Wedding Invitation - "No Boxed Gifts"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP again: i'm also south asian and it is quite common to give money as a gift.

registering is sometimes seen as uncouth - b/c it is asking for specific things.

money, however, is considered an appropriate and acceptable gift to a couple to help them start a home.

it's not "tacky"

It IS COMMON to give cash. The part that people (including me) are "hung up" on is the fact that the couple is ASKING/DEMANDING cash. THAT is rude beyond belief

I have never been to a wedding where cash was given as a gift. I am used to a wedding registry which I think is eminently sensible since the couple gets to select what they would like as a gift if someone wants to give one.

I think it is specific to the region of the country. My college friend from NJ got married and got tons of cash as wedding gifts, which they used as a down payment for their house. She's Irish and told me it's customary to give cash, not gifts. We had a registry at our wedding but one invited couple (70+ husband and wife from NJ) did give a check. Many non-Americans gave cash as well.

I always give cash at a wedding. It's the easiest thing to give, and it's always appreciated.

[Anonymous]

Write a check and move along. Simple. Done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This thread is not making South Asian cultures look good at all.

Whatever. Take a post off of DCUM and decide that South Asian cultures are horrible from it. Typical. Like your culture is all roses right?



To the OP- If you don't want to give a gift, don't. Stating no boxed gifts simply means that if you want to give the couple a gift then instead of spending on some stupid registry gift, please give them the cash instead and allow them to use it as they need to benefit them.

To you all stating that this is not Asia, I'm sure the couple and their family are aware of that obvious fact. The majority of the attendants to the wedding will be South Asian.

South Asian weddings are LARGE, no one wants 500 boxes of any kind of gift. Cash is the POLITE gift to give to a new couple starting their life together. We don't know their circumstances, we don't know if they need a toaster, if they need money for a downpayment for a house, or if they would like to use their gifts to pay down any student loans so they don't start life together with a debt.

In American culture, gifts are polite. If you like it, keep it, if you don't then donate it. But that is seen as extremely wasteful in India. What holds value is cash and gold. Those are the gifts given to a new couple or at a baby's birth, etc. because they mean a lot more for the well being of the family.


Registries for gifts or towards a honeymoon are TACKY. I mean, really, I've seen some things like " hey help us enjoy our honeymoon by paying for a snorkel trip". Gross. How about I give you some money and you go buy your own snorkel package or your own set of dishes. Why do I have to go shopping around for you when you are perfectly capable of shopping for yourself.

But you can not put nothing at all on the card. Guest want to know what to get, it's a lot more stressful for them to just have to randomly pick up a gift of for a new couple. So either a registry or "no boxed gifts" needs to be listed.

My husband and I are both South Asian, but newsflash DCUM, it's not a monolith. We did two different invitations- for my side and my husband's side. "No boxed gifts" on mine, nothing on his, since "no boxed gifts" would have been taboo in his family and like I said registries are tacky. My MIL was inundated with calls about what to buy us as a gift.

The checks from my side gave us a very nice cushion to start out with- the remainder my student loans paid off, the rest into a Vanguard account that's been growing money for the past 15 years.

Lot of sweeping generalizations here ....... and I certainly agree with the PP who wrote that paying your college debt is the farthest thing from my mind when I give a wedding gift. What is next? Pay-off credit card bills?

Like I said- it's giving a cushion to a new couple to use as would best serve them. Once it's given, it's given. It's not a go fund me for credit card bill or honeymoons.

As stated earlier, it would give most South Asians gift givers pleasure knowing that they were able to help in some small way to the financial security for a new couple.

We are very community oriented. Giving cash and gold serves the most stability for a family in the long term. This trickles down to a stronger community and more stabile future generations.

It's something that you will not get unless you get out of your box and try to understand that cultures are different.

Please just don't give a gift if you're so offended or just don't go to the wedding at all. It's different for you and apparently differences make you uncomfortable.
It's an invite, feel free to decline.

Exactly - cash and gold are given when the people involved are from POOR OR ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED backgrounds or cultures because everyone worries about money and financial secuity above all else. That is the accurate explanation that hopefully will end this debate. Giving cash is retalated to social class, in ANY CULTURE. Even once the social group is no longer poor, perhaps because they have immigrated to a country with more economic advantages, they will sometimes keep old traditions and call them cultural even those traditions are really class traditions. This explains all weddings where cash is exchanged: dollar dances, gifts of cash, money trees, etc... It originates from a time and place (and maybe still current) where the community worried about the financial stability of the marrying couple because they likely were farmers or herders or had the kind of job or lived in the kind of place where there wasn't any upper SES mobility and people regularly suffer from famine, poverty and insolvency.

You are so effing insecure you have to write in caps " poor and disadvantaged? How do you live with yourself? Hater.

One more thing. Poverty is a state of being or a condition. People don't choose to be poor. Even in this country there are people who struggle everyday to make ends meet. Economic conditions can change overnight. So don't act too smug.
Class and culture has nothing to do with economic background.

Wow. You are not very bright. It's odd how you are taking this so personally. There was no judgement value, just the facts. Class is directly related to economic background. Cultures arise from the habits and traditions of the community. In this case, the emanation for the giving of cash , rather than an item, is directly related to a lack of economic stability and lack of economic/social mobility. It's not an incitement of the poor, merely an explanation of a custom. The custom of giving cash to a Newly married couple (or patents of newborn). In each case, the community is trying to help ensure some economic stability for the couple or new parents. It is just an explanation of how the custom came into being. Perhaps you should take some sociology classes. It's very helpful in understanding customs of different people.

All Americans can trace their heritage back to a other places, and many, if not most, immigration waves to this country were caused/instigated by people trying to find a better life, a place with more opportunities (I.e. Economic and social opportunities). Ergo the different PPs saying giving cash at weddings is a "South Asain" thing or an "Irish" things or a "Hungarian money dance" or a New Jersey thing (i.e., Italian). In each case, there was a large immigrant population at an earlier time that came to the United States seeking better lives for their children. They brought their customs with them. Some of these customs survive and the gifting of cash is one of those things. WASPs, a term people are throwing around on this thread, are typically from a more economical advantaged background and their ancestors came to this country much earlier. Those people typically immigrated to the U.S. for different reasons than the latter waves. They were often second sons of the Aristocracy looking or more wealthy businessmen/traders/professionals. They too were looking to "make their fortunes" or find a place that would allow them more upward mobility but not from a place of poverty or destitute.

[Anonymous]

Continued...

In these WASPy families, weddings gifts of precious household items were customarily given at weddings or birth of a child as there was no need to give cash to those people, they had families and family wealth. It's just another example of immigrants to the U.S. bringing the custom of their forbearers.

Simple and accurate explanation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This thread is not making South Asian cultures look good at all.

Whatever. Take a post off of DCUM and decide that South Asian cultures are horrible from it. Typical. Like your culture is all roses right?



To the OP- If you don't want to give a gift, don't. Stating no boxed gifts simply means that if you want to give the couple a gift then instead of spending on some stupid registry gift, please give them the cash instead and allow them to use it as they need to benefit them.

To you all stating that this is not Asia, I'm sure the couple and their family are aware of that obvious fact. The majority of the attendants to the wedding will be South Asian.

South Asian weddings are LARGE, no one wants 500 boxes of any kind of gift. Cash is the POLITE gift to give to a new couple starting their life together. We don't know their circumstances, we don't know if they need a toaster, if they need money for a downpayment for a house, or if they would like to use their gifts to pay down any student loans so they don't start life together with a debt.

In American culture, gifts are polite. If you like it, keep it, if you don't then donate it. But that is seen as extremely wasteful in India. What holds value is cash and gold. Those are the gifts given to a new couple or at a baby's birth, etc. because they mean a lot more for the well being of the family.


Registries for gifts or towards a honeymoon are TACKY. I mean, really, I've seen some things like " hey help us enjoy our honeymoon by paying for a snorkel trip". Gross. How about I give you some money and you go buy your own snorkel package or your own set of dishes. Why do I have to go shopping around for you when you are perfectly capable of shopping for yourself.

But you can not put nothing at all on the card. Guest want to know what to get, it's a lot more stressful for them to just have to randomly pick up a gift of for a new couple. So either a registry or "no boxed gifts" needs to be listed.

