I was having a discussion at the pub last night. A friend of mine is getting married and her husband-to-be has said that he probably won’t wear his wedding ring as he is a tradesman, and it’s likely to get in the way.
Now this wouldn’t both me that much, but it clearly upsets my friend.
Male dopers - do you wear your wedding ring? If you’re not married, should you get married will you?
Female dopers - would it bother you if your husband didn’t wear his ring? If so why?
No it wouldn’t bother me if he didn’t wear his. I rarely wear mine.
I wear one all the time and all the other married men I know do to. The only people that don’t work with machinery that makes it dangerous. In my experience, it is considered a little suspect if a man refuses to wear a wedding ring not just with the wife, but with everyone. I lost mine for a while after I had to take it off following a finger injury and I got lots of comments, especially at work about not having it on.
(I don’t mean that it necessarily indicates playing around but it just makes people wonder in general).
I prefer wearing mine, since I don’t work at a job where it gets in the way. My wife rarely wears hers, which annoys me on occasion because of how much effort she put into picking out the one she wanted. There’s no feeling of ‘no ring = no commitment’ though.
Wearing rings is pretty uncommon here anyway, especially for men. Looking around at a meeting where I know everyone is married, I’m frequently the only one with a ring on.
I wear mine all the time. It symbolizes something important to me. When I first got married, I’d never worn a ring before, and it bothered me for awhile. I’d take it off when I got home from work. One day, the cat picked it up off the desk, and it stayed lost for months. When I found it, I put it back on and haven’t had it off since.
My wife always wears hers, since her orignal set was stolen in a break-in at our old apartment. Luckily, we were able to get the same style to replace it, as they’d stopped making it already.
I wear mine, as there is little danger of an out-of-control keyboard crushing my ring or a mouse ripping my finger off. I pretty much only take it off when I’m working around machinery or something.
I imagine it’d be a pain to take it off before work and put it back on after, so if I did that kind of thing for a living we’d have to discuss it. I want to keep all my fingers in place, and growing up with uncles in the oil fields (many of them were missing their ring finger) I know that it’s a valid concern.
I’m getting married in December and I plan on wearing mine. I don’t anticipate doing anything that would make it hazardous. My old man rarely takes his off but has still managed to lose a few over the years. My mom takes off hers occasionally, I think if she’s getting in to some kind of cleaning agent. I can’t think of anything specific though.
Most everyone wears his or hers here in the bible belt.
I wouldn’t wear it because I hate wearing jewerly. Plus I work in the trades and there’s a high chance of it getting ruined or lost.
I wear mine constantly, but then again, my job isn’t one where wearing a ring could cost me a finger.
The question assumes that every married male Doper has a wedding ring. I’m married but I don’t have one. I never have.
I’m unsure exactly why. Perhaps because the men in my family have never worn wedding rings; and while I cannot confirm it, the church I grew up in (Presbyterian Church of Canada) did not emphasize wedding rings for men. Very few of the married men at church had them, and nobody thought it was strange. My Dad certainly never had a wedding ring and nobody thought twice of it.
So, when my fiancee and I were planning our little wedding, she asked about a ring for me. I said I’d prefer not to have one, and explained the above. She was fine with that. She wanted nice rings (wedding and engagement), of course, and I was pleased to give her those. But she didn’t mind me not having one if I didn’t want one; and so, to this day, I don’t wear one because I don’t have one.
Neither of my parents wear their wedding rings because they don’t want to risk losing a finger or losing the ring in an unpleasant manner. I don’t think it’s ever been a bone of contention between the two of them – I can’t imagine them arguing over something so inconsenquential. They basically got the rings for the ceremony, wore them once or twice, and then put them away.
I’m not married, but if I was, then I wouldn’t mind if my husband decided not to wear his ring, especially if he had a job where he ran the risk of degloving a finger. Insisting on something so trivial as a gold band when there’s the potential to go through something as painful as losing a finger just isn’t worth it. If I didn’t know I loved him enough to keep him before he put on the ring, how is that little circle going to make it any more real?
Haha! You got me! How short sighted of me!
Ok let’s amend the OP to:-
Male dopers:
Female dopers - would it bother you if your husband didn’t wear his ring? If so why?
*That one might be a joke 
I have one and wear it all the time. In fact I have two, since I lost my original gold band for a while and got a white gold one to replace it, then found the original one. Now I “color coordinate” between the two rings to match my watch.
I enjoy wearing rings; even before I was married I typically wore my school ring all the time or a gold and onyx signet ring on my right hand. My hand feels oddly light and naked without one now – I try to get as heavy a ring as possible.
With my wedding band (as opposed to a ring with a stone on it) I also frequently take it off and finger it as a nervous habit, even bouncing it to hear it ring or spinning it like a coin on a table top when I’m bored.
The only times I take it off are to work with something greasy or slimy, or when exercising or doing sports where the ring would come into contact with equipment (such as basketball or bowling, as I am left handed).
This probably all stems from having read (and loved) LOTR when I was 11. I mean, those rings are precious to me.
You should tell your friend that I wore mine even after my divorce. For a while anyway.
Reason being; that damn thing was like a babe magnet. Or so it seemed at the time.
So if your friend thinks that ring acts as a deterent to keep other women from hitting on her hubby; she’s sadly mistaken.
My husband used to take his off when drumming, as it’s supposed to be bad for the skin (of the drumhead, not the drummer) to drum with rings on. Now he’s gotten fat enough that it won’t come off, so he doesn’t do that anymore. It didn’t bother me for any symbolic or emotional reason, but I was afraid he would lose it, just because he’s sort of a ditz when it comes to misplacing things. I made him a pouch to wear around his ankle to keep it in when he drummed. (Tried a neck pouch, but it kept getting in his way.)
If he had any type of machinery job, I’d totally understand not wearing a ring. I don’t suppose they’ve considered tattooed bands, eh? The drawback is that many tattooed rings actually rub off with time - fingers are a far less permanent tattoo place than anywhere else.
My husband lost his about 6 weeks after the wedding. We never replaced it, and it doesn’t bother me one way or the other. Well, it bothered me that it was lost, but not that he doesn’t wear one. I doubt he would care if I didn’t wear mine, either.
My husband doesn’t work with machinery, he’s an oral surgeon. He just doesn’t wear much jewlery and I don’t particularly care. I think only people that are a wee bit insecure would find it suspect. My father never wore one either.
I wear mine if we’re going out if I can find it.
My wedding ring never comes off. Of course, I was 118 pounds when I got married, so I couldn’t get the damn thing off now even if I wanted to. But even when I could, I never did.
Okay, this one I can answer. But you can probably guess my answers from my post above. Still, for the record:
No, I do not want one. And if I did have one, I wouldn’t wear it.
(No, you’re not short-sighted. Hey, we’re Dopers–we’ll figure out a way around this. 
)
Not married, won’t be any time in the foreseeable future.
I probably wouldn’t wear a wedding ring, since I can’t stand any sort of jewelry on my hands or wrists. I don’t even wear a watch.
Since I wouldn’t wear a ring, I’d be pretty ambivalent about having one in the first place.