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What arranged marriages are doing to the society**
He is from a “good” family or biradri! The girl might be given a chance to look at her future groom once if the parents are “Progressive” but usually the decision is made on those factors and the life and fate of the girl and in most cases the boy are sealed.
Common methods of selecting a spouse
Total Forced
This is practiced quite often where the young couple is TOLD that the ALL KNOWING elders have made the arrangement and they will be married to that person. Not a single word from either the boy or the girl is acceptable.
This usually means that the couple will talk for the first time after they are married without any choice in the matter.
The Inspection
These days the prevalent method of acquiring a baby producer for their son is to go to dinner at the girl’s house. The girl is told to dress up properly and be ready to be presented to her future in-laws. The in-laws will inspect the girl critically exactly like they would if they had gone out to purchase a pet for their house hold. Dinner is served and, it is expected for the girl to show off her culinary skills as a cook to impress the in-laws.
After the inspection session is over the girls’ parents will discuss the physical, financial and the families’ viability of the union. In very rare “modern” families, the girl is given a Yes or No decision in these matters.
Multiple refusals
If the girl is given a say in the matter it is not without its dangers in a closed society. Each week a prospective inspection will take place. Each week a heated session of emotional blackmail will occur and these sessions to force the girl to make a choice get more and more heated as time goes on. It is inevitable that at one point the girl will just give up and say yes to the next inspector who comes along.
If that does not happen the Yes and No decision is taken out of the girls hands and she is given a choice between a few perspective inspectors. The choice is not if she wants to marry that certain person, rather she has to choose one from one of them and the wedding is to follow soon afterwards.
Natural Selection
When we look at any species of animals, we see that nature has created a system where the Female of the species makes a definite choice between whom she wants to mate. The strongest Male, the male which shows the promise in providing the best to the offspring are the most sought after Males.
Human race has also relied on exactly the same method as in nature for selecting a mate. The female are the ones who have chosen their mates since the time of the Cavemen and even before to receive the seed and produce offsprings.
In every successful societies of the world we see this same practice has been followed. The methods of courting might be different but the purpose has remained the same.
Misconceptions about courting
In my conversations with people who live in a society where arranged / forced marriages are acceptable I have heard several arguments against allowing young men and women to find their own partners.
Open Sex
The first thing which comes to the mind of a proponent and supporter of forced marriage is that natural selection means “open sex” with anyone and everyone.
They will bring in exceptions and rare issues where boys and girls have acted inappropriately when left alone.
None of these people will accept the middle ground where there can be courting without “open sex”.
Eloping
Non Arranged marriages is considered synonymous to Eloping. Where the couple has to go and get married in secret and then face the parents.
The option that the boy meets the girl, they like each other, they talk and are sure that they will make a good couple then they introduce each other to the respective parents and get married with the blessing of both parents is completely ignored.
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Devastating effects of Arranged Marriages on Society**
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Psychological Effects**
In a recent televised interview with the head of The National Psychological Association on a government sponsored and supported channel the person was stating that over 97% of people in this closed society have major psychological issues.
I was not shocked to hear these figures, this is bound to happen in any society where the normal mental growth of people is curbed, where even talking to someone of the opposite sex is considered a SEXUAL ACT, where the most primal instincts of a human are curbed psychological issues will be rampant and will surface in every aspect of society.
Blame others for everything
One of the major consequence of taking away each and every decision from the young person is that he / she falls in the mindset of blaming anything and everything on someone else.
When a person does not have the right to make basic decisions in his / her life and all the decisions are made for him by someone else, it is natural that they blame all wrongs in their lives on other elements.
**Extremism
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I have discussed earlier, the suicidal tendencies that are acceptable, condoned and even encouraged in the controlled Society of Pakistan.
These feelings are projected by the mother onto their children who grow up with the feelings that killing themselves is acceptable and if it could be acceptable for one reason it would be completely acceptable for a number of other reasons.
With the ground work for extremism already done by the family unit and the society as a whole; the only thing extremists have to do is ingrain into the youth that there can be a number of other reasons where this kind of behavior would be acceptable.
The society has created those same people who the society shuns on the six o’clock news as mass murderers, suicide bombers etc.
**Lack of a need to innovate
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In any society or even in the animal kingdom, the male tries to excel in any and every way in the hope to attract the attention and approval of his prospective mate. For example, the male Peacock is equipped with beautiful feathers and displays them to impress the Peahen in hope for producing offspring and propagating the species.
Humans are very similar in this matter, the Male is tasked to earn a living and to excel in life so that he can improve the living standards and provide a comfortable environment for his family.
This improvement in living standards and providing a comfortable living is only possible if each and every member of society tries to improve their present situation which requires innovation or innovative ways to perform similar tasks easily and in a more efficient way hence being able to do more in the same available time.
Human nature dictates that Innovative thinking would only be possible if there is a desire in the person to achieve a higher goal / prize.
One of the biggest goals for any human male is to find the best wife he can and have a comfortable living. The decisions of this basic human desire once removed from the hands of a man eliminate his need to excel or to innovate. The result is that the Man just goes through life as a zombie, will do exactly the same thing he has been taught and will wake up in the morning repeat those same tasks like a trained monkey and go to sleep.
**Reliance on Pornography
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Pakistan does not rank number one in the world in many things but in a recent news item on BBC it was stated that the country which downloads and / or looks at pornography the most is Pakistan.
This did not come as a surprise to me, and single girls and boys are not the only ones who are going to these pornography sites. It is the married employed couples going there to fulfill their desires which they can not fulfill in a loveless forced marriage.
The corruption of the gene pool
The biggest issue by far these forced marriages are causing is the degrading of the gene pool. Where the unmatched couple who should not even be in the same room are forced to live and breed together.
These mismatches will for sure produce off springs but these offsprings are going to be the “GENTEIC ZOMBIES” seen in our daily lives.
It is very easy to identify these “Genetic zombies”, they fail to comprehend the simplest of instructions. Unable to comprehend any thing other than what they have been taught and will refuse to accept any different idea.
**What does Islam say about:
Arranged marriages**
In Islam, forced marriages are Haram, a marriage is only considered a proper marriage if it is with the free consent of both the bride and groom.
Most people will fulfill this requirement by making the bride and groom sit in front of them and after a thirty minute lecture which would include each and every method of blackmail known to them ask the youngster if it is ok for him / her to marry that person.
In other words, we are asking you to marry this person and your answer has to be “YES”.
This is known as coversion and does not comply with the sprit of the order given by the religion hence each and every arranged or forced marriage is illegal according to the religion.
Killing and Murder
Killing is permitted only in case of defending oneself from physical and bodily harm but this fact is completely forgotten by the Mullah community and they either keep quite about the subject or fully endorse the actions of Bothers and Fathers who go ahead and kill their sisters and daughters on the first inclination of the female even daring to meet some man even if she has done nothing wrong except for show interest in that man.
Suicide
It is surprising that the Mullahs of this country do not talk about the dire consequences Allah has prescribed to anyone who commits or thinks of committing suicide. In fact there is not a single instance where Islam has allowed a person to take his / her own life, there is no exception. It seems like the order by Allah clearly stating that killing oneself is completely and totally haram under any condition.
Not one of the millions of the self proclaimed “Scholars of Islam” has made it his mission in life to stop people from committing and / or contemplating suicide.
**Worse than the time of Jahaliya
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The Mullah population of Pakistan claim to be the standard bearers of Islam. They will scream at the top of their lungs the evil which was being committed on the women of Pre Islam Mecca while they will sit back and not say a word when they hear about the sub human treatment of women in front of their eyes.
Infact to defend arranged marriages, Mullahs will point out some of the Marriages of convince the Prophet (PBUH) asked his companions to perform. Those were special cases where there was a need for those women to be provided for and those cases can not be made the main way of forcing weddings for the whole society.
Please remember that Islam orders each and every Muslim to do whatever they can to stop a wrong from happening. If you do not do whatever you can then you are condoning it and you are as guilty as the person committing that crime.
Mindset that needs to Change
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As a Professor as well as a Career counselor in a leading University, I come across this issue on a daily basis. A student will walk in my office and will want to do sub standard work and when I will refuse to let him / her get away with sub standard work, the first thing he will do is blame the “culture” for not letting him work as hard as he should. In a 3 month period I heard “This is not America, this is Pakistan” comment as an excuse 84 times from different people. It seems that this comment is so deeply ingrained in the psyche of the people that they have accepted it at as fact and will consider this as a VALID Reason for not putting in a good effort.
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In a recent conversation with a respected teacher at a University on the subject of Co Education vs. segregated education. He accepted the fact that there is no difference in the contact level of male – Female in either place and tells me that he knows that there is more male - female contact going on in segregated schools (he tells me that he has also been in both segregated and coed schools and there is MUCH more “Things” happening in segregated schools). I was shocked to hear that even after he knows that there is no difference he has decided to send his daughter to a segregated school which a much lower standard of education because HE HAS TO AT LEAST PRETEND to follow the culture.
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A student told me that he lost a letter grade in a class because he made a mistake of correcting a “Teacher”, when the teacher was teaching the wrong thing. This is exactly the example of the totally destructive ego which rules this culture. In a speech by the esteemed Dr. Ata ur Rehman, who has my total respect as a great academic, his advice to the present students was “QUESTION EVERYTHING!” his advice is accurate, but all the society has taught young people is to not question elders. In our society, a simple inquisitive question by anyone younger is considered “arguing” and can mean a stream of insults from the elder.
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I have talked to a number of single girls and when ever I mention if they have tired to find a boy for themselves, the instant response they have is that they can not do any such thing because they “respect their parents”. When in fact even Islam allows that if a parent is doing something wrong, the children should not only not follow it, they are required to disobey the parents if the parents force them to follow it.
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In my interview with Zahida a 23 year old newly married girl, she has a very big smile on her face that finally someone is talking openly about what she is going through.
She was shoved into a Forced Marriage, she was asked but her only choice was given was an affirmative answer. In the previous few weeks she has come to detest the person she is married to. She completely understood the Scientific explanation of Pheromones. Her next question was what to do about this situation. When I mentioned a DIVORCE her answer was Yeah Right! I can not even think of doing that and hope to live to see another day. -
In case of a widow this society is very quick to label her unlucky and a curse because she lost her first husband.
In an interview with a widow, she told me that people were treating her worse then a leper. They would avoid her in the market place, they had forbidden their children from meeting her, and she had lost her husband in an accident. -
Physical abuse and emotional abuse are very common. It is not far fetched to hear stories where the girl was locked in her room for months for voicing her opinion in matters of matrimony.
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As a professor, I share a room with a Mullah want to be who threw a fit when some of my female students wanted to visit my office to get some scholastic advice. His comments were “you are calling women into the office, this causes major disturbance and ruins the whole day”. This pervert does not see that the problem is not in interaction with members of the opposite sex but with the mindset that sees every female they lay their eyes on as a sex object.
There are several other examples that can be sighted, the point is to understand the root cause and change one family at a time. It means empowering our children to question everything and trusting them to make their own choices. Rest will follow.
an article from chowk. I want to share it Just for brainstorming .