I don’t think I’m being misogynistic or primitive when I say that for most girls growing up, the day they look forward to most is their wedding day. It is the perfect opportunity for all of us to satisfy the narcissist in us, and some plan elaborate celebrations in their head that only God knows how they might come to pass.

Not every little girl gets to grow up to fulfil this fantasy. Worse, for most that do not get the opportunity to get married in quite early in their lives (20’s?), there is this often subtle and not so subtle pressure from all angles to get married that by the time it happens, the special day envisaged for so long becomes more like a chore one must get over with.

I often try to get into my head why the situation is as it is, and I’m most at times stumped at arriving at a good answer. Procreation is extremely vital to our survival as a species, so the institution of marriage which ostensibly serves that sole purpose is a crucial one.

However when that is portrayed like the ultimate climax of one’s life it becomes problematic, and that is the kind of thinking our current attitudes towards the whole institution is fostering. Its environments like these that trigger statements like those of Duncan Williams’ some weeks ago.

Still it’s unfair that women receive all that flack if they aren’t married but men generally escape that criticism. The situation has created a monster within Ghanaian society right now that charlatans are well equipped to take advantage of.

Already the expectation to ‘find a husband’ drives many ladies into the hands of unscrupulous pastors, mallams, fetish priests and the likes who take undue advantage of them, either in cash or through other means. Aside that sorry state of affairs comes another development that I’m not quite sure how to classify but I find exceptionally worrying all the same.

Apparently there’s something called a marriage ministry now, and that is where you go if all other hopes of getting married have not materialised. It’s quite a sight watching it on television, people testifying to how someone just walked up to them in the crowd and proposed, and then these two perfect strangers walk away into the sunset and throw their dream wedding.

Of course, God planned it all so it must be all right.

It is a combination of desperation and blind faith that frightens me, and unless there’s something I’m missing there is something very, very wrong with that whole picture.

But that’s what we’ve pushed people to these days, and this said marriage ministry holds programs and is able to draw enough attendees to fill up a sports stadium. It’s a big market, and capitalising on it is just one more way to make a quick buck in this world playing on religion.

I make no pretence to be a great advocate for women’s rights or anything, and obviously these are adults making their own life decisions. But there is a set of surrounding circumstances that are enough to drive the most level headed person to extreme measures, and people always throw logic out of the window faster than you could say Jack when religion gets involved in an issue.

Pressure on women to get married and settle down is nothing unique to Ghana, but we can take it to absurd levels. This creates the weird obsession some people have for weddings these days, but won’t the world be a better place if people are left to live their lives at their own pace?

Every girl deserves that dream wedding, and the pressure society puts on ladies is nothing compared to what our ladies put on themselves to fulfil that childhood fantasy.

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