In a recent half-hearted troll attack, someone added my Return Of Kings email to the Martha Stewart living newsletters. It was a surprisingly enlightening experience—besides getting some great recipes for my slow cooker, I was exposed to the ridiculous “Martha Stewart Weddings” list, a daily email with advertisements about how to spend more and indulge yourself for “your big day.”
Guys, listen up. If you put a ring on your girl’s finger despite our slut-promoting culture, well-established divorce industrial complex, and pervasive portrayals of married men as incompetent and powerless dweebs, she is already winning the game. Despite all of these advantages, if your woman insists on having a large, extravagant wedding, it’s in your best interests to end the relationship as quickly as you can.
Fancy weddings are the ultimate exercise of narcissism and commercialism in modern society. It’s been observed countless times that women in the west want to get married, but they do not want to be married. They want the year-long attention of being in “wedding planning mode,” culminating in the ultimate party where they are the supreme princess for the day. When it comes to fulfilling a role as a wife and mother, though, they will suddenly balk at any mention of tradition. Her unilateral insistence upon a large wedding reflects especially poorly on her character in these ways:
1. Financial Irresponsibility
The average american wedding costs $28,000. The median U.S. household income is $44,000. For anyone besides the super-rich, how can throwing a big party to commemorate your financial castration at the hands of the state be considered anything but irresponsible? Your sweetie would rather squander money (often much of it yours) on a lavish celebration rather than investments such as buying a house, saving for retirement, or traveling the world to educate yourselves. An expensive, pointless wedding is the ultimate display of low future-time orientation, a bad trait for someone to whom you’re pledging half your future earnings in a legally binding contract.
2. Selfishness
Have you ever seen a dead-eyed man dutifully trying to choose between yellow and goldenrod for his wedding’s place settings? Men don’t enjoy planning weddings. Though they make up half of a marriage partnership (and usually more financially-speaking), a preference for a courthouse or a small ceremony is almost always ignored because it’s “her day.” This sets a poor precedent for future decisions you will make as a couple. If you give a mouse a cookie…
3. Herd mentality
Though the silliness of the modern wedding ceremony are fairly easy to elucidate, women are more susceptible to the whims and opinions of those around them. Disney movies have taught her from childhood that she deserves a grand storybook wedding. Her friends goad her into one-upsmanship by showing off their expensive engagement rings on Facebook and Instagram. Her parents want to bring the entire extended family to the ceremony to show off their success at raising a well-adjusted little girl. And the aforementioned popular media normalizes the extravagance and consumerism of the experience by suggesting she is somehow abnormal or deficient if she doesn’t keep up with the joneses.
If you’ve committed yourself to getting married in western society, you’ve already made a tremendously risky move. If your woman insists that you dump a bunch of your hard-earned money into what amounts to a one-sided victory party, you know unequivocally that she will not make a good partner in the long run. Get out while you still can.
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