My husband and I are both South Asian, but newsflash DCUM, it's not a monolith. We did two different invitations- for my side and my husband's side. "No boxed gifts" on mine, nothing on his, since "no boxed gifts" would have been taboo in his family and like I said registries are tacky. My MIL was inundated with calls about what to buy us as a gift.

The checks from my side gave us a very nice cushion to start out with- the remainder my student loans paid off, the rest into a Vanguard account that's been growing money for the past 15 years.

Lot of sweeping generalizations here ....... and I certainly agree with the PP who wrote that paying your college debt is the farthest thing from my mind when I give a wedding gift. What is next? Pay-off credit card bills?

Like I said- it's giving a cushion to a new couple to use as would best serve them. Once it's given, it's given. It's not a go fund me for credit card bill or honeymoons.

As stated earlier, it would give most South Asians gift givers pleasure knowing that they were able to help in some small way to the financial security for a new couple.

We are very community oriented. Giving cash and gold serves the most stability for a family in the long term. This trickles down to a stronger community and more stabile future generations.

It's something that you will not get unless you get out of your box and try to understand that cultures are different.

Please just don't give a gift if you're so offended or just don't go to the wedding at all. It's different for you and apparently differences make you uncomfortable.
It's an invite, feel free to decline.

Exactly - cash and gold are given when the people involved are from POOR OR ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED backgrounds or cultures because everyone worries about money and financial secuity above all else. That is the accurate explanation that hopefully will end this debate. Giving cash is retalated to social class, in ANY CULTURE. Even once the social group is no longer poor, perhaps because they have immigrated to a country with more economic advantages, they will sometimes keep old traditions and call them cultural even those traditions are really class traditions. This explains all weddings where cash is exchanged: dollar dances, gifts of cash, money trees, etc... It originates from a time and place (and maybe still current) where the community worried about the financial stability of the marrying couple because they likely were farmers or herders or had the kind of job or lived in the kind of place where there wasn't any upper SES mobility and people regularly suffer from famine, poverty and insolvency.

You are so effing insecure you have to write in caps " poor and disadvantaged? How do you live with yourself? Hater.

One more thing. Poverty is a state of being or a condition. People don't choose to be poor. Even in this country there are people who struggle everyday to make ends meet. Economic conditions can change overnight. So don't act too smug.
Class and culture has nothing to do with economic background.

Wow. You are not very bright. It's odd how you are taking this so personally. There was no judgement value, just the facts. Class is directly related to economic background. Cultures arise from the habits and traditions of the community. In this case, the emanation for the giving of cash , rather than an item, is directly related to a lack of economic stability and lack of economic/social mobility. It's not an incitement of the poor, merely an explanation of a custom. The custom of giving cash to a Newly married couple (or patents of newborn). In each case, the community is trying to help ensure some economic stability for the couple or new parents. It is just an explanation of how the custom came into being. Perhaps you should take some sociology classes. It's very helpful in understanding customs of different people.

All Americans can trace their heritage back to a other places, and many, if not most, immigration waves to this country were caused/instigated by people trying to find a better life, a place with more opportunities (I.e. Economic and social opportunities). Ergo the different PPs saying giving cash at weddings is a "South Asain" thing or an "Irish" things or a "Hungarian money dance" or a New Jersey thing (i.e., Italian). In each case, there was a large immigrant population at an earlier time that came to the United States seeking better lives for their children. They brought their customs with them. Some of these customs survive and the gifting of cash is one of those things. WASPs, a term people are throwing around on this thread, are typically from a more economical advantaged background and their ancestors came to this country much earlier. Those people typically immigrated to the U.S. for different reasons than the latter waves. They were often second sons of the Aristocracy looking or more wealthy businessmen/traders/professionals. They too were looking to "make their fortunes" or find a place that would allow them more upward mobility but not from a place of poverty or destitute.

No. You are over analyzing it without knowing the background . Plain and simple. Cash was given to the newly weds so they have the flexibility to buy what they need. Gold was an investment for the bride's future, in case she ever needed to use it.

[Anonymous]

God! Why is it so difficult to understand? Save everyone the time, energy, effort of buying a gift and returning a gift - write a check.

The young couple will appreciate money more than things.

[Anonymous]

Cash and gold were only needed by a young couple if they didn't have family wealth. It's absolutely a custom arising from economic instability of the originating country/community.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Cash and gold were only needed by a young couple if they didn't have family wealth. It's absolutely a custom arising from economic instability of the originating country/community.

