There's a local television ad that is all about a couple's wedding and their love for each other. Not until the last few seconds do we learn that the ad is for a bakery. I wasn't surprised that matrimania was being used to sell muffins. I keep track of such perversions. At the time I wrote Singled Out, my list of items advertised with wedding porn included "cereal and soft drinks; ice cream, chocolate, and cheese; dentistry, headache medication, eye drops, and body lotion; cars, clothes, shoes, credit cards, and lottery tickets; beer, cigarettes, and wine coolers; hotels, real estate, life insurance, and financial institutions" (from p. 15). Since the book was published, I have a new favorite addition: The bridal theme has also been used to sell motor oil. What was "special" about the bakery ad, though, was that the baked goods were essentially an afterthought; the ad was all about the marriage.
Over at the Nation magazine, Katha Pollitt offered an important observation: Women aren't buying it. Reviewing the highs and lows for women during the past decade, she noted, "Despite oceans of wedding porn, women's age at first marriage rose over the decade."
Men aren't buying the wedding porn, either. The Census Bureau just released the latest figures for 2009. The median age at which men first marry - now 28.1 years old - is higher than it has ever been since the Census Bureau started recording such data in 1890. ("Median" means that half of the people marry before that age and half after.) Women have also never married later in life than they do now. Their median age at first marriage for 2009 is (continue reading here at the "Living Single" blog at Psychology Today).