![Victor Tang spent £33k on a helicopter banner when proposing to his girlfriend Stephanie Cheung in Hong Kong in 2015](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/columnists/2023/09/04/TELEMMGLPICT000347956246_16938455306280_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqhAf-O8u_IYd9gJAYrS_1Dw9i_aJEbrVIleQf6BU4ImE.jpeg?imwidth=680)
![Victor Tang spent £33k on a helicopter banner when proposing to his girlfriend Stephanie Cheung in Hong Kong in 2015](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/columnists/2023/09/04/TELEMMGLPICT000347956246_16938455306280_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqhAf-O8u_IYd9gJAYrS_1Dw9i_aJEbrVIleQf6BU4ImE.jpeg?imwidth=680)
A public marriage proposal – you’d think that the idea would strike fear into the heart of any Brit. But the UK’s “proposal planning” industry is booming, so much so that an etiquette adviser for Debrett’s has warned against the idea.
Liz Wyse says a public, performative proposal puts pressure on partners, following news that increasing numbers of companies are charging people thousands to make their betrothal memorable.
To pop the question in front of others could make one partner feel they were being “doorstepped in public”, adds Wyse. “It’s terribly embarrassing if the person says no. What you don’t want to do is put the person you’re proposing to in an impossible situation where they are so embarrassed that they automatically have to give a positive response.”
I’ve said no to a proposal and it’s a curiously embarrassing thing to do, even when there’s just the two of you in a room. So acutely embarrassing, in fact, that the British, people-pleasing part of me actually briefly considered saying “yes”, just to spare us both the awkwardness. Only when I weighed that up against a lifetime cuffed to the wrong man could I bring myself to say “it’s not you, it’s me”.
Everyone knows that the bigger and flashier the proposal, the more likely the couple are to divorce.
I’ve always wondered how many of those televised Super Bowl proposals in the US ever actually make it to the exchanging of vows – let alone last the distance. Imagine a hundred million people watching a man you had absolutely no intention of having anything but a passing fling with get down on one knee?
Of course now that intimate moments are a commodity, there is all too often a third, hundredth or thousandth witness to every joyful event in life. For that reason we’ve invented a whole new smorgasbord of Instagrammable “celebrations”: the “baby-moon” party, the “gender reveal” party, the renewal of vows. Alongside birthdays and anniversaries these must all be shared – presumably because the people involved can only really consider them to be of value if broadcast on social media? Gender reveal announcements seem to have become particularly out of hand: over the weekend, the concept turned deadly when a couple in Mexico hired a jet to do a flypast, dumping pink or blue power to indicate the gender of their baby. The jet crashed, killing the pilot in front of the gathered party of guests.
When it became clear my husband was going to propose to me, I remember being terrified he would do something performative – because he’s a performative kind of guy and because he loves the kind of rom-coms where train carriages full of strangers whoop and applaud in unison.
Thankfully, he couldn’t have been more discreet. We weren’t in public and Piers didn’t even speak. He just handed me a book by my favourite author, John Updike. The title? Marry Me.
Beware the public marriage proposal – it’s bound to end in tears
Companies are cashing in on people’s desire to pop the question in a flashy way but the chances are it’ll be excruciating for everyone