Jasvinder Sanghera, a resident of Derby, United Kingdom is an energetic, kind and a beautiful looking woman. However as the saying goes “luck isn’t with wonderful too”. She has gone through the worst things that life can ever offer. Jasvinder has been abused mentally and physically in the worst possible ways one can ever think of. She now lives with her boyfriend and her son, as she is now disowned by her parents. When a person has to make an important decision, that changes his or her life, the person should be the sole decider, to which they feel comfortable with. Forced Marriage is against this god given right and love marriages are the best way to get married.
Jasvinder and many women like her are forced into marriages they don’t want to be in, by their parents. Although Jasvinder, an Indian living in the U.K., her parents are staunch believers that they should handle her life and her decisions. Forced marriages are very common in the Asian countries like India and China. However, India has the most accounted forced marriages. It is justified to write that these societies that accept forced marriage, mostly live in the rural areas, where culture and tradition plays a daily role in their lives.
When we take a stand on something there is always an opposition that we have to consider about, as they are the ones who enforce it and in this case; the parents who believe in forced marriages. The reality is that forced marriage has become a culture or a popular belief and societies accept it where it is happening. Any sought of disobedience by the daughters to forced marriage leads to something everyone dreads about; death, starvation, labeling as outcasts, curfews, beatings and mockery. So what is the better way of getting married? That even a small child will answer correctly and it is love marriage.
Love marriages are the ultimate and best way to get married. It involves the ability to make up one’s own mind. By dating or by meeting people and comparing them against one’s ideals, is a right that is given to every human being. Love marriages bring out the best in every person. This type of marriage has love as its first priority. Referring back to the basic understanding of forced marriage, the parents general philosophy on this is widely related to this saying “decide with your head and not with your heart”. Parents that are for forced marriages mostly choose a partner based on what is best for the family. Love marriage allows a person to choose a partner based on what is good for her and good decision makers (parents) allow marriages to happen. Should either spouse end up unhappy after being married for a few years, no one can blame one’s parent for making an unsuitable choice in love marriages.
Love marriages involve a great deal of freedom. The people, who want to marry, have already got good informed information about that person after having spent one to eight years with that person. Both partners know each other in a personal level and they know what to expect. In love marriages, there is no compulsion in love; couples do not love each for the sake of loving it comes from their true feelings for each other. There is perfect bonding of the souls in a love marriage and hence the secret of their stability.
India, being the most accounted country for forced marriages has a culture, whereby relatives live under one single roof. While there are benefits to having one’s extended family close by who can offer support when needed, this calculations has it disadvantages also. Some marital arguments and conflicts are settled better when only the spouses are involved. When the in-laws interfere and impose their views, this can cause stress to the marriage.
To understand the opposition’s point of view we must first understand and transplant ourselves into the culture that promotes forced marriages. We will in time realize the reasons behind this practice. Some of those reasons can be attributed to the wisdom of elders. Because they raised and cared for children, they instinctively know what’s best for their family. From their point of view, they believe that the risk of incompatibility is diminished due to their research and trust on the husband’s family.
Parents force their child to marry a stranger due to many reasons. Force marriage in India is prevalent because people benefit from it. People benefit from this as they use forced marriages to settle debts. India, although being a huge economy, still has a major portion of its population under financial crisis. To families living in poverty or economic instability, a daughter may be seen as an “economic burden” who must be married as soon as possible to take financial strain off the financial strain of the family. Families also marry off their daughters at an early age against their will to maintain family honor in the society, as they feel that they are controlling unwanted behavior and sexuality (queer). In some of the Indian societies, families come under significant pressure from their extended families to get their children married in order to strengthen family links. In some instances, agreements have been made about marriage when the children were very young. People must understand that this is a culture and this has been practiced for many years. It has changed many lives whether good or bad, but in most cases; bad. Daughters are also married off to resolve tribal feuds. What people must also understand is that, if the opposition would challenge these people in a debate, then the opposition is also challenging their culture.
What we are seeing here is that these people believe that forced marriage is the only way to get to what they want, be it removal of debts, honor, overpowering the right of the daughter to decide and to maintain their age old culture. The evergreen way of thinking, that the elder’s choice on their daughter’s future husband, is positively remarked by the people who live in these societies. As mentioned before, they do it for the sake of what they feel is right for their daughter and family. The chain of forced marriage continues from generation to generation. In most cases, forced marriage emerges where young women refuse to adhere to an arranger marriage by their parents. More than just a feud between parents and a child, a parent may see the young woman’s action as a crime against their family honor.
What we notice here looking at the issue overall is that, there is a clash of two ways of thinking on this issue. One is that Forced marriage is something that people who live around it accept it, except for the daughter being coerced in it and the other being love marriage as the best possible way to get married. To the people who live around forced marriage; society and parents, this is the best possible way they could get their daughters married.
The betrayal of betrayals is portrayed by forced marriages as the daughter feels saddened by the coercion of the parents to get married to someone totally unknown to her. Forced marriage has let to suicides, rape, abuse, torture and mockery. The UN estimates that more than 60 million women in developing countries were married before the age of 18 against their will, with the practice most common in sub-Saharan Africa and south Asia. In view of the people who practice “forced marriage”, people brought up with virtues such as equality, freedom and liberty widely condemn this issue, but the people who practice it doesn’t want the tradition to fade away as they feel that morality in their culture will be lost someday.
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