I'm going to be the one lone voice of dissent here, aren't I?
Screaming for the long term and never going to be anything but single demographic - "WHY THE FUCK SHOULD I BUY YOU STUFF JUST COZ YOU ARE GETTING MARRIED?!?!?"
I think this is what is being objected to in the first place, rather than the actual wedding list itself.
Yes, it's sour grapes and selfish etc. etc. "I'm never going to get to have a day when I throw a giant party and demand that all my friends buy me stuff as a consolation prize, blah blah etc."
Fortunately, the few of my friends that have got married and actually invited me did manage to live with my just turning up and not actually punching anyone.
But then again, I hate presents, I hate fun, I hate Christmas and birthdays and everything else.
― Violent In Design (Masonic Boom), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 15:28 (fourteen years ago) link
see Pinefox's post above MB...
― Achtung Blobby (Neil S), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 15:33 (fourteen years ago) link
"WHY THE FUCK SHOULD I BUY YOU STUFF JUST COZ YOU ARE GETTING MARRIED?!?!?"
Because they're your friends and you're happy for them and it's a nice thing to do?
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 10 June 2009 15:33 (fourteen years ago) link
i would have guessed the pinefox is a fan of the wedding present?
― FREE DOM AND ETHAN (special guest stars mark bronson), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 15:40 (fourteen years ago) link
Oh, but i'm not happy for them. Inside, I'm seething with anger and jealousy and a cauldron of bad things and really want to tell them SUCKER!!!! YOU FELL FOR THE OLDEST TRICK OF THE PATRIARCHY!!!! but, erm, my real friends, like I said, settle for me turning up and not punching anyone.
― Violent In Design (Masonic Boom), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 15:47 (fourteen years ago) link
WHY THE FUCK SHOULD I GIVE YOU A CARD JUST COZ IT'S YOUR BIRTHDAY?!?!? etc etc
― leave true black metal to those who don't deserve to listen to it (DJ Mencap), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 15:53 (fourteen years ago) link
WHY SHOULD I CELEBRATE YOUR BIRTH?
― Hatfail of Hollow (Nicole), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 15:57 (fourteen years ago) link
I can't really remember/couldn't really care which people bought us a wedding present or not but I wd feel a right git going to a wedding and not turning up with something, however token it might be.
― Westwood Ho (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 15:58 (fourteen years ago) link
To be egalitarian, everybody gets born. Not everybody gets married. What do you want, a cookie? Wait, no, I'd give a cookie. Just not spoons. Ha.
― Violent In Design (Masonic Boom), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:01 (fourteen years ago) link
i'd rather get a cookie than spoons - sounds like we're on to a winning thing here
― lex pretend, Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:02 (fourteen years ago) link
It's the enforced nature of it that bugs me. Buy us a pressie even though we are salaried homeowners with more stuff than we need already! Or feel bad for the rest of your life!
― man saves ducklings from (ledge), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:03 (fourteen years ago) link
For most weddings I've been to lately I suspect the cost of actually inviting me to the wedding, feeding me and giving me free booze for much of the evening significantly outweighs the cost of even the most expensive present on the list.
It's not a particularly onerous task to turn up with something to show you give a shit.
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:04 (fourteen years ago) link
We had a wedding list at Debenhams, it was mostly cheap stuff like toaster, kettles, a blender (which we did actually use once I think). Some people got us stuff, some people didn't, we were just happy people came. It just makes things easier for everybody! There's no obligation! I hate buying picking out presents for people so I'm all for them, really.
― Colonel Poo, Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:04 (fourteen years ago) link
Pretty sure no-one is forcing any of you miserable gits to buy anything, tbh.
― Colonel Poo, Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:05 (fourteen years ago) link
^^^
― Westwood Ho (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:05 (fourteen years ago) link
Altho next time I get married I might put a "PS I COULDN'T GIVE A TOSS WHETHER YOU BUY SOMETHING OR NOT SO DON'T HAVE SLEEPLESS NIGHTS" clause on the invite.
― Westwood Ho (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:06 (fourteen years ago) link
i have yet to attend a wedding that had a list (iirc)
― Hard House SugBanton (blueski), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:06 (fourteen years ago) link
Altho next time I get married
Noodle Gabor more like
― Hard House SugBanton (blueski), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:07 (fourteen years ago) link
A list is meant to help people who want to buy a gift, it's not a series of demands.
― Westwood Ho (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:07 (fourteen years ago) link
I've not been to a wedding for a few years, and last time I did I was Best Man, so they gave ME a present, but in the past I've not been able to afford a present really. We did buy one couple a present because we COULDN'T attend.
Em and I have decided to get married, but it's just gonna be a register office job, family meal, and then all down the pub afterwards. I don't think we'll have a gift list. People can give us money if they really want.
― Sickamous Mouthall (Scik Mouthy), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:10 (fourteen years ago) link
Most, if not all, weddings I have been to have said on the invite something along the lines of "buy us a gift if you feel like it", as the Colonel says above that's hardly emotional blackmail or anything.
Although Tanya Gold should obv have her invite rescinded and be cast into the outer darkness.
― Achtung Blobby (Neil S), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:12 (fourteen years ago) link
I generally prefer to find ways to show people that I care about them without gross displays of materialism. And vice versa.
Luckily, most of the people I'm actually close enough to for them to invite me to their weddings feel the same way. (I hope)
I do actually kinda feel the same way about birthdays, as well. What I'd like best from people involves their time and their attention, not their money. My favourite birthday "gifts" have been when friends are all "why don't you come round my house and I'll cook you dinner?" or we take each other out for dinner or something. Because it's not the money involved, it's the fact that they care enough about me to spend a couple of hours eating and talking with me. And that's my favourite way to show friends that I care about them, too.
― Violent In Design (Masonic Boom), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:16 (fourteen years ago) link
Yeah that's better, it's still a present though!
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:22 (fourteen years ago) link
it's just gonna be a register office job, family meal, and then all down the pub afterwards. I don't think we'll have a gift list. People can give us money if they really want.
Damn straight. I've been with my current partner for 7 years. We already have mountains of useless crap accrued from distant relatives at various Christmases etc including kettles, toasters, toasted sandwich makers, Foreman grills, slow cookers (2), and, my personal fave, a device for simplifying the cooking of spaghetti (as if this wasn't straightforward enough). We could start multiple homes to be honest.
― ears are wounds, Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:27 (fourteen years ago) link
Labour MP: Guardian is worse than it used to be
― Alba, Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:36 (fourteen years ago) link
what would tom watson look like with a scarf on?
― languid samuel l. jackson (jim), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:38 (fourteen years ago) link
MP using winky face emoticon feels wrong for some reason
― Hard House SugBanton (blueski), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 16:56 (fourteen years ago) link
"it's for a duckhouse ;-)"
― go and put your f'kin torn jeans on (onimo), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 17:03 (fourteen years ago) link
Hmm. I hate to say it, but respect to both Rusbridger and Do ... er, Tom Watson for the way each of them handled that.
― a tiny, faltering megaphone (grimly fiendish), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 17:25 (fourteen years ago) link
Re: TG, I'm deeply suspicious of these awful straw-man dinner parties that only seem to exist in broadsheet columns and sub-Mike Leigh comedy-dramas. Even if they are as bad as she suggests, perhaps she should turn down such invitations or find new friends rather than indulging in phony epater-le-bourgeoisie posturing.
― Dorian (Dorianlynskey), Wednesday, 10 June 2009 19:20 (fourteen years ago) link
then what would she write about?
― Dingbod Kesterson, Thursday, 11 June 2009 08:18 (fourteen years ago) link
Why does no one invite me to their dinner parties? by Tanya Gold.
― DJ Angoreinhardt (Billy Dods), Thursday, 11 June 2009 08:36 (fourteen years ago) link
Picnics; a pathetic exercise in al fresco exhibitionism by Tanya Gold.
