The-Rise-of-Asian-Americans-Full-Report ( Page 96)
Indian-Americans looking for love
Arranged marriage is a prevalent concept in some parts of the world. Arranged marriage is a concept where a person married his/her life partner, chosen by their family. The decision of parents is the biggest factor in this case. As I am from a country where arranged marriage is still very much prevalent, I had a first hand experience of seeing a lot of arrange marriage around me. I am going to talk about South Asian cultural stage here, not about the world stage.
Countries like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh(most of the South Asian countries in general) has a big share of arranged marriage. There are some reasons behind arrange marriage. One of the main reasons might be the importance of older people’s opinion about young generations’ lifestyle. Another reason is young peoples’ dependence on older ones when it comes to earning. A lot of people started to earn at a much older age, thus reducing their chance of having an opinion in important issues like choosing life-partners. Male dominated societies like South Asiaare affected by it. There are benefits and flaws of arrange marriage. The good sides of arrange marriage might be:
1) Arrange marriage leads to a less divorce rate, thus stabilizing the model of strong family-bond. For example, India has a divorce rate of 1.1% and both Pakistan and Bangladesh has less than 1%. On the other hand, Canada has a divorce rate of 72 % and US has more than 40%.
2) A stabilizing family only helps the couple to have kids and it is a very good environment to raise your children.
However, bad sides of arrange marriage is making this concept a very controversial one:
1) Wife beating can be very much attributed to arrange marriage. Women have less power about a lot of opinions.
2) In some parts of South Asia, dowry and caste system are very much playing its part in rural areas.
3) Less knowledge about your partner might result in awkward bonding in some cases.
Arranged marriage has some interesting facts; it leads to huge amount of endogamy. Marrying someone from other societies is almost non-existent there. Even in US, the amount of interracial marriage among Indiacommunity is much less in comparison to other societies. 86% of Indian people in US are still marrying someone within their community. As I posted my video about marriage pattern among US Americans, you can see that tendencies there.
Arranged marriage also allows a lot of online marital business to boom in India. It has become the life-partner choosing site rather than becoming the dating side. My second video illustrates that situation. This evolution enables the partners to know more about it each other about themselves.
In conclusion, I am neither a supporter nor a hater of arrange marriage. The point is, it will always play a big part in those societies, even though love marriage is socially becoming more accepted in South Asia.
The idea of arranged marriages is hard for me to swallow. I am not absolutely against it but I do believe that there should be an ability to choose whether you would like to be apart of a marriage like this. If someone chooses to follow their family tradition that is definitely respectable and will be the decision that they chose. But if it is imposed I think it is not fair to the people involved. In my experience I have seen situations that were like arranged marriages and yeah they were married for many years and some even eventually fall in love with the other person; but I feel that in most cases this is not the case. I think people tend to cheat more in these situations and also treat each other with disrespect. I feel like these situations end up being frustrating and especially in these societies, it degrades women even more so. How will that be a good stable family for children? I think the pro you mentioned about less divorce rates in South Asia is not because people end up in loving situations that last a lifetime. It is because within that society getting divorce is seen in a negative light and even though they are not in happy marriages, they feel like they have no choice but to stay. I think the high divorce rates in the United States isn’t that much of a negative thing. I think it just means that people have gotten the courage to stand up for what they want and if what they wanted is not what they want today, that’s okay.
I found this blog post to be quite an interesting read. The fact that South Asia still goes on about arranged marriage doesn’t surprise me at all since that part of the world strongly maintains their traditional set of values. What I found most astonishing about the blog post was the statistics of divorce rate between countries that have arranged marriage and those that don’t. Obviously countries like Canada and the United States don’t have arranged marriage but as of now marriages are suffering from the high divorce rate. As stated in the blog post, Canada’s divorce rate is a soaring 72% and the United States’ divorce rate is over 40%. I was surprised that Canada’s divorce rate is that much higher than that of the United States. Surprisingly the countries that have arranged marriages such as Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh have divorce rates of less than 2%, some even less than 1%. I mean on statistics alone, it seems that arranged marriage is a better marital system than the marital system in North America at least.
One thing is for sure though, it is quite awkward to marry someone that one barely even knows but the idea becomes that you will learn to love and appreciate that person in due time. I saw a soap opera once about India and their customs. The main plot revolved about an arranged marriage. At first they had respect for each other but did not love one another at all. By the end of the novella they fell in love. Sure it sounds cliché but it does describe the marital situations in those parts of the world. In the long run an arranged marriage does lead to a more stable family household and much longer lasting marriage than those marriages in the western part of the world.
I am originally from Pakistan and actually see this happen first hand also. My parents were also arranged for marriage, 22 years ago. Being that I grew up with parents from this culture, I do understand why people do get arranged for marriage, but I don’t believe it is for me. Many people forget the fact that even though the divorce rate in these countries, such as Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh and Afghanistan are so low there is an actually true underline reason for this. Society In these cultures are not very fond of divorce. It is many times frowned upon. Many women are scared to even say anything to their abusive husbands. Punishment for crimes such as adultery is death. People are killed without evidence of their alleged crimes. How would a woman in a country like this fight for her rights or freedom? Many times they are quiet due to the fact that they have several kids and do not wish that their kids saw their parents arguing. There are also situations where the family picks out a wife or husband for their kids, which leads to love and happiness. I personally believe that a man and women should individually find their true partner in life, because he or she is the true person for them. How can you marry a person without even knowing them properly? How can you promise to spend your whole life with a person that you never met till your wedding day? In recent changes in history many parents, when migrating to America or any other country other than their origin, have changed their way of thought and arranged their kids so they can date the person before they get married. I believe that this is still a better way and helps young adults find a good person that their parents already approve of.