Many 'counter-cultural' expressions recur at weddings

(Baonghean) - Over the past 10 years, the new cultural wedding movement in Nghe An has been formed, developed widely, spread in localities and units, and received support from all classes of people... However, recently, many negative and "anti-cultural" manifestations in weddings have reappeared.

New cultural wedding models

In the coastal commune of Dien Hung (Dien Chau), for over 10 years, the 500,000 VND wedding model has been organized and popularized at the commune cultural house. The Party Committee - People's Council - People's Committee of the commune has developed regulations for organizing weddings at the commune cultural house.

Accordingly, each wedding is held at the cultural house in a very simple but warm and joyful manner. The newlyweds only have to pay 500,000 VND, including hiring music, organizers and buying candy, water, and fruit for the wedding, while the service is left to the cultural committee and the youth union.

Mr. Phan Duc Luong - Secretary of the Dien Hung Commune Party Committee said: During the wedding ceremony, the newlyweds will offer flowers and incense at the commune memorial; the Chairman of the Commune People's Committee will give a congratulatory speech and present the marriage certificate. The entire procedure only takes about 40 minutes. For families with conditions, only 25 trays will be held in a party to announce the good news to friends and relatives. Initially, it was difficult to mobilize people to implement the regulations, but when the model was effectively organized, contributing to saving tens of millions of VND/wedding, people realized and responded positively. Every year, 100% of weddings are held at the commune cultural house.

The wedding procession on foot in Hung Tay commune, Hung Nguyen district.

Similarly, Nghi Hop commune (Nghi Loc) has also built a model of weddings according to the new cultural lifestyle. To implement the model, the commune integrated it into meetings, through the commune's loudspeakers down to the hamlets, through articles and real stories about the consequences of uneconomical weddings; directed the youth union to build model weddings, from there to replicate and spread the model.

For the model wedding, the commune government organizes it at the village cultural house, the youth union takes care of the speakers, tables and chairs, and the MC. If the main holiday is a salty party, the participants are only relatives, close friends of the host family. In the past 5 years, Nghi Hop commune has had over 30 such model weddings.

Ms. Tran Thi Anh Tuyet - Vice Chairman of Nghi Loc District People's Committee said: Since 2004, in the district, 100% of residential hamlets, agencies and units have built and included the implementation of civilized lifestyle in weddings in the conventions and village covenants; accordingly, the wedding organization process is simple and concise but still ensures the cultural features in weddings, basically there are only 2 ceremonies: the engagement ceremony and the wedding ceremony. In addition, the wedding is held without smoking, no drinking, no loud speakers after 10pm and before 6am, there is no more phenomenon of setting up wedding tents on traffic routes, no gambling at weddings.

Before 2000, the situation of weddings in the area being organized in an ostentatious and lavish manner, causing waste, waste and disorder, was still common. To prevent and limit this situation, Nghe An province issued many directives, including Directive 19 dated February 18, 2004 of the Provincial Party Committee Standing Committee on implementing a cultural lifestyle in weddings for cadres, party members, civil servants and public employees. According to statistics from the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, after 12 years of implementing Directive 19 and related documents, the whole province has built 86 models with 94,752/229,771 weddings following the new cultural lifestyle.

Repel negative manifestations

Implementing the new cultural wedding movement, backward customs (demanding dowry, wife kidnapping, forced marriage...) are eliminated; wedding time is shortened, weddings are held at one location; wedding ceremonies are more streamlined, gentle and civilized... Besides the benefits, there are still many shortcomings. In the conference summarizing 12 years of implementing Directive 19 of the province that was recently held, the report assessing the results said: The rate of violations of cultural lifestyle in weddings is 3.2%, there are 1,250 early marriages.

At the above conference, comrade Nguyen Xuan Son - Standing Deputy Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee, Chairman of the Provincial People's Council stated: In the first 5 years, the Directive was seriously implemented, but in recent years, the leadership and direction of the implementation of weddings by Party committees and authorities at all levels has been irregular, so the movement of organizing weddings according to a cultural lifestyle has stagnated; wedding models according to a cultural lifestyle have not been maintained and widely replicated.

In Vinh City, violations of the regulations prohibiting the use of sidewalks and roads for weddings are still common. (Photo taken on October 9, 2016 on Le Duan Street)

A common occurrence in some urban areas in recent years is that weddings and engagements tend to be more and more ostentatious and formal, causing public outrage; the situation of scattering coins on the street when picking up the bride still occurs, and violations of order and traffic corridors have become quite common...

In Vinh city, every time the wedding season comes, many families often rent and set up wedding tents on the sidewalks and roads, causing urban unsightliness, traffic jams and obstructions. Recently, a ward or commune leader even organized a lavish wedding party for his child who was not old enough to get married...

The reason for the recent proliferation of “anti-cultural” weddings is that local authorities and sectors have been lax in their management; the awareness of a number of cadres and party members is still limited; the forms of handling violations are not strict and do not have a high deterrent effect; and wedding models following a cultural lifestyle have not been developed and perfected to be disseminated to the people for their knowledge and implementation.

Party members go first, the country follows. To strictly implement the wedding according to the new cultural lifestyle, Standing Deputy Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee Nguyen Xuan Son directed: Party members and leaders must set high exemplary standards in organizing weddings; Link setting examples with the implementation of the Resolution of the 4th Conference of the Party Central Committee (11th tenure): Some urgent issues on Party building at present; at the same time, promote the implementation of Decision 60/2016/UBND dated October 10, 2016 of the People's Committee of Nghe An province on promulgating regulations on implementing civilized lifestyles in weddings, funerals and festivals in Nghe An province. Include implementation in the criteria for annual evaluation and classification of party organizations, authorities and unions.

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