I just got finished watching Surprise Wedding on Fox. On this show, 5 women “surprised” their boyfriends–The boyfriends were brought out on stage in front of a jusge audience and there was the girlfriend, in a wedding dress. The boyfriends had a couple of hours to decide if they were willing to go through with it.
To my surprise, all 5 did. (suckers!)
This whole thing was so wrong on so many levels I just don’t know where to begin…I guess the worst part is that it played on and reinforced the stereotypes that women are so desperate to get married that they are willing to resort to duplicity and manipulation in order to get that ring.
We (about 20 of us) were watching the Simpsons in the house lounge almost a week ago. When the commercial came on, we spoke as one, “OH MY GOD!! How could they possibly DO that?! Those poor guys!!”
I was hoping until the bitter end that someone would say no. And how original of the final guy to cleverly turn it around and get down on his knee, when it had been done by another guy 15 minutes earlier?
The whole desperate woman stereotype thing doesn’t bother me; it wasn’t any worse than the desperate millionaire a while back.
I didn’t see it but I assume these guys were adults and able to think for themselves. It’s also possible that it was a rigged show and the producers had already confirmed ahead of time what the guys would say. People will do anything to be on t.v. Even <shock!> act surprised! Just look at shows like Springer.
And they also have the choice of not actually getting the marriage legally binded by not following through with the filing of the marriage license. So it’s also possible they did it just to not look like jerks.
Then again, if it was indeed real and they did it out of pressure, then they get what they deserve when their wives turn on them the next day.
I watched a little bit of it… had the sound down while I was playing a video game with my boyfriend on line; then I turned it up and actually paid attention for about half an hour. I had to turn it off when they went to a comercial break with something like “We’ll be back with our brides’ final dramatic plea for marriage.”
To me, that summed up the stereotypes you’re talking about, Green Bean.
I’m hoping it was all a set-up, frankly-- that the guys knew all along. I suppose there’s some romance in the idea of being surprised with a wedding, but it was the background of each story that bothered me. The ones I saw all boiled down to “I want to get married but he doesn’t,” and I think it’s incredibly selfish to force a wedding just because you want one (this would apply equally to men and women).
Please please please someone discover that it was all staged!
mini hijack. I’ve coined a phrase: freudian type. It’s just like a freudian slip except you type a different, wrong word. I’ve noticed it from time to time when I’m just typing as I’m thinking.
OK, that was a major hijack, back to the OP
I didn’t see the show. But yes, it was wrong on so many levels. Question: how long have these couples been dating? What was the shortest length of time? I think that if any of them had been dating less than a year, then both the man and the woman are positively certifiable. The woman especially.
Not that there’s anything wrong with a short dating period before marriage. But pressuring someone like that on national TV? I might have just walked on principle. No one I loved would do something like that.
I loved the guy who “lectured” his girlfriend for being duplicitous and deceptive, when theirs was supposed to be a relationship based on honesty…and then he proposed to her because he was “an old-fashioned guy”
I wonder if the show paid for the dresses- and if so, do the brides get to keep them?
Why, oh why, in the name that of all that is Good 'n Plenty would you watch that show? You are so beautiful and smart and honest and kind Greenie. Don’t you know you’re just encouraging Fox?
Soon we’ll be watching “Do You Really Want Me To Get That Abortion, Honey?” and “Guess What Ma, We’re Putting You Away In The Nursing Home!”
Actually, FOX doesn’t know (or care) if neither you nor I were watching their show unless we are a Nelson Family.
It’s just like a bad crash, bloody and grusome but we just can’t help but look.
I can’t believe these women would go on national television and make themselves look so pathetically desparate and I am really disappointed that these guys said yes. Had it been me, I would have been so pissed to have been tricked onto the show and put on the spot in front of so many people that I would have walked out right then and there.
What part of “I DON’T WANT TO GET MARRIED” did these women not understand? I mean, “I would rather be buried than married” is pretty clear to most of us, isn’t it?
I watched this show in between NBC commercials and I agree that it was a total travesty.
If some bitch has to put her poor boyfriend on the spot like this in front of millions of people to get him to marry her, then there’s a problem with the relationship already.
What’s they guy going to say- NO?
These women are devious, sneaky and conniving snakes in the grass. They are obviously pathetic lonely losers as well. By committing this atrocity, these women have risked ruining their lives and their husbands lives by pushing them into a marriage that their husbands obviously were not ready for.
Frankly their suckers- EEEER HUSBANDS have tons of legal support for an annulment. They were forced into a contract under duress.
I had it on in the background as I gutted out my closet.
Most of it I ignored. But every time that weight lifting gal came on and started crying, I just had to watch. If this woman isn’t the definition of unstable, I don’t know what is.
She couldn’t keep it together for more than a couple of seconds.
I was anxiously waiting for the guy to say no and watch her collapse on national television. When he said yes, despite his brother’s uneasiness, I knew this thing was rigged.
Who in their right mind would marry that woman? Even having Mr. Weiders invading the brain can’t corrupt common sense that bad.
Rigged. Rigged, I tell you.
My personal theory is that Fox committed to a set number of shows from the ‘Who wants to marry a…” producers. Rather than eat the costs to complete the contract, they retooled the format and came up with this instead. This just seemed too set-up to not be.
On the flip side, George Michael, who does sports for the Baltimore NBC affiliate, showed his “Thursday Bloopers” last night. In one, a guy pulled the old “putting the marriage proposal on the scoreboard” trick, and the soon-to-be happy couple was shown on the monitor. As the proposal came up, he got down on one knee and pulled out a ring. She promptly dumped not one, but two soft drinks on his head and ran away. Pretty weird.
I’m still gonna blame Greenie. It’s her fault. It’s all her fault. The A-Team? Green Bean’s baby. WWF Smackdown? Greenie green lit it. Actually, it’s Greenie’s bad T.V. watching habits that caused the debates to be so boring and scripted.
