Last weekend, I went to a bachelor party in Atlantic City for my former college roommate Doug. It was a good time. We had fun. Possibly too much fun, but there were no arrests or venereal diseases so maybe not. I don't know. What's too much fun? I draw the line at police involvement or permanent disease but I could be wrong. I'm no lawyer. But you know that. Or maybe you don't. I'll type it again: I'm no lawyer. Now you should know. Unless you're too stupid to read. In which case this is all wasted on you anyway. Hey, Guy Who Can't Read: Learn how to fucking read, dumbass.
Now, as is the case with bachelor parties, the night was all about the groom-to-be. He got the meal he wanted, the strippers he wanted, the drinks he wanted and the gambling he wanted. We toasted him. We stayed up with him. In short, we made sure he had a great time. That's the job of the members of a bachelor party: to make sure that the groom parties like a nineteen year old sailor on shore leave. That's the way bachelor parties work. There's a reason for this and I will reveal said reason to you before this piece is finished. But not now. Because now doesn't work with the flow of the overall post.
You see (again, this is limited to those of you who can read), while I was in AC (that's what the cool kids call it) bachelor-partying away, my girlfriend was bachelorette partying her ass off in beautiful Ybor City (note: only beautiful in the daytime). We both spent the following Sunday lying on our couches and not moving. The following Monday, we talked about our separate experiences in the "friends getting married" party department. And I learned something that I always kind of thought I knew.
Girlfriend explained to me how her and her friends went out of their way to embarrass the bride to be at their bachelorette party. You see this shit all over drinking districts on your nights out: chicks wearing dildo caps, veils with "slut" embroidered on them, young brides encouraged to let guys "suck for a buck" (the lamest of lame bachelorette party gimmicks) etc, etc, et al, and on and on and stuff like that. The goal, as I understand bachelorette parties, is to make fun of the young bride and force her to face the ravage toughness of the single world for one last night.
With bachelor parties, the goal is to make sure the groom to be has one crazy ass evening that he'll hopefully remember forever. We're not trying to embarrass the man, we're trying to let him have one last taste of the good life.
Again, I kind of understood this difference but I never really realized why this difference occurs until Girlfriend and I broke down the motivation for the difference between the two parties. And that motivation is as follows:
Women embarrass the young bride because they are jealous of her upcoming nuptials. Men aid the young groom in debauchery and good times because they feel sorry for the poor bastard.
And that got me thinking: why do men get married anymore anyway?
I mean, what's in it for us? It's basically just an invitation to give up fellatio and risk half our stuff.
Maybe I'm just bitter because I've slept with so many unhappily married women or maybe I'm being totally logical because you have better odds in blackjack than in marriage or maybe I'm just a total idiot who has no clue why the world is the way that it is but I think I have a legitimate question here.
In this world of moral hazards and a complete lack of accountability among our citizens, in this buy now pay later humdrum we call America, in this popular culture laden chunk of crap we know as society, how exactly can men benefit from marriage?
Feel free to answer in the comments if you think you know. Because I don't have a shit clue.