Permission? No. Blessing, yes. And I agree it should be mother *and *father, not just dad. My parents don’t get to say who I can marry, but my husband is becoming a part of our family, and it’s nice when that’s an enjoyable thought for everyone.
Plus, it gives the groom-to-be a nice time to suck up a little bit, expound on how wonderful his intended is to the people who made him or her that way and forge his own emotional connection with these people he’s going to be connected to for the rest of his spouse’s life.
For what it’s worth, I had a similar talk with my mother-in-law, although it admittedly wasn’t until after we’d decided to get married. (There was never really a “proposal”, per se.) Never had to with my father in law 'cause he was effusive in his approval from the start.
Blessing is what I was thinking. That’s how I approached it and it turned out well. I was 31 when I asked my wife to marry me, her parents were still twenty years older than me.
I got engaged back in October, and I did not ask my fiancee’s father for permission. However, the engagement was not a surprise to anyone (she picked out her ring) and we had a conversation with her parents a few weeks before the engagement filling them in on our basic plans. I suppose any vigorous objections could have been raised at that time.
I actually did ask my fiancee if she wanted me to ask permission for her hand in marriage. She thought it would be a lovely gesture, but in the end we went with the open discussion, with her and her mother in the room. Of course, we are also both in our mid-30s and have know each other since college so YMMV.
I honestly never even thought about doing it, and was totally oblivious to the notion that some people in this day and age still expect it to be done - but I’d certainly have done it if my wife wanted me to (though if he said “no” I would not have listened - the only person whose “yes” mattered to me was hers).
I also did not do that on-the-knee proposal stuff - rather, we just talked about it (I said something along the lines of “well, now we are going to move in together, do you think we should formalize that and get married? The plus is that our parents will like it, the minus is the annoyance of a ceremony” - I know, real romantic. :D) .
I didn’t. My wife is very close to her parents, but considering that when I proposed, we were already living in the house we bought together, asking them ahead of time would have been very odd. Plus she would have killed me if SHE didn’t get to tell her mother that we were getting married.
I didn’t ask for permission or ask for a blessing, but I did tell them ahead of time that I was going to do it. They aren’t religious and neither am I but I think they liked that I let them in on my plans so they felt somewhat included. It also gave them the opportunity to voice any objections, concerns, or warnings (they had none).
A professor in one of my small fourth-year university classes decided to conduct a quick informal survey on this topic. I think most women answered that they would not expect it. Anyone who did think it was a nice nod to tradition wanted their parents’ blessings to be asked after the proposal, not before.
(I felt that was an overly personal and irrelevant question to ask in a medieval history class, so I tried to quip, “Oh, he won’t meet my father,” meaning that if anyone were to meet my father, he would probably run in terror instead of marrying me. Unfortunately I have a defective “humour in front of large groups” gene, and the professor thought I meant that my father was dead or not around. So he apologized. So I felt hugely awkward. And I should have learned my lesson about making jokes in class.)
It never occurred to me that I might (either time).
But then since if they withheld permission or blessing it would have had no impact on the outcome it truly was irrelevant. I asked her. Then we told the parents (the first time, the second time we waited until after we were married to tell anybody because that makes life easier) together.
I didn’t ask and I don’t think anyone cared (normal parent-child relationships all around). It’s been almost 9 years and we were both still in college, but financially independent and living together. My feeling was that it was our life and I wanted the proposal to be just between the two of us.
I don’t fault some people for doing it though. I guess it’s really up to what you think she would want.
My consent is what is important, not my father’s. Also, I would want to be the one to tell my parents I’m getting married, not have it done behind my back.
Absolutely, and my father would be offended by such a thing too. He went through a feminist education phase and came out the other side saying he wouldn’t give me away or fund the wedding (I wouldn’t have expected that anyway), and he would attend if he didn’t have anything else planned for that day. I know my father loves me but he would be offended by the traditional women-as-chattel basis of asking a father for a daughter’s hand.
I didn’t ask for my FIL’s blessing, and it’s always been a slight regret of mine.
At the time, it simply never occurred to me. I thought it an antiquated idea – what the hell did I care if I had his blessing or not? It was between my wife-to-be and myself. As the years have passed, I now realize that it would have been a nice gesture – a show of respect for a man who deserves it.
Plus, now that I’m a father of a little girl, I’d like to think that the man who is eventually going to want to propose to my daughter would extend me that courtesy (I mean, I’m going to say “no”, have him kidnapped and sent to Peru, since no one will every be good enough for my little girl, but it’d be a nice gesture).
I knew my father would be touched by the gesture so, even though it was not about getting my father’s blessing, approval, what have you, to get married, I made it clear to my husband that he should do so.
And yes, my father was very touched by the gesture.
