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Style and Marriage
Jun. 2nd, 2022 12:59 amThere was an article in the Wednesday Washington Post’s Style section about non-white wedding gowns, including brides wearing black. This was just a fashion choice, not a matter of a woman getting married for the second time, or of feeling unworthy to wear white because she had already shared a bed with her boyfriend. By the way, before Queen Victoria got married in a special white gown, a woman would normally marry wearing the best ordinary dress she had.
This reminded me of reading Dear Abby when I was a child; the letter I remembered was probably from the mid-1970s. A woman wrote to the advice columnist saying that she was going to get married, but worried about whether she could wear white, since she had been raped once, and was therefore not a virgin. Abby assured her that if she had been raped, she was still morally pure (I think that Abby italicized the word “morally”), and could properly wear white. I agree with the answer.
I do feel that we’ve lost something these days, because, although virgin brides (and grooms) do exist, people very often shack up together, get engaged, and get married, in that order. While the mores of an earlier time no doubt led to some problems, so do the marriage and non-marriage customs of today. For one thing, the loss of family stability is not generally good for children, and the higher percentage of children born out of wedlock is not cause for rejoicing.
This reminded me of reading Dear Abby when I was a child; the letter I remembered was probably from the mid-1970s. A woman wrote to the advice columnist saying that she was going to get married, but worried about whether she could wear white, since she had been raped once, and was therefore not a virgin. Abby assured her that if she had been raped, she was still morally pure (I think that Abby italicized the word “morally”), and could properly wear white. I agree with the answer.
I do feel that we’ve lost something these days, because, although virgin brides (and grooms) do exist, people very often shack up together, get engaged, and get married, in that order. While the mores of an earlier time no doubt led to some problems, so do the marriage and non-marriage customs of today. For one thing, the loss of family stability is not generally good for children, and the higher percentage of children born out of wedlock is not cause for rejoicing.
