Wedding Officiant Makes 'Rude' Comment About Groom's Appearance During Ceremony: 'Definitely Marrying Up'

Mar. 15, 2025

Uncomfortable groom (stock image).Photo:Neustockimages/Getty

Neustockimages/Getty

In a post onReddit’s “Wedding Shaming” forum, the poster explained that they went to a wedding recently where the officiant made a “rude” comment on the groom’s appearance.

The officiant’s unprofessionalism got worse near the end of the ceremony.

“He makes a comment about how it was a good thing that the groom was, ‘definitely marrying up,’ meaning that the bride was significantly better looking than the groom,” the wedding guest recalled.

Two men in formal attire having a conversation (stock image).Thomas Barwick/Getty

Thomas Barwick/Getty

Although the comment could have been taken as “just a simple joke,” the wedding guest thinks it was an inappropriate thing to say out loud on someone’s big day. The poster imagined if they were in the bride or groom’s shoes. In that case, they’d be “very mad if any part of the wedding ceremony speech was used to talk negatively about either of our looks.”

They added, “I also just felt like it was unprofessional.”

The poster asked the forum if he was overreacting to a potential joke.

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“You’re absolutely right,” one person commented. “It’s the combo of two toxic ideas — one is that it’s the bride’s day and the groom is just window dressing. The second is that you need to put someone down to praise their partner. What happened to ‘he’s so lucky to be marrying such a beautiful wife’ or something? Even that I feel is a little lopsided but at least not actively trying to be mean. Idk, I grew out of this corny and unkind humor ages ago. I hope the groom didn’t internalize it too much. It would bother me.”

Another Redditor wrote, “So, the officiant used the ceremony as an opportunity to heckle the groom? That’s just plain weird!”

Other commenters shared their own stories of unsavory things people have said at important life events, suggesting that tacky jokes are common at weddings even if they shouldn’t be.

source: people.com