Wanna know how to send me into a full-on rage?
Just ask me if my beautiful Russian wife is a “mail-order bride.”
The question is rude (and dumb) on multiple levels. 
- First, the question not-so-subtly suggests that my wife is a whore. That she sold herself out to an Internet livestock auction.
- Second, the question not-so-subtly suggests that I’m too big of a dork to meet, date and marry a woman through ordinary methods. I’m such a repulsive stain on society that I have to pay women to be within a certain radius of me.
- Third, and this is indirect, but the question insults my offspring because the insinuation that mama’s a whore and daddy’s a loser-dork do not reflect kindly on our ability to perpetuate the species in an effective manner.
The inherent rudeness qualifies as a punchable offense.
And people DO ask the question. It comes from drunks at bars, long-lost acquaintances, random strangers and creepy weirdoes in the pharmacy lounge. One time, a guy overheard my pharmacist and me discussing a tidbit about my cross-cultural family. Lo and behold, the eavesdropping dirtbag — who wore flip-flops that showcased his gnarled bird feet — told me he regularly scopes out Russian chicks on the bus. “They don’t talk to me much,” he confessed. “Some of them are quite lovely, though.” Nice, dude. Maybe they’d talk to you if you got your avian feet amputated. Two fleshy stumps have more aesthetic value than mangled talons.
Unkempt bird-men are one thing. I can forgive a pathetic freak. But when the nonsense comes from people I know or vaguely know, my patience evaporates. Take for instance the case of a friend I invited to our fourth wedding anniversary this year, an event attended by several foxy Uzbek babes. As I was on the phone giving directions to the dummy, I heard his charming “date” in the background yell “I ain’t gonna go hang out with a bunch of fucking mail-order brides!”
Perhaps you can see how this gets annoying.
One final story. A few years ago, I had to kick a member out of my fantasy football league for engaging in this sophisticated brand of discourse. His “trash talk” regularly involved such remarks as “You loser fuck! So what if I’m out five bucks! At least I didn’t buy my wife with an American Express card! Ha!”
And this was a guy I KNEW; a guy I had played in a band with.
Is it wrong to despise this kind of person? To airdrop them in a densely populated Taliban encampment wearing nothing but a sandwich-board that says “Fuck Allah“?
No, I think that level of venom is justified.
And to answer the initial question: No, she’s not a mail-order bride. But you’re an asshole for asking.
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