In “Bridal Wave,” Melissa Morrison claims that “the same way
porn shows the act of lovemaking without reference to love, wedding porn
fetishistically focuses on the ceremony without reference the profound
sentiments—and contemporary problems—that it represents.” By looking at a
popular wedding magazine, “Brides” magazine, we can see that Morrison might be
on to something.
By looking at the October 2011 cover of “Brides,” I found
that everything featured has only to do with the wedding and nothing about
marriage. Titles such as “Flattering Dresses for every figure!,” “6 quick fixes
for Big-Day Disasters,” “Creative Ideas for a backyard wedding,” and “Kids at
the Wedding” lead me to believe that the wedding industry was like the porn
industry, in that all of the focus was focused on one very small part of
marriage: the wedding.
Looking further, inside the issue, I did find two articles
that did not focus solely on the wedding. First, in the Marriage section of
“Brides,” there is an article called “Year One: Dinner For 6 For $100.” This
article talked about how to entertain guests for less money when you’re on a
budget/don’t have very much money but still want to entertain guests. There was
also a “First-Year Finance Quiz,” which helps you figure out yours and your
partner’s spending habits so that you can plan for the big day and beyond.
While both of these featured items didn’t focus attention only to the wedding,
they also only dealt with the financial aspects of marriage. These were the
only articles dealing with anything besides the wedding, so it’s clear that
“Brides” ignores the problems involved in marriages that go beyond issues with
money.
I was able to find a few pictures and blurbs from “Brides”
Real Weddings section that featured gay and lesbian couples. I found the
weddings of three lesbian couples and three gay couples out of a total of 699
weddings shown on the website. Although this is a very small percentage of the
total pictures shown, just the fact that I was able to find homosexual
individuals’ weddings featured on “Brides” magazine’s website gives me hope
that the wedding industry is less hetero-normative than some people believe it
to be.
After analyzing an issue of “Brides” magazine, I find it
clear that the wedding industry does have some qualities of the porn industry.
Most of the magazine was focused on the wedding, and when it wasn’t, the focus
was only on the financial aspects of marriage. It ignored other issues affecting
married couples, like learning how to live together, how to deal with fights
and disagreements, and issues that come with raising a family.
I'm actually very impressed with your findings, because I couldn't find any of that! I could not find a single non-heterosexual couples or any articles addressing marriage outside the wedding. What that tells me is that they were very difficult to find and require a lot of time and effort. Basically, yes, they did address the issue in some way, but what percentage of readers will notice/read them? And how were they presented? Were the non-heterosexual couples presented in a way that made them seem out of the ordinary?
ReplyDeleteBut something that upset me, regardless of the magazine’s incorporation of relationships and non-heterosexual couples, is the fact that the magazine is only directed towards women, and there are zero magazines on the market directed towards men. The only thing I found is this website (http://www.groomgroove.com) that helps men decide if they really want to get married and guides them through NOT ONLY the wedding but also the MARRIAGE! I find it odd that men are encouraged to think about the relationship and institution of marriage more than women – men are encouraged the think, where women are encouraged to decorate and play dress up. It almost contradicts gender stereotypes in a way; women are traditionally the gender to think about relationships and romance, but this seems backwards! I think it’s part of the industry’s attempt to get at money.