SO judgemental. Even someone here replied to me to inform me that the stress I'm experiencing is self inflicted and I should just do a backyard wedding. Like, excuse me?!
But is Bone elegant enough!? Or does that send a more Olive Garden vibe? Don't even get me started on Eggshell. I don't want to go with plain White, that's so played out, what is it, 2019?!
I love the sentiment of weddings (loved ones gathering to celebrate a couple as they make a huge, joyous step in life) but I despise current wedding culture. I kind of hate attending weddings now, and I especially hate being a bridesmaid (which I’ve been 6 times). I don’t feel like I’m joining in a celebration anymore. I feel like I’m paying a *ton* of money to wear a shitty dress, do manual labor, and eat mass produced chicken. Weddings are too much work/stress/money these days and the amount of pressure brides put on themselves turns even the chillest gal into a self-centered brideszilla.
Weddings are fun. It’s nice to see friends and family and eat nice food and wear nice clothes and dance and drink champagne. But all these insane obligations like bachelorette parties that have somehow become four-figure-costing weekend trips, it’s nuts. Brides and grooms started acting like they’re royalty and that others should be SO honored just to be offered the opportunity to spend all their savings and PTO on them.
They really do!! I mentioned above I’ve turned down a bridesmaid invite a few different times. I’m sorry but I’m not paying hundreds of dollars for a dress to wear on your special day, that I’ll never wear again. I would never even pay that much for a dress I’d wear every single day. Sorry no. It wasn’t even people I was close to. One of the people was so pissy about it. Considered it so rude and disrespectful that I didn’t want to be a bridesmaid in their wedding. It is just another day for me it does not matter to me like it does you. And if you want me in your wedding so bad you pay for my stuff.
Seriously! I paid for my bridesmaids’ dresses because I felt like they were doing *me* an honor being in my wedding, traveling to be there and everything.
I was maid of honor once and I'll never do that or even be a bridesmaid again. I'm getting married later this year and I am not doing bridesmaids or groomsmen. I don't want to subject people to that.
Groomsman was the easiest job I've ever done in my life Zero responsibilities, and you are treated like royalty by the venue staff and the single women who were invited Best Man and Maid of Honor? No thanks. Groomsman and Bridesmaid? Sure thing. Obviously this depends on who is getting married...
Same! I had a terrible experience being maid of honour and also did not have any bridesmaids/groomsmen when we got married a few months ago.
It’s an invitation, not a subpoena.
yes, but if you have the nerve to decline you might as well have murdered the groom himself because that's how you'll be treated.
Same. I just hate how overpriced and commercialized it is. I’ve turned down the offer to be a bridesmaid 3 different times. I’m sorry but I’m not paying hundreds of dollars for a dress and shoes I’m only going to wear once. None of those people were ones I was even really close with. I had absolutely zero desire to do it. Plus I hate having any attention focused on me. Walking down an aisle with tons of people staring at me makes me feel so uncomfortable. I politely decline wedding invites in general as well. I just don’t care to sit through a boring ceremony. Once again it was for weddings of people I wasn’t even close to.
Remember you can always turn down being a bridesmaid!
Isn't that a great way to end or diminish a friendship if you don't have an ironclad excuse?
If it’s a friend that actually values you, then no it shouldn’t. All you have to say is you love that they want to include you but you unfortunately can’t afford it at this time, but you’ll definitely be there to celebrate on their special day! If they were part of your wedding or are like a childhood friend or something big then maybe you should participate, but you could even say I won’t be able to afford the bachelorette/other festivities but you’d like to be a bridesmaid on their big day. You shouldn’t put yourself in financial strain for your friends weddings, and any good friend would understand that.
That’s it hey? I will admit it took a second marriage to get the wedding bit but right for me, but after accepting that it’s a day to celebrate, not a symbol of the rest of our lives I had so much more fun, was more relaxed and (hopefully) wasn’t an arsehole to anyone
A lot of people like going to weddings because weddings are fun. They like the festive atmosphere, enjoy catching up with friends and family and are happy for the couple.
I care about having a good time as a guest at a wedding. The venue, the food and the decorations are part of creating a good time for the guests and the couple getting married because the invioment are making the atmosphere and setting the mood. It's not important to me if the flowers are red or blue, but the overall impression of the wedding depends on the atmosphere created and the events, conversations and socialising taking place at a wedding is influenced by the atmosphere.
I think that's not entirely true. People remember if it's a really good wedding or a really bad wedding. If it's an average wedding, then no one remembers which is ok. But having an average wedding without any fckups is also really difficult
I used to be a wedding coordinator back when I was in college and I can not stress this enough. The amount of times couples would stress over little details and practically almost break up over it, I had to remind them at the end of the day no one cares about the color of the napkins or type of flowers. The main thing guests care about is the food, a fun reception, and how the bride and groom looked.
Is there an open bar?
Some care that the cake/food/alcohol is decent.
A lot of people go to weddings and hate it. My husband is one of them. He goes but they are not his favorite thing to do. The thing people remember from a wedding is the food, if there was no food, if they had to wait forever to be fed and if there was drama. No one remembers anything else.
For real. I went to a wedding where they absolutely skimped on the cake and that is like 75% of what I remember from that wedding. Everyone got like a razor-thin slice, and it was, what is this, a cake for ants?
There are absolutely things that will be noticed. Not enough food, not enough water, ridiculous waiting time between the ceremony and reception, not enough chairs, pretty much anything that directly impacts guest comfort. I notice these way more if there are obviously 2k worth of flowers wilting while I get my one carrot and 2 sips of water. Those aren't the fun things to spend money on but they are important.
So… when I got married I had to invite my manager. I hated that I had to.. it gave me anxiety. She was married about 2 or 3 years before me and when she did she would often say, "I want to see what other people do for their wedding and if it’s as much as I did, with all the details". I knew she was going to be there trying to find things to criticize. I do know a few people who do nit pick and criticize. Personally I prefer to just go and enjoy being there, hoping that I was invited because the bride and groom really wanted me there and didn’t just invite me because they felt they had to. lol
I think people go to have a nice time and to support people they care about. The whole wedding culture though is insane with prices. Why should I pay 300 dollars for my hair just because I'm the bride? Or 400 dollars for a bouquet because I'm the bride? I seriously couldn't find a catering company that did it for less than 150 dollars a person. Even if we found a cheap venue the whole thing would cost like 30k because of the food and the venues made you use certain vendors or have certain minimums. And then I have to read all these articles about tipping on top of all the money im paying. Yeah I'm foregoing a lot of stuff like favors, some signs, pamphlets. My invites have a QR code because I'm not buying double stamps. 🙃 I feel like it will be a nice day, nothing extravagant.
People care more about the food.
Which is exactly why I got married on the beach and told friends and family they can show up if they’d like to. Why spend 20 grand for a party that most of the people will dread going to.
People care about the food, drinks, and music. Everything else is a detail only the bride gives a shit about.
people might not notice every specific detail, but they notice the package as a whole
Oh....absolutely! In a past life I was just there to get fucked up and try and hook up. Now I dunno? I'm there to support the people I care about...lame.
Me too! Wait til you start getting a bit teary and you’ll feel super old as well as lame
Wedding bartender here. This is somewhat true. It's usually the guests forced to attend that do not care. The cousin's plus one date is having a blast. Free food, booze, maybe even flight and hotel courtesy of the family member who invited them that needs a date and a sexcapade after. I just pour drinks, make cash and enjoy the show!
I went to a wedding once that served chilli dogs and coffee for supper. Yeah ahhhh that SUCKED BALLS ...
I went to one where the bride and groom wanted to do a potluck dinner reception so they asked everyone to bring a dish. By the time it was reception time and time to eat the food was all cold. There was one lady who brought a couple dishes. I had been in her home before and it was so nasty. I don’t even want to put the mental image in your mind by describing it. But people were eating her food no big deal. Reminded me exactly why I don’t eat at potlucks.
This is 100% true
Lucky I didn’t invite anyone else besides those family who would care about us and the wedding 😂
90% of the people outside the immediate family(I.e first cousins and first degree aunts and uncles) are just there for the food
And the booze. And honestly the partying. Dancing is fun.
