This is my first time posting on this particular board, but I just saw something that made me gag on Facebook and I just had to share it. Girl gets engaged around Valentines Day, posts multiple times about planning her summer wedding, then changes her relationship status to “married” today and changes her last name. She then posts to *clarify* that they got married a week ago “but don't worry! There will still be a wedding!” ... ... ... What do you mean? You're already married... You had a wedding... A week ago! You are MARRIED!
Rolling my eyes all over the place.
Re: “We’re still having a wedding though!”
Well thank god. I'm sure people just devastated when they thought there wouldn't be a wedding! Surely at least a few people needed to be talked off the ledge of buildings. *eye roll*
I'd be tempted to reply with this:
I just informed my sister and 3 of my bridesmaids that their wedding days were not real and that they are pretty princesses. They are excited about this. Also, asked me to get the fuck out of this place.
So, you are to come to this site to plan your wedding, as long as you never appear to be enjoying anything about planning your wedding or being a bride. Makes sense.
Sorry for getting off topic, OP. The case you described seems worthy of side eyeing.
It's not official until the officiant, myself, my FI and our two witnesses sign it and it's filed with the county. Then we are legally bound and married. Not three weeks prior when we filed for a license.
I've always heard ladies say "Oh, we're already married" the day they picked up their certificates so I assumed they were signing. They were not official yet.
Still, I cannot imagine why I would care if some one had. This is so not important.------------ BOXES -------------------
In most states, you get the license first. Usually within 30 days of your planned wedding date. Then, an officiant marries you. I'm in IL and the officiant signed our license and mailed it off for us; part of what he's paid to do. About a month or so later I went back to the records office to collect my certificate. Now that I have the certificate, I use it as evidence to get my name legally changed and changed on all my accounts, etc.
The Catholic regards marriage as one of their seven sacraments. This was not always so, but it has only been in the last 200 years that the wedding has focused on the bride and groom. Before that, the wedding day was a day when the families celebrated that their children were successfully (and some times profitably) married. This is still true in many non-western cultures.
Most protestant Christian churches do not regard the marriage ceremony as a holy sacrament. (I think the Episcopalians still do.) It is a legal contract between the bride and groom, and the church is offering to bless their union. In the USA, ministers, rabbis, and priests are licensed to perform legal ceremonies. With the exception of two states (PA and CO) the marriage is not legal until the officiant signs the license, along with witnesses. The rules do vary by state. Of course, you are just as married if a licensed judge, justice of the peace, or state recognized officiant performs the marriage. There is absolutely NO REASON to have two ceremonies in the USA.
In Europe, and some other countries, religious ceremonies are not a legal marriage. In those countries, the couple must be married at the courthouse. If they desire a religious ceremony, they will usually have it within 24 hours of their legal marriage. In many communities there is a procession from the courthouse to the church for the religious ceremony on the same day. If your wedding is taking place in one of these countries, you are free to have two ceremonies if you want a religious ceremony.
A wedding is when your legal status changes from two single people to that of a married couple. The date you are legally married is the date that is on your completed license which is usually sent in by your officiant. You cannot do this twice. Your status changes only once (per partner) and once you are legally married you cannot have another wedding because you will already be wed.
What is so hard to understand about this?
I think the main difference in my thought processes has to do with the value of the cultural/social ritual vs. the value of the legal/bureaucratic ritual, and moral judgment on participating in one but not the other. In the former, two people promise to commit their lives to each other, often in front of their community and in participation with their culture and/or religion. In the other, two people promise the government that they are now a collective legal unit, and in return the government (plus some other bureaucracies -- the insurance industry, etc) bestows benefits that they don't give to people who aren't in that type of unit. They are definitely both important -- as you correctly say, it's wrong to say that the legal one isn't important. But I don't see them as the same thing or as equivalent things, so I don't follow the statement that it is morally wrong for them to occur at different times, or morally right for them to occur at the same time. I also don't think it's right to say that the legal commitment is the more significant one -- if that's the case, we're judging the Hmong wedding as fake/PPD/not as "real" as a legal one, which I personally can't agree with.
I also admit some resistance to the culture -- the phrase "PPD" is already crazy demeaning (I kinda crack up seeing people use it and "wedding-industrial complex" in the same post -- enlightened enough to realize the wedding industry is trying to manipulate you, but not enough to avoid using a heavily gendered and judgmental insult, eh?), ditto "fake wedding" (per reasons given above), and the amount of rage and cruelty surrounding it all is pretty over the top.
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Sorry I sort of posted and ran. I don't get on much on the weekends.
My question for you is, why aren't they the same or equivalent if the couple is planning to do them both? Because those are the couples we have issues with. Couples who want to be both legally and religiously married. Or even couples who want to be legally married and then "legally" married by another person later when everyone can see.
I can understand being annoyed if people lie about getting married, but if it's that upsetting to you just don't go. You don't get to sit there and be smug because these people aren't doing their wedding "the right way." Seriously, you don't know all the details about why they set things up the way they did. Maybe their parents asked them to go ahead and have the wedding. Maye their timeline got moved for some reason. You. Don't. Know.
And even if you did, it's not your place to decide what weddings count and what don't. It's beyond rude and makes you look like a huge brat. You're just as bad as the people who show up to weddings talking about how this marriage is a disaster and the couple is bound to get divorced in a couple years.
Yes, seriously, you are being that tacky.
I mean, let's be honest, most guests aren't going to weddings because they're really excited to see these people exchange their vows. You're there because you want the free food and booze and you want to party. So if you're going to complain about someone throwing their wedding for the same reasons you're being a huge hypocrite.
First bolded:
The whole point, if they're lying, is that you usually don't know until after you've locked yourself into a trip that you might not otherwise have taken, or in many cases until after the reenactment party itself. You don't know until it's too late that they're lying, which is part of what makes it upsetting - they took away your ability to consider all the facts and decide not to go. You thought you were watching something special and it turns out they just wanted to force you into taking your vacation on their terms.
Second bolded:
Wrong. People who have their shit straight go to see two people actually pledge their lives to one another, and would be disappointed to find it was a reenactment of a real, legal, commitment that already happened. I am sorry for you if this is the reason you go to most weddings.