Not sure if my feelings should be hurt…
I don’t think you can have it both ways. If you truly are a cultural vagabond, I can inform you that a lot of cultures are very blatant about gift-giving, especially cash, for weddings. I recently saw a show about the role of gold in Indian weddings - it’s pivotal, it seems.
For some couples, yeah, they need nice flatware and pots and pans and bedsheets, shit like that. That was my wife and I when we got married. Just out of graduate school with a household outfitted from Salvation Army.
I think very few people in this world are skilled enough gift givers to not need a clue. That’s why registries, wish lists, etc. exist.
If there are right and wrong colors, I sure don’t know how to figure out which are which, so I don’t think that’s it.
I don’t live there now, but it had flaws and charms like any other culture. I’m sure it was no worse than most.
Hippy Hollow, I’m well aware of the practices of a variety of cultures. The existence of some particular group of people behaving in a particular way does not mean that my objections are invalid. Even if it did, you aren’t giving examples that involve written requests for money. Giving money is a different issue.
If my friend is from a remote jungle tribe that always writes money-requesting doggerel as an essential and prized part of the ritual, I’d have heard about it by now.
AnaMen, why are you even wasting this much time thinking about this? How well do you know these people? If you don’t know them well at all, don’t go to the wedding and don’t send a present. Just return the card in the wedding invitation with a note that you won’t be able to come but you wish them well. If you know them well enough that you feel obligated to give them something, choose a reasonable but not large monetary limit and give them a gift or a gift card or a check for that amount. Then forget about it.
You’ve spent far too much time thinking about this. Do you think there is a wedding police that goes around arresting people who don’t properly acknowledge wedding invitations? Why do you care what this couple think about you? Do you think that you will be ostracized from your entire community if you don’t attend the wedding or give them a present? This isn’t worth the bother of worrying so much.
I think any mention of gifts is tacky. But agree with Wendell and the sentiment “do what you are going to do anyway.” Which means, if you know they well and like them and want to keep in contact with them - laugh it off and go - stick some money in gift, and make the gift meaningful but not expensive (we got some rare Magic the Gathering Cards from one friend :)). If you don’t know them well, but want to get to know them better and want to keep the connection, go if it isn’t inconvenient, and regardless send a card with some cash in it. If you barely know them, keep in mind that a wedding is not a royal command to show up, nor is it an obligation to provide a gift. Some people invite everyone out of either greed or not wanting anyone’s feelings to be hurt or because they simply think that they should. But most people with a wedding budget aren’t too hurt by people sending regrets that are on the bottom of their lists anyway.
We only go to weddings (graduations, christenings, baby showers, et. al.) if we see people socially with some regularity. We avoid these events for co-workers (unless we see them socially)
I do know the couple well and going to the wedding will be expensive and time-consuming. I had been looking forward to it for a long time and would have been happy to spend the time and money required to attend.
Is fear of arrest really the only reasonable cause for modifying one’s actions in your world? I’m not worried that some outside agency is going to get involved and your concern about how I spend my time or what I “bother” to worry about is unwarranted.
Once a woman I worked with attached her wedding invitation on the bulletin board and told us we were all invited to her wedding.
However, none of us were invited to the reception because they couldn’t afford to have everybody.
I didn’t go and she didn’t get a gift.
Another co-worker (at a different job) brought in a list one day and said she knew we were going to have her a bridal shower and this is what she wanted. She even listed brand names, colors and the stores where we could find it. As an extra nicety, she figured it all out so each gift cost about the same.
I didn’t buy her a gift either.
Normally I give cash as a wedding gift because it’s one size fits all. If a couple asked for cash I’d probably go out and find a hideous vase or knickknack and give it to them, telling them I knew when I saw it it was the perfect gift for them.
Depends on how bitchy I’m feeling about it.
Way back in the dark ages when I got married I wasn’t even thinking about gifts when I wrote out the invitations. I was inviting family and friends to come share the happy day and I was more worried about the guests having a good time, with good food, drink and music. Granted my parents were hosting the celebration, but it is the job of the hosts to make sure their guests enjoy themselves.
Thinking about recouping the cost of the wedding and/or making money off the event is beyond tacky.
