How NOT to Ask Her to Marry You

For most of us in the West, the tradition is for a man to ask a woman to be his bride.  It's not unknown (and increasingly common) for it to happen the other way around, but still people expect the onus to be on the males.

This means that many women won't ask him to marry her, even if she would like that very much. She'll wait silently hoping that he'll ask her.

Hence there's a ridiculous amount of pressure for men to initiate a marriage. He has to guess whether she is likely to want this too. Then he has to judge the right moment to ask her. It falls to him to research the traditional rites involved in this milestone, then to plan it all to perfection.

If he gets any part of that wrong, then the result could well be humiliation and/or the end of a beautiful relationship.

Yet the females feel the pressure too. They have no idea if, or when, that question might be asked. When it is, then they are put on the spot, having to make a life-changing decision with just a split second's knowledge.

At least he had time to contemplate the implications first.

So what is a marriage proposal?  It's two people acting under a lot of pressure, focusing upon a decision that will map their whole future lives. And we wonder why some marriage proposals go so badly wrong...

Would it ruin the cringe-giggling, or make it all better to know that the Dubai Mall wedding proposal fail couple are actors? 

The whole stunt was part of a viral online campaign by Cadbury's - hence the train which cut across the picture - to promote their Not So Sweet Bourneville Chocolate range.

However, just because this one was fake, it doesn't mean that similar things haven't happened in real life too.  As this lot aptly demonstrate:

I've been reading all morning the comments on videos, like the above, of failed marriage proposals caught on film. I was absolutely stunned by the fact that so many of them launched into vitriolic reprimands towards the ladies involved.

The general feeling was that she should always say yes - regardless of her true feelings on the matter - in order to spare his blushes.

To my mind, the facts of the matter are quite otherwise. He created that situation in the full knowledge that she could either say 'yes' or 'no'. That's a 50/50 chance either way. That it might be 'no' was the risk that he took when popping the question.

As for 'she shouldn't have humiliated him!', that's a bizarre one. He's just humiliated her. He's put her on the spot, during one of the most important decisions of her life, and ensured that there's a huge audience to watch her.

In those circumstances, the pressure is immense for her to say 'yes'. And isn't that precisely why so many prospective bridegrooms ask the question in public?  He's trying to emotionally blackmail her into marrying him.

So he's using coercive tactics and embarrassing her, yet she's the nasty individual for refusing to play along?  Let's put this to the vote!

Set and setting is quite important.  Even if you wisely opt for a private affair - without the eyes of millions placing pressure on the marriage proposal - that doesn't mean that your environment can't intrude in unforeseen ways.

The gentleman above thought that going down on one knee in the middle of a sea-washed slab was a good idea. He was lucky that neither of them were seriously injured, when a wave knocked them clean out to shore!

This is one of the most important moments of your life. Try not to cripple your prospective spouse in the asking.

And remember your own physical reactions too, as Cody should have done during his proposal of marriage.

When Cody decided to ask Amberlie to marry him, he enlisted his best friend Tyson Henderson to help. As Tyson makes a living out of filming special moments, he offered to catch this wedding proposal on tape.

It wasn't so strange that Tyson took his camera on that trek to a local waterfall. He was always recording his friends and family in this way. It wasn't like the couple were alone. Tyson took his fiancee too.

So Cody had his big moment all worked out - the scenery, the romance, not too public a proposal, the friend filming, and a beautiful day.  What he hadn't figured upon was how much his hands would be shaking at the time.

Top tip, marriage suitors! You're going to be nervous. Try not to stand too close to anywhere that the ring might be lost, if your trembling fingers drop it. Because the odds are high that you will.

Cody had both engagement ring and wedding band at his fingertips. The latter ended up flying over the edge of a waterfall and crashing into the waters below. Some might take that as a bad omen. Others might laugh.

Fortunately for him, it all worked out well in the end.

Unlike this next man. It wasn't the ring that he lost, it was his temper.

Another great tip for a successful wedding proposal is to not get angry, when it's not all going quite according to plan. Ryan Houston's bad example is a case in point.

He'd done everything right. He'd booked a quiet holiday for himself and his girlfriend Laura Yearout, in a sun-drenched resort in Cozumel. He'd even arranged a romantic meal for two, out on a pier with the ocean lapping all around. It should have been beautiful.

But someone had moored their yacht right behind the couple.

On the verge of asking Laura to marry him, Ryan glanced over her shoulder and saw a man in Speedos stand up and stretch. Just feet away, the man looked across at the couple. Feeling the moment somewhat ruined, Ryan leapt from his seat and untied the yacht, pushing it out to sea.

There's no record of what the man in the Speedos did. But presumably he called the police, because before Ryan had geared himself up to finally make his proposal, he was staring into the eyes of a Mexican constable.

As he was handcuffed and being dragged away, Ryan yelled at Laura to get 'something' out of his pocket. She did. It was the ring. She freaked the Hell out and dropped the ring, right into the ocean.

It transpired that the yacht wasn't actually damaged. After a while cooling his heels inside, Ryan was let go to continue the rest of his holiday.

Which is when Laura told him what she'd done. He spent the next two hours in full Scuba gear, combing the sea floor until he discovered the errant engagement ring. The words 'lucky man' spring to mind. I would have guessed it drifted well out on the currents by then!

He returned to his girlfriend on the beach and finally asked her if she'd be his wife. She said 'yes'.  Personally? I'd have entered in a clause there. A tentative yes, depending upon whether or not he subscribes to some anger management classes.

And if your great planned proposal doesn't go quite as scripted?  Then let it happen. This next bloke redeemed his moment brilliantly. You'll not be able to watch this without laughing.

Over-complicating things means that there is more to potentially go wrong. The best wedding proposals are kept simple.

Personally, I'm really glad that film-maker Nick Plagman decided to create a whole movie set of his marriage proposal. But that's only because I can selfishly giggle like mad at the outcome. As for poor Sarah Madsen, I'm amazed that she ever worked out what he was trying to ask her, in the midst of all that chaos!

The pertinent point is that complicated proposals of marriage can easily be doomed. There is so much to remember, at a moment when your mind might be frozen with nerves, and there is plenty that may not pan out as planned.

Keep it simple and it won't end up looking like a farce. Unless, of course, that's what you planned. Like this next band of ill-advised suitors did.

Nikki and John are known for playing pranks upon each other, not to mention on their family and friends. But surely there's a time and a place?

The way that John popped the question (or should that be plopped the question?) meant that Nikki wasn't even entirely sure that he was in earnest.  To be fair, neither did anyone watching the video afterwards, and we weren't contending with gunk dripping in our ears.

It was certainly a memorable, but probably the most immature wedding proposal ever between two consenting adults.

There was more than a hint of childishness, and John framed the whole thing in such a way that he could claim to have only been joking if she had said no. Maybe that's a win-win situation for himself, but it equally risked Nikki saying no out of sheer spite.

I think it would take a certain kind of woman to say yes after a prank proposal. Fortunately for John, Nikki is apparently one of those women.  As were these two ladies in the wedding proposal prank videos below.  (Watch out for strong language. Fury is the first reaction, then a 'yes' if they're ready to forgive him quickly.)