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While I love weddings, one aspect of the whole shabang that often leaves me with my eyes bugged out and blushing is the garter removal dance.

garter removal

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One presentation that definitely left me cringing was a dance that has since gone viral at a recent Nigerian wedding in New Jersey. After body rolling and grinding his way underneath the bride’s dress, the groom received quite the surprise when he was dragged out from underneath her by the an unidentified relative (word on the street was that it was the bride’s uncle). We don’t know if the relative in white was angry or being silly, but he sure looked serious as he maneuvered his agbada to grab the young whippersnapper:

And here’s a much closer look at a highlight reel of the dance. You can see why an elder might have felt some type of way:

Now, garter removal dances are often all in good fun. And the trick to keeping them fun is for the groom to make things more goofy than sexual. But today’s presentations have turned up the raunch, and while some are here for it, others have literally said that they find them a bit “tasteless.”

For instance, I went to a Nigerian wedding where the groom put on a whole show to get the garter belt. He crawled to his bride on the floor, body rolled in front of her (as in, on her lap) and pretty much left everyone, including the kids in attendance, with their jaws on the floor.

I could barely get through it without screaming, but the person who truly looked like they wanted to run was the bride. She didn’t really smile, she didn’t really show much emotion and honestly, she kept a pretty straight face throughout the whole song and dance, which made things awkward. It was the same face that I noticed her parents kept as her new husband worked hard in front of his groomsmen.

As for my own wedding, while I bought a fancy garter for my husband to remove, in the craziness of the day, I completely forgot to put it on. Because of that, we scrapped the entire garter dance, as well as the bouquet toss. And if I’m being honest, I was a little relieved that we didn’t have to go through all of that in front of my family (though the best man made a joke during his toast saying, “May the only ups and downs in your marriage happen in the bedroom,” which was still pretty mortifying).

In the end, I think that the garter moment is an important one for the groom. A lot of the wedding planning and accompanying celebration focuses on the bride and how it’s “her day.” But the removal of the garter has become a very fun and unique way for the husband to have some shine and showcase his personality while putting on a show. It’s also become a lot of fun because it often gets the groomsmen involved. But do some take it a little bit too far these days? Is all of the gyrating to Ginuwine’s “Pony” and going underneath the dress of the bride in front of everyone becoming obnoxious, or is it all in good fun?

Some say that since we all know what the bride and groom will be doing after the wedding, there is no need to let us in on the plans early by going Rated-R with the dance. Others say it’s harmless and often times, hilarious. I say that it makes the wedding day all the more interesting to see how far a groom will go (and how far their choreography will go, too). So I’m all here for it — as long as it doesn’t turn into an uncut scene straight out of Chocolate City.

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