The guests at an Australian wedding are causing a stir online after the videographer shared a snippet of the bride being forced to chastise them to put their phones away at the ceremony.
"How do you feel about phones out during your ceremony?" @mapleandmist, the videographer, captioned the video.
"The bride should NOT have to say this during her big moment," the text on the video reads.
As bride Anna Reuss walks down the aisle in the video, she can be heard laughing and chastising her guests focused on their phones.
"Put your phones away," she says, good-naturedly. "Come on!"
In a pinned comment, the @mapleandmist account — run by Khyla Nixon and her husband, Andrew — noted that the guests had been asked to keep their phones put away for the ceremony.
Reuss did not immediately respond to TODAY.com’s request for comment.
Speaking to TODAY.com, Nixon says that Reuss had been a "chill" bride and really just wanted her guests to have a "relaxed feel" throughout the wedding.
"They just wanted a really relaxed, fun day," she says. "Nothing too over the top and stressful."
The wedding was held on March 23 in Samford, a town in south-east Queensland, Nixon says, and had close to 100 people in attendance. She explains there were around 10 cellphone offenders that Reuss called out.
"It was quite a lot of the first front few rows," Nixon says. "So, the immediate family."
She reiterates that the officiant had expressly asked everyone to put their phones away for the ceremony.
"The celebrant actually did ask all the guests at the couple's request ... to keep their phones away," Nixon says, adding the officiant said something to the effect of: "They've got paid professionals. They want you to be in the moment."
"Obviously, that got ignored," Nixon says. She notes it was the first time she'd ever seen the pointed request for a no-phone ceremony be blatantly disregarded in her nearly six years working in the wedding industry.
Nixon went on to say that she didn't think that the moment put a damper on the wedding day, and it wasn't mentioned again — that she knew of. She had just stumbled across the moment while editing the footage and thought she would share it for awareness.
"Not many people would say anything," she says, noting how Reuss was a good sport about it and called her guests out in a fun, loving way. "So normally a bride will probably see it happening but just sort of ignore it at the moment and maybe talk about it later but she was flat out like, 'I'm saying something.'"
In the comments on the @mapleandmist post, people mostly seemed to be on the bride's side of the debate.
"She’s smiling but I know she’s really upset. I’d feel so disrespected honestly," one person replied.
"My wedding was yesterday and our officiant announced to put phones away," another wrote. "I did NOT spend thousands of dollars to see phones!"
"There’s photographers there for a reason," another person responded.
Still, a few people played devil's advocate.
"I understand it being annoying, but if that’s what ur focused on during one of the biggest moments of ur life.... idk man," one person wrote.
"I want memories, PULL DEM PHONE OUT cause im gone record," another replied.
To her chagrin, Nixon says that more and more, she sees phones (or even iPads) in the audience during wedding ceremonies. Not only do guests recording on cellphones block the professionals' shots, but it also just ruins the moment, she says.
“We’ve seen people just sort of living behind their phones during these moments,” Nixon says.
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