Dear Abby and the Wedding Cake Smashers

[Mental Magpie]

http://dearabby.com/

Today's bottom post is a letter written from someone who is offended (her words) when couples smash wedding cake in each other's faces at weddings.  She is also sure the bride in the latest wedding was just humiliated when her new husband did it.

Abby's response also really bothers me.  She says it is wrong and only shows how immature the perpetrator is.

If my husband to be ever did it to me, I'd do it right back, and then we'd laugh like loons.  If I was worried about my expensive dress, I would tell him beforehand, "I know it seems like fun, but I really don't want to ruin this dress."  He would understand and not do it then.  Perhaps a little immature, but when things are all in good fun and both sides of the couple are all for it, whose business is it but theirs that they're having that fun?  As for wrong?  On what principle?

I wondered what the rest of E-Hell thought about it.

*I can't seems to put my thoughts to words; I'm sorry if my explanation is choppy.  I will try again later.

[alkira6]

It's up to the couple. DH and I discussed it before the wedding - since neither of us wanted to, we didn't.  A couple of our friends got married a couple of months before we did and the cake smash turned into the EPIC CAKE SMASH BATTLE OF DOOM.  It was hilarious and they both wanted it that way.  They used the groom's cake for it and it was epic.

[Judah]

It's immature and undignified, and DH and I did it anyway. I don't see why anyone else's opinion matters if it's what the HC wants. 

[MorgnsGrl]

Personally, I am not a fan of cake smashing. I think it's an odd thing for a couple to do after swearing fidelity and honor and love etc. But if the couple in question agree that it's hilarious and have a great time doing it, then more power to them. I definitely dislike it when it's clear that one member of the wedding couple is NOT into it. People watching can tell when it's fun, happy antics, and they can also tell when there's some kind of unpleasantness simmering under the surface, and I've seen BOTH. At weddings. Which makes me uncomfortable. I don't want to be uncomfortable at a wedding, you know?

[Harriet Jones]

If both halves of the couple are ok with it, it's fine.  Not to my taste, though.  It seems mean.


Here's a direct link to the column http://www.uexpress.com/dearabby/?uc_full_date=20121001 the dearabby.com link will always take you to the current day's column.

[Yvaine]

Ugh. I think this is a question I'd actually raise long before my hypothetical wedding, and I'd seriously reconsider said wedding if the guy wanted to do this! I would hate it. But that's me. If the bride was actually into this, it's not the LW's business. If she really was upset, then the groom is a bacon-fed knave, but it's still probably not the LW's business.

[Ginya]

It's really up to the couple. I told DH I didn't want to do it and he ended up just dabbing my nose with some icing because well that's just him.  I really didn't mind and we had a great time. The person writing is really over-thinking things, as long as both parties are ok with it why does she care?

[Addy]

I don't know, the letter sounded kind of like it was one-sided. Like the groom smashed cake in the bride's face, but she didn't reciprocate. That doesn't sound nice to me, but then, I hate the cake smash with the burning hot fire of a thousand suns.

I think I told this story before on this site, but when my son was getting married, his fiancee confided to me that he had asked her not to do the cake smash, but she was going to do it to him anyway. I think the horrified look on my face was enough to make her change her mind. Good thing, too, because if she had done it, my son would probably be too much of a gentleman to return the favour, so I would have to do it for him. 

[NyaChan]

I think in Dear Abby's case, she was responding to the LW's belief that the bride was not expecting this to happen.  If both people are not in agreement over cake smashing at the wedding, I think it is a horrible thing to do to someone you've just promised to respect and love.  If both people want it, there is nothing wrong with it. 

[Jones]

DH and I didn't discuss it ahead of time. I expected some sort of smash (face ONLY), because it happened at every single reception I had attended up to that point. When he delicately fed me the slice, as I did him, I was surprised. With a grin I dabbed some icing onto the tip of my own nose, he laughed but declined to kiss it off.

If the bride honestly didn't know it was coming and was upset, I feel for her, but it's none of the letterwriting guest's business.

[QueenofAllThings]

It's ridiculous and bizarre. We didn't do it.

You want to do it? Go right ahead! Not my business. Perhaps Abby is single-handedly trying to rid the world of a practice she finds offensive, hoping that couples will say "Well, but Abby says not to do it ...."

[violinp]

I personally think it's a bit gross - I have a thing about food all over the face - but if both people want to do it, that's their choice. It seemed, though, that the LW was talking about a groom who was playing a mean trick on his bride, which is a quick way to have an annulment in my book.

[hobish]

I personally think it's a bit gross - I have a thing about food all over the face - but if both people want to do it, that's their choice. It seemed, though, that the LW was talking about a groom who was playing a mean trick on his bride, which is a quick way to have an annulment in my book.

Amen, sista.
Gish and i aren't even getting married for a few years still and i have already brought it up with him. Lucky for me he is just as skeeved by people wearing food as i am. He was genuinely surprised that i would even  ask him not to do that.
It is up to the couple, but yeah, i think it is gross on par with the babies with spagetti on their head and dripping down their face, or cake smeared all over their bodies. It just bugs me. Maybe i am getting crotchety already  because i don't think i had as much aversion to it before that i do now.

[WillyNilly]

I think the cake smashing is a terrible and disrespectful, and yes as Abby says an immature thing to do.  I don't ever voice this opinion at weddings or really much at all unless asked, but I do think it.

And as a guest who is giving of my time and energy to attend the wedding, and dress up and look nice, and give a gift, etc, I do think its my business if I am asked to witness this act of public disrespect to a union I was just asked to witness as a public act of love & commitment.

I think the letter writer has a point - when you ask people to attend your wedding you have an obligation to them.  You are obligated to actually provide whatever you have offered to host (cake & punch, dinner, whatever), you are obligated to at minimum say "hi" to each guest, and I think you are obligated to publicly honor the vows you just made.  There's a time & a place for joking disrespect and I personally don't think at the wedding is the time.

[25wishes]

I generally see this as instigated by the groom, at the behest of his male friends. Kind of like a way to show he is "one of the guys" first and a married man second. Not very mature in my opinion.