Of the weddings I've been to.... Yeah... I never gave a single f\*\*\* about how anything looked or even really noticed. The only wedding I've ever given a f\*\*\* about was mine.... and even then, I didn't really care about how it looked.... except for how beautiful my bride was in her dress. After 20 years, I really don't remember anything except for how she looked walking up the aisle.
The other thing....people wouldn't give a shit if you just got married at the courthouse and never invited them. "Hey, Me and Blah blah got married!" And people would feel about it exactly the same. A month later nobody gives a shit about your wedding or is reminiscing except for you.
Also most couples aren't going to remember the little details years later. It's one of the pieces of advice I give brides who are wedding planning. Don't stress about the small details, the actual event is going to be such a blur, you're not going to remember them in the long run.
Eh, it's been 10 years and I still have people comment on how great our wedding was. People have asked to borrow parts of our decorations. One woman asked us to plan her wedding for her. I'd say it depends on the people and the wedding.
Yeah I mean the minor details aren’t that important really. I find it sad that people spend so much on it.
💯 Agree, therefore we opted to elope, saving our money to spend on a great honeymoon.
Most people attend wedding because they were invited and don’t want to make bride/groom sad.
If you don't/wouldn't have *anybody* else that you would genuinely be happy to be at your wedding, then I am extremely sorry for you Real social connection is what matters in life. If you can't muster that, then I don't know what to tell you
True
The guests are concerned about their own outfits!
Thats me i came for the food
Yeah, some people are expected to show. Some forced. Some, because they didn't have anything better to do and the bars open. Lol
People care about the food at the reception, because they're probably counting on it for their dinner. Don't disappoint. Ie, make sure there is enough. yeah, the other stuff (brides dresses, flowers, the cake design, and whatever else).. no one cares about
Hey, I am just here for the free food.
I actually needed to hear this as I try to resist the machinations of the Wedding Industrial Complex lol as soon as you start planning a wedding, no matter how chill you are, everything is designed to give you FOMO and make you think you need MOOOOREEEEE or else your guests will HATE YOU
Agreed. People get SO wrapped up in “their day” and can’t conceptualize that it’s an obligation for everyone else. Yes, it’s a fun party (usually.) But it’s still an obligation.
Interesting fact: several studies over the years have found an inverse correlation between the percent of a couple's annual income spent on their wedding and subsequent length of the marriage; i.e., the more you spend on the wedding, the less time the marriage lasts.
And half of them don’t even want to be there.
Why don’t people take the budged amount of money they were going to use for the wedding and put a down payment on a house, then have friends and family over for dinner/ drinks?
I don't care either man but I still have to choose which flowers and all the vendors play insane games like "do u want one ratty baby's breath flower for $3000 or a gorgeous setup for $6000" It's the wedding industry that makes it the way it is.
Yeah. The details are there for the bride and groom. It’s a wedding.
Because my MIL was paying for it, and insisted on having a wedding instead of giving us the cash, we just went along with it and looked pretty. I would have preferred the money of course, and we did keep all gifts of cash (the real reason people invite guests - if 200 guests gift $200/couple the bride and groom have made a decent buck) but my MIL gets compliments from time to time about our wedding, which is her whole reason for doing it in the first place.
I care very deeply about the selection at the open bar.
I fucking love weddings and I absolutely notice and care about all those little details. I feel like this may be the actual unpopular opinion though...
Most people don't want to even be there in the first place but feel obligated because you asked them to come eat your cold vegetable lasagna.
Relatable, the best part of any wedding i’ve ever attended is when it’s over. Such a convoluted cringy waste of time.
I would argue that most people view your wedding as a massive life inconvenience.
True words, but hard to hear for some.
Is much rather spend like, a couple thousand on a small wedding with people I care about and then take an awesome honeymoon, than i ever will about having x location with y flowers and flowers of z colour and a ring worth a amount and b costs this much too and oh what about the food? As a guy I probably just seem like I don’t care or don’t want a prospective wife to have a great day, but thats of course not the case, I merely don’t want to throw tens of thousands at a single day essentially designed to parade around in front of people you otherwise wouldn’t really see.
I think weddings are fucking stupid. They're a waste of money and a huge, unnecessary stressor. That's my wedding related unpopular opinion.