{"id":10473,"date":"2012-04-30T09:00:59","date_gmt":"2012-04-30T08:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.badreputation.org.uk\/?p=10473"},"modified":"2012-04-30T09:00:59","modified_gmt":"2012-04-30T08:00:59","slug":"guest-post-gender-divide-his-and-hers-wedding-parties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/2012\/04\/30\/guest-post-gender-divide-his-and-hers-wedding-parties\/","title":{"rendered":"[Guest Post] Gender Divide: His and Hers Wedding Parties"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the third of my series of guest posts<\/a> on the trials of being a feminist while getting married (previously: being given away<\/a>; the Name Issue<\/a>), I\u2019m going to take a look at the issues of bridesmaids, best men, hen parties and stag dos.<\/p>\n

\"Front-on<\/a>On the surface, it doesn\u2019t seem like it would be a big deal, right? I mean, you say bride, you think \u2018bridesmaids\u2019. \u00a0What wedding photographer doesn\u2019t have a plethora of pictures of a girl in white, smiling, with five other women of varying ages in a terrifying shade of coral, looking less happy? If you’re the bride, you’re meant to be surrounded by loads of female extras being feminine and cooing about appearance and hair and The Dress and flowers \u2013 that\u2019s what the media show. But I had a big issue when it came to my bridesmaids. I have a lot of friends and they are’t all female, and lots of them are in different groups and some are in different countries. In the end, I have a family member (stepsister), my best mate (who lives in South Korea) and a bridesman.<\/p>\n

Yup, that\u2019s right. I\u2019ve known Dan since I was 18 and he knows me almost as well as my fianc\u00e9, so screw it, he\u2019s in my bridal party. I have a bridesman. \u00a0There are actually some great sides to this. For one thing, like my fianc\u00e9, he doesn\u2019t drink, so he’ll be very helpful in negotiating the family tensions on the day when it comes to the group photographs. For another, he\u2019s great at calming me down and getting me to remember to have some perspective. And he\u2019s funny and can cheer me up when I\u2019m stressed and grumpy.<\/p>\n

\"Colour<\/a>Needless to say, my mother does not<\/em> approve. \u2018Why can\u2019t he be part of Future Husband\u2019s party?\u2019 she wailed. It is seemingly \u2018not done\u2019 to have men in your wedding entourage if you’re a woman, I imagine because of women not having male friends in the same way in the old days, because, tradition implies, that would surely lead to romance. \u00a0(Although I have in fact slept with him. I am not revealing this fact to my mother.) A couple of other people have joked \u2018Oh, in a dress?\u2019 and I\u2019ve just stared at them until they stop with their gender stereotyping.<\/p>\n

The idea of just having your female friends is a lovely one but a little outdated when you a) know what sex is and don\u2019t need your married friends telling you before your wedding night, and b) regularly talk to men without the worry that someone will see you and call you a strumpet. We\u2019ve moved on as a society, haven\u2019t we? It\u2019s nicely balanced by the fact that Future Husband chose his sister as his best man. I love that our wedding party is made up of a mix of men and women on both sides.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also nice to have an additional excuse for extra parties. I\u2019ve always said I would have a Cock Party as well as a Hen Do. Future Husband is having a Doe Night as well as a Stag Do. Fine, we\u2019ll segregate by gender but by god we\u2019ll have both. It shakes it up from the normal alternative of one single party we could throw, but also means that I\u2019m not just hanging out in a female-only group.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not even that I\u2019ve set out to be \u2018controversial\u2019 (my mother, yet again), it\u2019s just that I couldn\u2019t see how I could organise my wedding and not be non-gender biased. We have too many friends, male and female, to simply be that abrupt and schismatic.<\/p>\n