NYT Daringly Exposes Single Gals Who've Already Planned Their Wedding


I don’t know if you know this, but there are actually women out there who spend a considerable amount of their downtime thinking about what their wedding will be like one day. But get this—some of them don’t even have boyfriends yet. LOL, FREAKS.
That is the gist of this well-intentioned but inadvertently patronizing piece at the NYT op-ed page called Blame the Princess: Chasing the Fairy-Tale Wedding. In it, we learn that ladies still be crazy about weddings. In 2014! Sad! Because Disney! We’re still poisoned after all these years!
Author Abby Ellin writes:
… even though women may be leaning in, branching out, cracking glass ceilings and forging vibrant careers in multiple sectors, for many of them, it is their wedding day that heralds true success.
But what follows is not, say, a story about career-driven, ceiling-shattering ladies whose computer monitors are elevated by back issues of Brides. It’s not even a story about highly accomplished women who, upon looking back, realized their wedding day was the biggest signifier of true success in their lives (LOL, and yet, possible).
Instead, the NYT published a story about two women in their early-to-mid twenties who have imagined and planned weddings without boyfriends or grooms. It’s enough of a jumping point for the author to say: Aren’t we all supposed to be over this whole wedding dream day thing? Because 2014? Because progress?
After introducing us to 24-year-old Sami Horneff, a NYC actress and tour guide who’s been strategizing her big day since girlhood, Ellin tells us:
Ms. Horneff has no idea whom she will marry. She isn’t even dating seriously at the moment. But that hasn’t prevented her from plotting every detail of the day, from the color of the bridesmaids’ dresses (champagne) to the floral arrangements (white and pink roses, along with white hydrangeas, lilies and orchids).
She is not alone. Never mind the bleak statistics on marriage (about 45 percent end in divorce). Many women still dream, feverishly, about their wedding, even those with no groom or boyfriend in sight. They pin photos of fantasy event spaces, dresses and flowers on Pinterest; they design their ideal engagement rings on sites like Ritani.com; they turn to MyKnot, Lover.ly and Project Wedding for ideas on invitations, gift registries and seating charts.
They know it all, except — oops! — whom their partner will be. But why let a small detail like that interfere with preparations?
Or why let broadmindedness get in the way of a good sweeping generalization?
It goes on.
Hey, did you know that a quarter of the people who read Brides magazine ARE NOT EVEN ENGAGED? Did you know more than a third of the people who went to the website TheKnot.com DID NOT EVEN HAVE A FIANCE? Did you know that a clinical psychologist named Sue Johnson “finds this mentality worrisome”? Sure, it’s fine to want companionship, Johnson allows (thanks, Sue!), but all this emphasis on weddings and marriages? DANGEROUS. Says Johnson: