I once wrote an article defending arranged marriage in response to a nonsense CBC 'article'. In this post, I want to talk about some of the regressive attitudes and behaviours that make arranged marriages a fiasco in some South Asian families.
Warning: The writing may be blunt and to the point. It may make you uncomfortable, especially if you are one of the liberal secular feminist type. It's the truth.
More and more it seems arranged marriages in the South Asian diaspora are becoming a type of "last resort". The boy has played the field and now wants some "domesticated girl" so turns to his mother for help. The girl has been with a boyfriend for so long but suddenly the mother of the said boyfriend decided her "golden boy" would be better off with someone she chose, and the boyfriend is too spineless to say otherwise, so now the girl is left looking for a poor sucker who has no idea where she has been before.
Now these people are in the same 'market' as the boy and girl who has kept away from any physical relationships, kept themselves pure and looking to get married, but finding it extremely difficult to do so.
Parents of Girls
Don't reject a good proposal from a boy just because he is not a doctor or engineer. Despite it being2017 2018, there is ... unbelievably ... desi parents who still are looking for a doctor or engineer for their princesses. Any other proposal from a thousand other good professions, be it teacher (2 months off, hey), public policy (stable job for life yay), consultant (travel the world, wow), lawyer (moolah much), writer (intelligent people), and so on are all rejected. Automatically, without even a glance. Now that is serious limitation to a good prospect for your girl. In the end she does end up marrying a doctor ten years older than her. Good, bad?
The other thing they do is they tell, convince, argue, threaten and cajol their daughters to please ... PLEASE ... do not get involved in any relationship ... we WILL find someone good for you, and the poor daughter believes it.
And then when it's time to look for a groom, they have all these reasons to reject perfectly good candidates:
He's not a doctor or engineer (civil doesn't count).
He's still living with his parents.
He does not want to leave his job and resettle to where WE are living.
He's not from our biraderi, gram, upojela and so on.
Meanwhile the girl who managed to land herself a good boy is looked at upon jealously.
Oooh oder to chokkor choltesilo (oooh they were having an affair)
Parents of Boys (especially the mother)
Your son is not the Prince of Persia. He's not even the best looking boy in your street. Yet you reject any girl who falls short of Aishwarya Rai standard. You are rejecting girls because you saw her once at a party and she was talking too much. You rejected a girl because she was from Borishal and everyone knows Borishali girls are like this (replace Borishal with Noakhali, Chittagong, Dhaka, NSU, Foridpur, English Medium, as appropriate). You are rejecting girls because they are only three years younger than your son and everyone knows 4 is the ideal number. You are rejecting a girl because she is a Project Manager at BoA and everyone knows career oriented women do not make good wives.
And when I say everyone knows I mean your fellow aunty circle and the good old Indian television serial.
Meanwhile the poor boy doesn't even know of any of this and is wondering why there is a shortage of girls and he should just have tried his luck with the Vietnamese girl in his study group.
Please ... PLEASE ... have an honest discussion with your son to find out what matters to HIM. Half the stuff people write in their biodata is pretty much useless. Who cares what your uncle's son's occupation or grandfather's place of birth was.
Girls
You are at a serious disadvantage in this process. Just accept it. Guys and their families (usually) hold all the cards. If you are aware of this fact, you can definitely not screw up even more.
One definite way to screw up is to have a relationship before and then broadcast it to the world, and then something happens, and now you are screwed. Your heart is a precious real estate - not just anyone and everyone should be let into it. Be very wary of falling for playboys and smooth talkers and please, for goodness sake, stop watching rubbish Indian serials. Life is not Bollywood. Life is more like the Quentin Tarantino movie.
If a smooth talking boy charms you, it's not spiritual abuse - you have been played. Be smart.
Also, Liberal feminists like to say to women that a) you are all pretty b) you are all good just the way you are. OK ... false, and false.
First - looks matter, whether you are a guy or a girl. So, rule number one. Please shape up. Maintain yourself physically. Now I know this is rich coming from me, but it is the uncomfortable truth that looks do matter more for women than men.
Second, be educated. It's a common myth that man-hating feminists like to spread that men are scared of a women who is educated. We are not. No man I know is turned off because a woman has a Ph.D. It's usually other reasons.
Third, have an opinion.
DO
NOT
BE
A
DOORMAT.
Another common fallacy by feminists is that men are turned off by women who are opinionated, strong willed or confident. No... we are turned off by women who are cocky. There's a big difference. If you want to know, its the answer to this question.
Question: What do you think of Justin Trudeau ?
Wrong Answer: Oh he's so cute .. heheheh
Right Answer: I think he has governed well enough, but I don't like the fact that he couldn't get a pipeline built in Alberta ... and so on.
