By Christianne Walker
© Girlfriends Magazine, January 2002

For many lesbians, few things are as uncomfortable as being a bridesmaid in a straight wedding. Wearing a dress, walking down the aisle arm-in-arm with a groomsman, hesitating to dance with your girlfriend at the reception-all these things can trigger strong emotions. And yet, being asked to be a bridesmaid demonstrates how much our straight friends and family love us. After all, they're inviting us to play a role in one of the biggest days of their lives. But what they expect us to do can reveal how little they understand us.

Having been a bridesmaid myself, I wanted to speak with other women around the country about their experiences as a member of the wedding party. All of them were eager to support the bride in any way they could and felt honored to have been asked to participate. One changed her mind after hastily agreeing. Rebecca, a twenty-nine-year-old financial analyst in Seattle, grew up Mormon and is now out to her entire family. When asked to be matron of honor at her niece's wedding back home in Utah, "I accepted right away, because I was really honored that she asked me." Kelly, a thirty-five-year-old self-defined computer geek in Austin, Texas was a bridesmaid in her younger brother's wedding five years ago. She wanted to support her brother, who used to screen his dates by asking whether they had a problem with lesbians and gays. "If he asked me for a kidney, I'd give it to him. If he wanted me to walk down the aisle again, I would."

Oppressed by the Dress

"I don't consider myself an extremely butch woman, but I'm not comfortable in dresses at all," says Kelly. "If you ever see me in a dress, you know hell's freezing over." Anne, a thirty-eight-year-old high school math teacher in Minneapolis, says, "I don't do dresses." Nevertheless, she agreed to wear one for the bride, a close friend and sports mate from high school, because it was expected of her. (Her consolation prize was the wedding party gift: Nike Air tennis shoes.)

"I don't like wearing dresses, ever," says Rebecca, "and for a while, I was suspecting that maybe they talked me into being the matron of honor just so I would wear a dress for them. It was really torture. I didn't want to stay in the dress. I felt silly. When you're in a dress, you have to act more proper. It seems like they made dresses to oppress women, you know, because you can't do certain things in a dress. I just felt stuck."

Tanya, a thirty-year-old high school softball coach from Boston, was maid of honor at her younger sister's wedding last summer. She drew the line at dancing with the best man at the reception and wearing makeup or having her hair done, but she wore the dress. "They were more excited about picking out my dress than they were about picking out [the bride's] dress." As guests made their way down the reception line, Tanya says they gushed over another of her sisters, an ideal bridesmaid with beauty shop hair and makeup. But when they came to Tanya, they just smiled, shook her hand, and walked by. They didn't treat her like the bride's sister. "And it just pissed me off, because I knew the only reason they didn't associate me with my sister was because I didn't fit. And that really hurt the most out of the whole wedding." When Tanya changed into a button-down silk blouse and tailored pants after dinner, she was finally able to relax and have fun. "I felt so confident," she says. She even got her sister to slow dance with her.

Playing It Straight

Many lesbian bridesmaids refuse to act straight in front of a crowd of people which includes their own family and lovers. Lilith, a twenty-nine-year-old accountant in Seattle, reneged on her agreement with a close friend. The bride, a fundamentalist Christian who believes homosexuality is a sin, had come to terms with Lilith's lesbianism, but Lilith wasn't out to the bride's fundamentalist family. She imagined dancing with her partner of four years at the reception and having a fundie yell, "Don't do that in front of my children!" Besides, entering the reception with the groomsman and having to dance with him felt like a sham. "It's this very straight presumption, this total presumption that I'm straight, and I felt really uncomfortable with that." One of the hardest decisions she's ever made was to change her mind about being a bridesmaid. As a compromise, she came early to the wedding to help the bride and run errands. They both felt this reaffirmed their friendship.

Giving in to the straight role-playing can send the wrong message to one's own heterosexist family members. When her father saw Rebecca walk down a staircase on the best man's arm during the rehearsal, he came up to her afterwards and said, "Wow, I really liked seeing you with that guy"-right in front of her partner. "It felt like a big fantasy world for him." Then there was walking arm-in-arm with the best man. "It was really strange. I wanted to put my arm out [for him to take]-and he put his out, and I felt suddenly really submissive. It was really an uncomfortable feeling."

