Image via Complex Original
If you're a miserable, jealous person who can't feel happiness for others, then wedding season must be the most painful time of the year. We bet a recluse like you could think of a million ways to ruin some happy couple's special day. But this list isn't about you, weirdo. Go back to listening to noisecore.
This list is about everyday, happy people. People who find each other, fall in love, and have horrible weddings. We're talking corny, predictable, eye-rolling snooze fests, monstrous demonstrations of fawning that not even free cake can save. So, raise your glass as we toast the 10 Ways to Ruin a Wedding.
Engagement Photos
Will an engagement photo ruin a wedding? No. Probably not. But it is a fittingly unnatural precursor to your wedlock and, undoubtedly, the most humiliating snapshot you'll ever take part in.
The setting for these pictures can vary. We've seen a lot of cheesing in random fields—because hanging out in filthy nature is romantic and a total blast. A handful of piggy-back rides on the beach—because that's totally original, natural, and nobody else would ever think to do a beach shot. Especially if it's in black and white. Oh, and it's pretty common for people getting married in major cities to stage a grandiose kiss on the street—nothing says eternal love quite like being smashed into the Fifth Avenue pavement during rush hour.
To make matters worse, the photos will be carelessly displayed on refrigerators across your guest list for total strangers to wonder, "Who is that douchebag with the cotton sweater over his button-up?" You know who should do photo shoots? Models. You know who shouldn't? You.
The Cash Bar
We have no problem with throwing yourself an extravagant, gaudy wedding. As a publication that calls your coolness into question if you have less than ten pairs of Jordan IIIs, we downright appreciate your exaggerated sense of self-worth. We live in a world of starving children, genocide, and Jerry Sandusky, but that Vera Wang gown is so you, and display cakes are for poor people.
So, if you can’t afford an open bar, don’t have a wedding. Reception formalities are insufferable. If you expect your guests to flock to the dance floor when they hear "I Gotta Feeling" and sit quietly through fifteen-minute toasts from the bride's mom, you better be supplying the booze.
Lame Attempts to Go Viral
In 2009, some kids from flyover country minced down the aisle to Chris Brown's "Forever" and, curiously, the video got 80M YouTube hits. Since weddings are as much about competition as they are everlasting love, nowadays every ceremony has their hackneyed attempt at going viral.
We don't mean to hate on a clip that's touched a lot of people, but let's talk about something right quick. First, not sure it was a great idea to frolic down the aisle in the name of love to a Chris Brown song. The guy tried to murder his girlfriend, like, three months prior.
Second, this in't very original, right? We've been to a million weddings and—like clockwork—someone, at some point throws on a pair of shades and dances about like a jerk-off. Maybe not down the aisle, but for sure while introducing the wedding party and undoubtedly on the dance floor. Think about it. Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean" is playing and drunk Uncle Joel is doing the Thriller dance in a pair of polarized wrap-arounds. Like a karaoke song, it's fun for thirty seconds. After that, it's embarrassing.
A moment's significance is not measured by YouTube hits. If it were, "Charlie Bit My Finger" would be our generation's Berlin Wall. You're probably not funny or clever. Just playing the odds on that one. So, don't ruin a wedding with a lame stunt.
Please, No Pictures
Nothing encapsulates the artificiality of a wedding quite like the hired photographers. Ugh, those guys. They're paid to ironically capture timeless moments while, simultaneously, shitting all over them. The couple stands at the front of the congregation. And, in a supposedly hallowed moment, some art school dropout with a Nikon is doing shoulder rolls in the aisle, firing off his flash bulb, and clapping that rapid fire shutter. Rather curiously, everyone seems to be cool with it.
Wedding photos were overexposed (so to speak) before the camera phone. Now, all bets are off. Between the professional photographer, Facebook, and Instagram there are now a hundred pictures of the bride awkwardly waltzing to Van Morrison's "Brown Eyed Girl" during the father-daughter dance. Weddings have turned into concerts. Instead of enjoying the experience, onlookers prefer to prove they attended.
The Playlist
There's no right way to put together a wedding playlist. But there's definitely a wrong way. And, typically, they're done the wrong way.
