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There was a bit of a blow up this morning regarding a real wedding with a very slender bride featured on a popular blog . I understand that there has been a call out there recently for more diverse weddings in the blogosphere but that should not give any of us permission to bash on the physical appearance of a bride, her wedding or lifestyle choices. Imagine if you shared your wedding with a blog and the majority of the 34 comments were snarky and insensitive remarks about the way you look? How hurt would you be?
On the other hand, I spent a good deal of time going through the real wedding category on this website and was unimpressed with what I found. Though there were claims of posting a variety of weddings and wedding parties, and I'm not saying that they did anything intentionally, there was not much of a range when it came to the people showcased in the weddings. So perhaps, instead of bashing the poor bride (or groom), we could all do a little more to help the situation by asking (nicely) for more of an assortment of weddings and asking our photographers to send in more diverse weddings and posting more variety on our own blogs. Sure, it's fun to look at pretty people but we can look in Vogue for that. Here I think most of us just want to see more people to whom we can relate.
11 comments:
Reading all of those comments was seriously like watching a bad reality show. I completely agree on both points. Though said bride was extremely skinny, it was very sad that people completely bashed her in the comments. I would have been mortified if that where to happen to me.
I also agree that more diversity would be very refreshing. There is sooo much pressure to look thin and perfect with $800 shoes and a bejillion dollar dress it can be insanely overwhelming (and definitely led to more than a few breakdowns while planning my own wedding). It really takes away from what the day is all about and it would be so very nice to see more"real" weddings and "real brides."
Yes, I do feel bad for that bride. I am sorry to have participated in any way. But the fact is, that site does not publish diverse brides. There is usually one type. And for her to insist they do is insulting to her readership.
The images they showcased yesterday were so striking because they were an extreme. Her defenders were saying that people are the way they are and not to judge. But you have to say something when the other extreme, very obese women, are not showcased in kind. Obviously, they are not accepting all body sizes.
Yes, that dress would not come in a size 20, so you do need to find a thinner woman to show it off. But there are beautiful weddings of brides over size 8. And I want to see them.
well said!
I happen to love Zanna! Just from seeing her on reality shows like Project Runway and the one about the Marie Claire interns (forgot what it was called).
Anyway, I don't have a problem with skinny or fat people. If their wedding was insanely gorgeous, I might like to draw inspiration from it.
Also, I think women reading these blogs (brides-to-be, mostly?) should be mature, confident, secure enough to look at a bride and not be intimidated by her looks/style/wedding budget. We're not little girls anymore. We should be pretty comfortable in our own skin by now. I mean, the man you're marrying chose you. You, with all of your flaws. He doesn't expect you to spend $10,000 on a dress. He doesn't expect you to lose 10 lbs. He doesn't expect you to make stir sticks and table runners and paper garlands. He just wants to be your husband. You should love him and LOVE YOU enough to be happy with that. Everything else is just stuff. Trendy stuff, at that.
Thanks for letting me share my two cents!
I was just about to leave a comment about how I wish my Google reader had an "agree" button in addition to "like." But I see you already have that covered. Score one for forethought.
I think that blog does a really great job. They have many styles of weddings in differing venues with a lot of great ideas. I think people are out of line to comment on the bride's size. If she were a 200 pound bride, and someone said something like- she needs to push away from the table- the opposite of eat a sandwich, it would not be acceptable.
Cupcake: I totally agree. When I looked through their real weddings it was a lot of fair-skinned folk who ranged from size 2 to probably a size 8 at the most. BUT instead of commenting about a skinny brides appearence perhaps we could do more? Like email the blog editors and ask for more diversity or send them photos of weddings we want to see more.
Anon: I think it's a great blog too. I love their inspiration boards and I will continue to go there for ideas and pretty pictures. My whole point was that making remarks about a woman's physical appearance is not acceptable no matter what and that we can get our point across in less verbally abusive ways.
I think this is such an interesting conversation. First, I have to agree with comments here and on the original post in question that I think hating on the bride herself is the wrong approach. (Which, I realize not everyone is hating, but there were a few comments over there that were rather snarky toward the bride herself.) However, I do think it's really important for readers of wedding blogs to ask for more of what they really want to see. Hell, I write a wedding blog and work in the wedding industry full time and my wedding sure as hell didn't look like most of the weddings you see on the blogs. Why? Because I'm not a size 6 and I didn't have a huge budget. (And, for the record, my idea of a "budget-friendly" wedding is not $20,000...but that's just me.) You know what? None of that mattered. Our wedding was full of love and in at least half of the photos I have the ugliest laugh/cry face you can imagine, because that day was pure glee for me. I had six amazingly beautiful bridesmaids of every shape and size and we had the most incredible time. It was awesome.
At any rate, I vote that everyone start writing emails and putting out the call for "real" real weddings. I'm a huge advocate of this. I encourage anyone at any time from any walk of life with any skin color or any sexual orientation of any shape to submit their wedding to the blogs they love and be the change you wish to see. hahaha Not to be cheesy, but I think the way to see change is to make it and I hope everyone will consider submitting their weddings to the blogs so we can get more "real" brides out there.
Great discussion, Emilia!
Yeah, I had a particularly bad week with weddings overall and I'm not proud of my response. I though it was more magnanimous-bit-picture but it fell on the side of body-bashing more than I was comfortable. She had a beautiful wedding and a beautiful dress and I already know the real-bride stuff is crap on those blogs. And I know that bride may be a genuinely lovely woman but she is not that naturally slim. And it was so much further off from a "real" wedding any of us could relate to that it deserved to be labeled as a "celebrity-ish" real wedding inspiration. Context in these aspirational images is important. Her weight still didn't need to be mentioned in the comments. But I do think letters to the editors is an important start.
What blog was it?
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