If you don't have a clue about another country's culture at least stop putting out theories like you are an expert!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cash and gold were only needed by a young couple if they didn't have family wealth. It's absolutely a custom arising from economic instability of the originating country/community.

If you don't have a clue about another country's culture at least stop putting out theories like you are an expert!

Not the PP: Frankly, you are the one who is clueless with your generalizations. Your emphasis on cash and gold really shows you to be an ignoramus. Gold was once the investment of last resort. Today it is not the case in most parts of India. In a country as diverse as India customs vary from state to state and sometimes within the state.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have never been to a wedding where cash was given as a gift. I am used to a wedding registry which I think is eminently sensible since the couple gets to select what they would like as a gift if someone wants to give one.

How could you possibly know that? Did you inspect all the gifts and monitor the couple's bank accounts?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cash and gold were only needed by a young couple if they didn't have family wealth. It's absolutely a custom arising from economic instability of the originating country/community.

If you don't have a clue about another country's culture at least stop putting out theories like you are an expert!

Not the PP: Frankly, you are the one who is clueless with your generalizations. Your emphasis on cash and gold really shows you to be an ignoramus. Gold was once the investment of last resort. Today it is not the case in most parts of India. In a country as diverse as India customs vary from state to state and sometimes within the state.

When the whole premise of the argument is to satisfy someone's need to assert "superiority" over another group, everything is moot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People don't get married until late 20's and early 30's these days. They neither need nor want a toaster. I will never understand why a registry is acceptable but stating you want cash isn't. We did a registry with about 5 items on it. Most people got the idea, and the dinosaurs gave us some weird gift they decided we should have.

Exactly. I didn't want to do a registry at all, preferring not to dictate I'm any way want I wanted. I don't understand how asking for 12 place settings of china at $125 is any more tacky than asking for cash. Either way, there is a expectation that you will spend money on me. If we had been smart we would have returned all the shit we didn't need and hardly ever use for the cash anyway.

And yes, the foot high Thomas Kincaid sculpture we received was super special.

The next best thing to specify on a wedding invite, I guess, would be " include return receipts please" !

Well for the people who had the good sense to mail us items (since our wedding was in a different state from where we lived), the receipt was enclosed by the company. So that makes it easy!

For people like the PPs I would decline to give anything. It is a celebration, not an etiquette war. But now I know where to get rid of all my dollar store stuff. we got some super special junk (along with some much appreciated things) It took us years to toss that junk away!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This thread is not making South Asian cultures look good at all.

Whatever. Take a post off of DCUM and decide that South Asian cultures are horrible from it. Typical. Like your culture is all roses right?



To the OP- If you don't want to give a gift, don't. Stating no boxed gifts simply means that if you want to give the couple a gift then instead of spending on some stupid registry gift, please give them the cash instead and allow them to use it as they need to benefit them.

To you all stating that this is not Asia, I'm sure the couple and their family are aware of that obvious fact. The majority of the attendants to the wedding will be South Asian.

South Asian weddings are LARGE, no one wants 500 boxes of any kind of gift. Cash is the POLITE gift to give to a new couple starting their life together. We don't know their circumstances, we don't know if they need a toaster, if they need money for a downpayment for a house, or if they would like to use their gifts to pay down any student loans so they don't start life together with a debt.

In American culture, gifts are polite. If you like it, keep it, if you don't then donate it. But that is seen as extremely wasteful in India. What holds value is cash and gold. Those are the gifts given to a new couple or at a baby's birth, etc. because they mean a lot more for the well being of the family.


Registries for gifts or towards a honeymoon are TACKY. I mean, really, I've seen some things like " hey help us enjoy our honeymoon by paying for a snorkel trip". Gross. How about I give you some money and you go buy your own snorkel package or your own set of dishes. Why do I have to go shopping around for you when you are perfectly capable of shopping for yourself.

But you can not put nothing at all on the card. Guest want to know what to get, it's a lot more stressful for them to just have to randomly pick up a gift of for a new couple. So either a registry or "no boxed gifts" needs to be listed.

