I’m on the record as despising a certain kind of narcissistic wedding Web site, the ones where there are four-paragraph-long bios of each of the groomsmen and a rambling “how we met” story. And yet, just once, I was hoping against hope for that kind of inappropriate oversharing: Prince Will and Kate Middleton have put up a wedding Web site , like just about every other couple getting married in 2011. (So common , that waity-Katie!) It’s quite unrevealing and deadly dull; the wedding party is listed simply by name and age, above a request that editors not contact them. I’m sure it’s mostly an attempt to slake the thirst of the royal-wedding-mad public and meant also as a clearinghouse for the press, but it’s designed to look like a normal wedding site.
This I find particularly funny: At least some of the current wedding mania can probably be traced back to Princess Diana’s wedding. Brides are convinced it’s their day to be a celebrity and a princess, with every move chronicled and glorified, and these sites are a way of asserting that. Now, some 30 years later, it’s the princess brides hollowly imitating some of the wedding rituals of the everyday brides.