Anamen, I am firmly in your camp, but something puzzles me. (I avoided this thread for quite a while, because the answer to me is so obviously “Yes, of course.”). You obviously have very firm standards that responders here are not going to change. Did you expect a different outcome from this thread? I just don’t understand what exercise we are supposed to be participating in.
For myself, I am with Miss Manners that weddings and receptions are for celebrating the event, and anything extra in the way of gifts should just be a very pleasant surprise. If I were invited to a wedding and knew that it was a cash-strapped young couple just starting out, I would certainly consider giving them a nice check (and have done so). Anyone else gets a token gift, which I will select from their registry if they have one, or else I will spend some time finding something nice but not extravagant. People have too much damn stuff anyway. If I ever get married (SCOTUS willing) I will be tempted to specify “no gifts, please” even though that is also seen as tacky by the hard-core polite people, just because at this stage of my life gifts are more trouble than they are worth. Maybe I will take a cue from a lot of funerals and say “In lieu of gifts, donations to xxx charity will be gratefully received.”
Roddy
Was it my similar thread you’re thinking of?
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=688617
Personally, I think etiquette rules like “Don’t mention money!” are simply a holdover from ridiculous standards of extraordinarily class-conscious forbears. See, you can’t mention money because then people would know that you aren’t rich, and being rich or being seen or presumed to be rich, was the most important value.
Since that’s not something I value, I don’t consider this a valuable piece of etiquette.
I disagree. It’s not that it’s only tacky to ask for money; it’s tacky to ask for anything. It’s tacky to let on that you expect to receive anything at your wedding or reception, other than the much-appreciated attendance by your loved ones and friends. It’s tacky to make your reception dinner a quid pro quo for some fabulous gift (or a certain amount of cash).
If I throw a party and invite people to come, no matter what the underlying occasion, it should be because I want to share the occasion with them, not because I want to milk them for gifts and money. If I can’t afford a lavish party, if they are my friends and loved ones they will come anyway to enjoy my company. If they won’t come unless it is lavish, they aren’t friends (and probably not loved ones). If it is lavish, it is because I enjoy giving my friends and loved ones a nice experience.
I know this is not the majority view in the US (I can’t speak about other places). But there are still plenty of people who hold these views, they haven’t died out completely.
Roddy
If someone only wants your attendance to get your money, the problem isn’t that they are tacky. The problem is that they are using you. Personally, I’d rather hear their real motivations than worry about whether someone is being tacky.
Well, since I can’t read minds, I’m left reading behavior to figure out what’s going on. Behaving in this manner is a symptom of a larger problem.
Exactly.
Since I can’t read minds, I’d prefer people actually say what they want. That way, I’m judging people for their real feelings and actions rather than perceived slights.
I am judging them for their genuine desire for cash from their friends and the fact that they are willing to demand it. Frankly, I’d rather have been left with a bit of space to give them the benefit of the doubt!
It’s not so much that they only want my attendance for what they can get out of it; however, when the calculations in setting up the event have a lot to do with “cost of event” compared to “value of gifts” likely to be received, if the second value is smaller than they expected, they are likely to be disappointed even if the event was otherwise wonderful. If that is the case, I don’t want to know about it. I would rather they kept it to themselves, instead of saying “We are paying $40 per person for this event, so please be sure your gift is worth at least that much.” I’m assuming (probably being generous) that no-one would actually say that in a public way.
Sometimes people go off the deep end for things like weddings; often that is an aberration. I would prefer to be able to keep the friendship, if it is otherwise valuable to me, rather than kiss it goodbye based on one uber-tacky incident. If they can maintain politeness and at least the appearance of a generous spirit, it makes it easier for everyone. Isn’t that what manners are really all about?
Roddy
Most people want gifts when they have a wedding. Indeed, even a genuine desire for cash. As for the demand, I didn’t see any demand in your OP; maybe you forgot that part.
It is a thinly-veiled demand. Do you think that because they will magnanimously not “mind” a different gift that it isn’t? Note the absence of the idea of not giving a gift at all.
People that want their friends to give them money for parties and trips are not the kind of people I like.
I think manners are about kindness.