My husband and I are both South Asian, but newsflash DCUM, it's not a monolith. We did two different invitations- for my side and my husband's side. "No boxed gifts" on mine, nothing on his, since "no boxed gifts" would have been taboo in his family and like I said registries are tacky. My MIL was inundated with calls about what to buy us as a gift.

The checks from my side gave us a very nice cushion to start out with- the remainder my student loans paid off, the rest into a Vanguard account that's been growing money for the past 15 years.

Lot of sweeping generalizations here ....... and I certainly agree with the PP who wrote that paying your college debt is the farthest thing from my mind when I give a wedding gift. What is next? Pay-off credit card bills?

Like I said- it's giving a cushion to a new couple to use as would best serve them. Once it's given, it's given. It's not a go fund me for credit card bill or honeymoons.

As stated earlier, it would give most South Asians gift givers pleasure knowing that they were able to help in some small way to the financial security for a new couple.

We are very community oriented. Giving cash and gold serves the most stability for a family in the long term. This trickles down to a stronger community and more stabile future generations.

It's something that you will not get unless you get out of your box and try to understand that cultures are different.

Please just don't give a gift if you're so offended or just don't go to the wedding at all. It's different for you and apparently differences make you uncomfortable.
It's an invite, feel free to decline.

Exactly - cash and gold are given when the people involved are from POOR OR ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED backgrounds or cultures because everyone worries about money and financial secuity above all else. That is the accurate explanation that hopefully will end this debate. Giving cash is retalated to social class, in ANY CULTURE. Even once the social group is no longer poor, perhaps because they have immigrated to a country with more economic advantages, they will sometimes keep old traditions and call them cultural even those traditions are really class traditions. This explains all weddings where cash is exchanged: dollar dances, gifts of cash, money trees, etc... It originates from a time and place (and maybe still current) where the community worried about the financial stability of the marrying couple because they likely were farmers or herders or had the kind of job or lived in the kind of place where there wasn't any upper SES mobility and people regularly suffer from famine, poverty and insolvency.

You are so effing insecure you have to write in caps " poor and disadvantaged? How do you live with yourself? Hater.

One more thing. Poverty is a state of being or a condition. People don't choose to be poor. Even in this country there are people who struggle everyday to make ends meet. Economic conditions can change overnight. So don't act too smug.
Class and culture has nothing to do with economic background.

Wow. You are not very bright. It's odd how you are taking this so personally. There was no judgement value, just the facts. Class is directly related to economic background. Cultures arise from the habits and traditions of the community. In this case, the emanation for the giving of cash , rather than an item, is directly related to a lack of economic stability and lack of economic/social mobility. It's not an incitement of the poor, merely an explanation of a custom. The custom of giving cash to a Newly married couple (or patents of newborn). In each case, the community is trying to help ensure some economic stability for the couple or new parents. It is just an explanation of how the custom came into being. Perhaps you should take some sociology classes. It's very helpful in understanding customs of different people.

All Americans can trace their heritage back to a other places, and many, if not most, immigration waves to this country were caused/instigated by people trying to find a better life, a place with more opportunities (I.e. Economic and social opportunities). Ergo the different PPs saying giving cash at weddings is a "South Asain" thing or an "Irish" things or a "Hungarian money dance" or a New Jersey thing (i.e., Italian). In each case, there was a large immigrant population at an earlier time that came to the United States seeking better lives for their children. They brought their customs with them. Some of these customs survive and the gifting of cash is one of those things. WASPs, a term people are throwing around on this thread, are typically from a more economical advantaged background and their ancestors came to this country much earlier. Those people typically immigrated to the U.S. for different reasons than the latter waves. They were often second sons of the Aristocracy looking or more wealthy businessmen/traders/professionals. They too were looking to "make their fortunes" or find a place that would allow them more upward mobility but not from a place of poverty or destitute.

Nice analysis, but you have never been to Potomac, Great Falls, Mclean or Bethesda, or NW. That is where the rich immigrants live.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Money grab. Tacky.

+1000

the alternative may be bagged gifts. Use a plastic bag from a grocery store or similar.

[Anonymous]

OP,

Decline the invitation.

The average cost of an Indian wedding in the US is 100K. If this is an South Asian wedding, it will be a beyond lavish affair with at least a few hundred guests.

You and your gift will not be missed. Trust me on this.