Obeying the Bride

The bride's mindset is the determining factor in how comfortable the lesbian bridesmaid feels. Sarah, twenty-nine-year-old law school graduate from Connecticut, had to answer her sister's questions about how she'd behave-Would she bring a woman date and dance with her at the reception?-before she was officially invited to be a bridesmaid.

Anne came face-to-face with homophobia in her own family over her younger sister's wedding. Anne wasn't even asked to be a bridesmaid, although another sister was. Then she was told not to bring her then-partner. Anne simply told her sister, "If she's not welcome, I'm not coming."

Lilith might have agreed to be a bridesmaid "if the wedding weren't so traditional and if there were a place for me. [But] in that kind of super-traditional, hard-core straight situation, I wasn't acknowledged." At another straight wedding she recently attended, a prayer was offered for those who can't get married. "If they would have had something like that," she says, "I would have had no problem with the rest of it."

Tanya feels brides need to respect their bridesmaids. "I think, a lot of times, they're just in this fantasy land, like a Princess Di wedding. That's what they all have in their head and they're not thinking about who they're actually asking and how those people feel. Yes, it's an honor, and I loved that my sister asked me to be there for her, and to play such a significant role in her wedding. But I also would have liked her to see that you don't need to follow all the traditions. And when you ask somebody, you ask them for who they are, and not for what you want them to be."

Questioning the Status Quo

Watching her sister getting married, Tanya couldn't help thinking that if she ever got married, she'd be treated differently by her family and the law. "Every part of my family was there. And it was sad, because I looked around when I was standing up there and thought, [Not all] of these people would come to my wedding. I wouldn't even know how to ask them to come. Everyone accepts them and cheers them on. They drive by in a car that has a Just Married sign on it and people look at them and clap. Whereas, if two women were in a Just Married vehicle with noisemakers in the back, people would just give dirty looks and think, Oh, disgusting." A self-described hopeless romantic, she says the experience made her "want to get married more than ever in my life, because I want to prove how strong my marriage would be compared to the marriage I was seeing."

After her niece's ceremony, Rebecca's father hugged her and said how happy he was she wouldn't be getting married, because of all the money he'd save. "I thought, Oh my god, so what does that mean? If I get married, will he not pay for my wedding? Will he not participate and help me put it together? It hurt my feelings. I mean, how do you know I'm not going to get married, for one thing? And for another, if I did, wouldn't you pay for it?" And it does cost money. "I just kept thinking through the wedding, Wow, this is really expensive-and it's not going to last." (Her niece was twenty-one and the groom twenty.)

Rebecca's glad she supported her niece, but wouldn't be in another straight wedding because of the social and political implications. Traditionally, the bride's father walks her down the aisle and gives her to the groom. "What is that? It pisses me off as a feminist. I don't believe in it and I don't support it." If she ever has a commitment ceremony, she'll skip the ritual. Would she have bridesmaids? "I don't know what the reason is for that in traditional weddings. I'd have to figure out what the reason is and then decide from there. It seems kind of funny to have an entourage."

Lilith wants a commitment ceremony someday. What it will look like has been shaped by her near-bridesmaid experience and her recent attendance at a lesbian ceremony. "There are so many cultural issues that don't apply to the lesbian and gay community that you can't just take a straight wedding and copy it with two brides or two grooms. It would be so absurd that it would be funny." Will she have bridesmaids? "The whole concept is revolting to me."

Telling the Truth

For anyone contemplating the bridesmaid experience, here's some advice from the veterans. "Before you say yes," says Lilith, "let the bride know as tactfully as you can that you have to think about it. It's really important that you stick up for yourself."

"If you're not out to them already," says Kelly, "come out, because it's really empowering. If she feels strong enough to ask you to be in their wedding, you should at least share with them who you are."

"You just really need to be up front with her," says Tanya. "I'd just be honest."

"If you have a partner and you're being invited to the wedding and your partner is not invited," Rebecca says, "refuse to go. Just because it's that person's day doesn't mean they have to make it hellish for you-like, 'You can come as a straight person, just don't come as a gay person.' Don't hide your sexuality just because they want you to come and participate in this straight event. Be yourself. Don't let them tell you how to be."

Freelancer Christianne Walker writes on politics, women, and queer issues from Seattle.