― DJ Angoreinhardt (Billy Dods), Thursday, 11 June 2009 08:38 (fourteen years ago) link
Why do I imagine anyone gives a shit what I think about anything? by *fill in g2 hack of your choice*
― Dingbod Kesterson, Thursday, 11 June 2009 08:45 (fourteen years ago) link
Predictable:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2009/jun/15/defence-wedding-gift-lists
And the humiliation of taking a dozen nasty cut-glass whisky tumblers to Selfridges to exchange them only to be told: "I'm sorry, madam, but this design was discontinued eight years ago," cannot be underestimated.
Can't imagine anything worse, tbh.
― ears are wounds, Monday, 15 June 2009 11:31 (fourteen years ago) link
Why have all these Femail journalists suddenly started turning up in The Guardian? Have rates been cut in Kensington or raised in Farringdon?
― farcottonloco, Monday, 15 June 2009 11:36 (fourteen years ago) link
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/jun/15/charlotte-jones-complaint-comic-jon-henley
lol at even 8-year-olds zinging the guardian but really, this is sub-student paper shit.
― joe, Monday, 15 June 2009 11:55 (fourteen years ago) link
Wedding Lists? "Boring".
Small child on the money.
― ears are wounds, Monday, 15 June 2009 11:59 (fourteen years ago) link
I dunno. Maybe getting 8yos to edit papers is the way forward.
There was some godawful fucking jism in the Nobserver at the weekend that I nearly posted on here for shits and giggles, but really: it was so fucking dreadful I couldn't be arsed. What the fuck was it again?
Oh aye, it was this. Over-inflated sense of own importance much, Polly? (And I say that as a non-parent.)
― a tiny, faltering megaphone (grimly fiendish), Tuesday, 16 June 2009 19:57 (fourteen years ago) link
And not only that she wrote the same thing in February.http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/feb/08/motherhood-children-babies1
She really is quite poor.
― Old Ned 1962 Vinyl Edition (Ned Trifle II), Tuesday, 16 June 2009 20:36 (fourteen years ago) link
Ooops, I didn't read past the first few sentences - I see she says that herself. Way to earn yer fee then Polly.
― Old Ned 1962 Vinyl Edition (Ned Trifle II), Tuesday, 16 June 2009 20:41 (fourteen years ago) link
Must have had another pregnancy scare.
― ghetto nanna (sic), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 02:44 (fourteen years ago) link
Jeezus "I Hate Babies" is one of the all time challops classics for scumbags and morons.
― F.C. Farcottonlocomotiv (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 07:53 (fourteen years ago) link
Yeh, but it takes a special kind of cock-drip to twist it into "I hate babies: pity me, for I am socially superior".
I have a feeling that if PV's friends give her grief all the time, it's not just because she doesn't have children.
― a tiny, faltering megaphone (grimly fiendish), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 09:09 (fourteen years ago) link
Maybe going round your friends' houses and shrieking and jumping on a chair like the woman in Tom and Jerry every time a kid gets near you doesn't endear either.
― F.C. Farcottonlocomotiv (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 09:13 (fourteen years ago) link
guardian assholes removing themselves from the gene pool should be celebrated surely?
― admin log special guest star (DG), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 09:31 (fourteen years ago) link
Yeh, but you just know she's going to hit 40 and then decide she's got a god-given fucking right to fertility treatment on the NHS.
― a tiny, faltering megaphone (grimly fiendish), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 09:54 (fourteen years ago) link
In a series of blowing minds pieces for the Graun.
― Bueller is a douche (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 09:56 (fourteen years ago) link
Either that or a hard-hitting year-long series about how adopting a Burmese baby requires lots of paperwork.
― Tracer Hand, Wednesday, 17 June 2009 10:07 (fourteen years ago) link
But you can easily fit 3 of them in a suitcase.
― Bueller is a douche (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 17 June 2009 10:11 (fourteen years ago) link