SALON

Monday, Jul 31, 2006 3:58 AM UTC

Mexicans ditch sexist wedding vows

After 147 long years women can finally say "I do" without being humiliated.

By

Topics: Broadsheet, Coupling, Love and Sex,

According to an AP story in yesterday’s Boston Globe, the wedding vows traditionally recited by Mexican judges — which proclaim wives both weak and annoying — are thankfully falling out of favor as machismo loses some of its cultural impact, and people generally begin to recognize that predicating a modern marriage on sexist assumptions just won’t cut it.

“Even though the Mexican constitution says we are equal, the vows put the woman in a very disadvantaged position where the man can make it her obligation to reproduce, take care of the home,” Teresa Ulloa, president of the women’s rights organization Defensoras Populares, told the AP.

The old vows — a 537-word ode to marriage written by liberal politician Melchor Ocampo in 1859 — were created to replace religious vows endorsed by the Roman Catholic Church. (After penning the vows Ocampo was executed for promoting the separation of church and state — yet for some reason his vows were left in the civil marriage law.) In March, Defensoras Populares convinced Mexico’s Congress to adopt a resolution that urges judges to skip the vows, though they are still on the books in 31 states.

The AP didn’t reprint the full vows, but they sound pretty bad. In part they order a husband to treat his wife with “generous benevolence that the strong should give to the weak” and that a wife should “avoid awakening the most brusque, irritable and hard part of (her husband’s) character.”

Abandoning the traditional vows has inspired some Mexican states to hold contests to see who can come up with some classy, modern alternatives.

At one DIY wedding I attended, the husband promised his wife that he would forever endure her need to watch the WB. Perhaps that doesn’t qualify as enlightened, but I thought it was pretty sweet. If you’ve heard — or recited — any great, egalitarian vows, tell us about them.

Lori Leibovich is a contributing editor at Salon and the former editor of the Life section. More Lori Leibovich.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 11 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations