It’s time to surrender white wedding dresses.

White once signified virginal purity.

A bride in white was a vessel of vestal innocence.

This antiquated idea desperately needs modernization.

Modern brides walk down the aisle in their 3rd trimester of pregnancy.

They have their daughters serve as flower girls.

Their sons are ring bearers…

…or groomsmen.

And they’ve been sleeping with the groom for months.

Yet they wear white on the wedding day.

So clearly, white isn’t just for virgins anymore.

White is sullied.

Spoiled.

I know better than to suggest that non-virgins quit wearing white.

I’d face the ire of various vitiated maidens. “Virginity is a social construct,” they’d tell me. “I’m going to live my truth!”

I’ve no interest in reasoning with the unreasonable. Instead, I propose that virgins pick another color for their wedding dresses.

A color that stands for purity.

A color that exalts an ingenuous virginal innocence.

Red.

Like the planet Mars.

…a place where no man has ever been.