As a general rule, if "shuffle" is in the song title, don't play it. The “Cha Cha Slide” is another wedding staple that nobody enjoys. Besides being the dumbest dance ever, it drags on for seven agonizing minutes. By the time Mr. C the Slide Man demands “two hops, this time” the dance floor’s been cleared. And sweating through your rental tux to “Shout” has become as painful a wedding formality as hand-written thank you notes.
The Rehearsal
The wedding rehearsal is easily the stupidest of all pre-ceremony preparations. All the wedding party does is, literally, walk in a straight line and stand still for an hour. It's the easiest fucking thing in the world. What is there to practice? There is nothing to practice.
Look, if someone is in your wedding party, they probably care about you. And, presumably, they've already attended six pre-wedding parties, four showers, and are holding tight to a rather incriminating secret about your bachelor weekend in Vancouver. Stop annoying your friends and maybe they'll keep quiet about you paying, actually paying, $20 to have a dancer squeeze a bottle of Aquafina on your face. And not from the bottle.
Six Months of YOU
Every woman goes through a pair of events that they care wayyyyy too much about. First, their 21st birthday. You need how many parties? Second, getting married.
It's a year-long celebration-crisis-celebration-drunk-cry-celebration all leading up the purportedly "happiest day of your life." (That's the patriarchy talking.) Anyone with the misfortune of being close to you has a front row seat to the whole tired act. Between the engagement party, wedding shower, handful of bachelorette parties, the bridesmaids brunch, bridal shower, and rehearsal dinner—everyone's kind of sick of your guys. Seriously.
Your girlfriends feign admiration for the sole purpose of you returning the favor when they spend half a year adoring themselves.
Wedding Planners
A high school prom requires as much coordination as a wedding. Reserving a banquet hall, decorations, feeding people, a DJ. Same stuff. Proms are organized by a handful of zit-faced teens with learner's permits and they seem to do a pretty good job. Most of the time.
Weddings, on the other hand, are managed by highly paid would-be-realtors who talk couples into getting sterling silver flatware and, somehow, find that rewarding.
You can't create a fairy tale. So, stop trying so hard. People are starting to feel uncomfortable. Surprises, flowers, and centerpieces are details that even your most spiteful, jealous ex-sorority sister won't notice. You're not being judged by your cake or your dress. You're being judged by that already-fat oaf you're marrying. Remember that.
The Toast
As the best man, you've been asked to give a toast at your brother's wedding. You've spent weeks scouring the Internet, stealing ideas, and now it's time to deliver. Don't put too much pressure on yourself. In that room of 120 people, only, say, four give a shit. Make it snappy.
There have been millions of weddings with at least a half dozen toasts at each one. Not to mention the handful of self-aggrandizing tributes shared at the thirty showers, brunches, and parties the couple has been generous enough to throw for themselves. Are any of them famous? Nope. They all bleed into one excruciating, indistinguishable diatribe that separates uninterested guests from the open bar. It forces painful, disingenuous laughter at stuff that isn't funny. Just, not funny at all. Why is everyone laughing?
So, don’t try too hard. Keep it under two minutes. Don’t get too creative. Remember that you're not that funny, jokes aren't your thing, and definitely don’t do this.
Social Media Play-by-Play
During your college years, social media exists to prove you're having a good time. Tweets about "icing" fools and pictures of you funneling Keystone Light. When you graduate, it's to prove that you locked down that now-chubby sorority girl you were dating. Nice, bro!
For women, it's a lot worse. Society demands that self-worth be measured against the Instagram feed of recently engaged friends. Single, but otherwise put together women are encouraged to race to the alter by every look-at-my-ring hand picture. That's not to say that social media is lowering the age at which people get married. That would take research and stuff. But any single woman in her late-20s, early-30s with a "news feed" is made to feel pressure.
The problem is, at that point, your marriage exists for the wedding. Your relationship peaks when you tag you and your boyfriend in a picture of your hand on Facebook. Then, after a party with a lot of uncomfortable hugging amongst total strangers, the two of you are stuck together. Forever. Or, until you get a divorce (shit happens), or one of you dies (shit always happens). Prince Charming gets stretch marks on his ass and Saturday nights come to end around 10:30. That's real life. Now, go "like" that.