Contrary to what feminists say, a young pretty intelligent girl will win over a young pretty dumb girl any day.
And that's the last point. Be young. If you know marriage is something you want to do, do it when you are young.
Boys
Please grow up.
Really.
I could go on and on but half the problems would be solved if desi boys would simply grow up, let go of their mother's apron strings and grow a spine.
Warning: The writing may be blunt and to the point. It may make you uncomfortable, especially if you are one of the liberal secular feminist type. It's the truth.
More and more it seems arranged marriages in the South Asian diaspora are becoming a type of "last resort". The boy has played the field and now wants some "domesticated girl" so turns to his mother for help. The girl has been with a boyfriend for so long but suddenly the mother of the said boyfriend decided her "golden boy" would be better off with someone she chose, and the boyfriend is too spineless to say otherwise, so now the girl is left looking for a poor sucker who has no idea where she has been before.
Now these people are in the same 'market' as the boy and girl who has kept away from any physical relationships, kept themselves pure and looking to get married, but finding it extremely difficult to do so.
Parents of Girls
Don't reject a good proposal from a boy just because he is not a doctor or engineer. Despite it being
The other thing they do is they tell, convince, argue, threaten and cajol their daughters to please ... PLEASE ... do not get involved in any relationship ... we WILL find someone good for you, and the poor daughter believes it.
And then when it's time to look for a groom, they have all these reasons to reject perfectly good candidates:
He's not a doctor or engineer (civil doesn't count).
He's still living with his parents.
He does not want to leave his job and resettle to where WE are living.
He's not from our biraderi, gram, upojela and so on.
Meanwhile the girl who managed to land herself a good boy is looked at upon jealously.
Oooh oder to chokkor choltesilo (oooh they were having an affair)
Parents of Boys (especially the mother)
Your son is not the Prince of Persia. He's not even the best looking boy in your street. Yet you reject any girl who falls short of Aishwarya Rai standard. You are rejecting girls because you saw her once at a party and she was talking too much. You rejected a girl because she was from Borishal and everyone knows Borishali girls are like this (replace Borishal with Noakhali, Chittagong, Dhaka, NSU, Foridpur, English Medium, as appropriate). You are rejecting girls because they are only three years younger than your son and everyone knows 4 is the ideal number. You are rejecting a girl because she is a Project Manager at BoA and everyone knows career oriented women do not make good wives.
And when I say everyone knows I mean your fellow aunty circle and the good old Indian television serial.
Meanwhile the poor boy doesn't even know of any of this and is wondering why there is a shortage of girls and he should just have tried his luck with the Vietnamese girl in his study group.
Please ... PLEASE ... have an honest discussion with your son to find out what matters to HIM. Half the stuff people write in their biodata is pretty much useless. Who cares what your uncle's son's occupation or grandfather's place of birth was.
Girls
You are at a serious disadvantage in this process. Just accept it. Guys and their families (usually) hold all the cards. If you are aware of this fact, you can definitely not screw up even more.
One definite way to screw up is to have a relationship before and then broadcast it to the world, and then something happens, and now you are screwed. Your heart is a precious real estate - not just anyone and everyone should be let into it. Be very wary of falling for playboys and smooth talkers and please, for goodness sake, stop watching rubbish Indian serials. Life is not Bollywood. Life is more like the Quentin Tarantino movie.
If a smooth talking boy charms you, it's not spiritual abuse - you have been played. Be smart.
Also, Liberal feminists like to say to women that a) you are all pretty b) you are all good just the way you are. OK ... false, and false.
First - looks matter, whether you are a guy or a girl. So, rule number one. Please shape up. Maintain yourself physically. Now I know this is rich coming from me, but it is the uncomfortable truth that looks do matter more for women than men.
Second, be educated. It's a common myth that man-hating feminists like to spread that men are scared of a women who is educated. We are not. No man I know is turned off because a woman has a Ph.D. It's usually other reasons.
Third, have an opinion.
DO
NOT
BE
A
DOORMAT.
Another common fallacy by feminists is that men are turned off by women who are opinionated, strong willed or confident. No... we are turned off by women who are cocky. There's a big difference. If you want to know, its the answer to this question.
Question: What do you think of Justin Trudeau ?
Wrong Answer: Oh he's so cute .. heheheh
Right Answer: I think he has governed well enough, but I don't like the fact that he couldn't get a pipeline built in Alberta ... and so on.
Contrary to what feminists say, a young pretty intelligent girl will win over a young pretty dumb girl any day.
And that's the last point. Be young. If you know marriage is something you want to do, do it when you are young.
Boys
Please grow up.
Really.
I could go on and on but half the problems would be solved if desi boys would simply grow up, let go of their mother's apron strings and grow a spine.
