The YoungWorld

Darkest Souls · Posted: Sat Nov 12, 2011 7:31 pm Post subject: Arranged Marriages

Summary: Should arranged marriages be outlawed?

Context:

Arranged marriages make up vastly the higher percentage in human history but have, largely in the last century, become unusual and morally questioned in the Western world. Where overt arranged marriages still occur in Europe and the Americas it is usually within immigrant communities. This creates further complications in discussing the issue because it not only becomes caught up in discussions of racism and ethnic rights, but also in the loaded debate on immigration. In 2000, for example, Britain granted 21 300 Entry Clearances for the spouses of British Asians; a large proportion were the product of marriages which were in some measure arranged.
The immigration debate in relation to arranged marriage is not essential to the question but cannot be left out because the discussion of arranged marriage is no longer one that can be addressed in the abstract without considering its effects in marking out different communities and maintaining their cultural integrity. In some senses we can see the entire model of multiculturalism in the developed world reflected in this discussion of whether substantially different practices which maintain an ethnically individual community, drawing heavily on outside influences and immigration should be allowed. It is vital to remember, however, that arranged marriage is not some kind of ‘us and them’ immigration issue. It occurs both in religious communities and social groups within Western countries and the debate must reflect them as well. In fact, drawing a distinction between the types of influence that do and do not constitute arrangement is one of the most difficult in this debate.
It should also be noted that while many countries ban forced marriages, in which one or both partners have no meaningful opportunity to object to a marriage partner, arranged marriages to which both partners give consent remain legal everywhere. Similarly, a debate can be held over the appropriate minimum age for marriage, but this is different from a debate on the principle of arranged vs love marriages.

Arguments for/ Pro:

Arranging marriages is an insult to the very nature of marriage, which should be about creating a loving and lasting partnership and family. It reduces a central part of what is fundamentally a religious ceremony (and every religion, including Islam, guarantees choice) to a commercial transaction and therefore undermines family values. This is even more an issue where people come into a country where marriage is seen as a central value that should be free, where it is a specific challenge to any moral code.

To allow arranged marriages leads to unacceptable pressure on those involved. They are often reliant on the parents who wish them to take part in arranged marriages for their futures as well as their current welfare. Moreover, the line between what constitutes an arranged and what constitutes a forced marriage is so hazy it can’t be policed, as is the line between legitimate and illegitimate influence. To protect from the latter we must stop the former. The law can help children who are often seeking bargaining chips to help them evade the pressure to marry from their family and community.

Arranged marriage is bad both for the individual women concerned and for women generally in society. In the former case this is because they are very vulnerable. Often they are from far away from home, don’t speak the local language or dialect and are totally reliant on the husband’s house and family. The lack of a support network, the language to appeal for help or knowledge of their rights makes women in arranged marriages disproportionately likely to suffer abuse. In the latter case, arrangement commodifies women who are bartered between the male heads of houses. This is not acceptable within an egalitarian model of citizenship and does not fit with a western model of rights.

The practice of arranged marriage separates communities, helping to stop integration and encourage distrust between communities. This applies largely where it occurs among immigrant populations and helps to maintain a language barrier and an associated cultural ghettoisation. This doesn’t just create a group of people who can feel trapped between two cultures and unsure of whether they have a place in their host society, and a poverty trap associated with the language barrier that creates further segregation. It also helps to foster distrust in the wider community by holding to such a radically alien value, particularly where it is opposed to our notion of equal rights.

Arranged marriage is not a true ‘cultural value’ that is in some sense inviolate. Every major religion including Islam guarantees the legitimacy of freedom of choice in marriage. Further, the extent to which this is custom is a product of a patriarchal culture that oppresses women and an element of that culture which maintains the imbalance of power between the genders. Although we cannot intervene in countries that hold to such a value system, we can stop such a system being imported. True multiculturalism itself relies on some basic shared value of commitment to a tolerant and fair society.

Arranged marriage provides a cover for illegal immigration. We attempt to challenge false marriages with non-nationals such as mail order brides for just this reason but are unable to properly examine most overtly arranged marriages because of the danger of being seen as culturally insensitive. Where arranged marriage is truly traditional and not motivated at least in part by immigration it is equally traditional that brides leave home to go to their husband’s house. You don’t see many European or American Asians leaving their home to go and live in their husband’s home country.

Arguments Against/ Con:

Arranged marriages are very much ‘real’ marriages. Vastly more marriages than not in human history would fall under any sensible definition of arrangement. More than that, an unusually small number of arranged marriages actually end in divorce. Maybe we should look harder at whether Pop stars marriages constitute ‘real’ marriages if we are about to make that distinction. More seriously, millions of people marry for the ‘wrong’ reasons: financial security, desire for children, parental pressure and lack of choice among potential partners. It is pure romanticism to claim that marriages must be love matches or they should be stopped. This only serves to illustrate that it is impossible to make any sensible division between what is and isn’t an arranged marriage and therefore quixotic to attempt a ban.

Arranged marriages do involve choice. The difference is merely that whole families are involved together in both considering the best options and in helping to achieve what is wanted. This is particularly fitting in a social system which places high value on the way in which the extended family work together, and ensures that there is family support and shared expectations which contribute to the longevity of the marriage. Many of what we would call arranged marriages are actually either parents just introducing their children to potential partners, or effecting the negotiations necessary for marriage after their children have already chosen a partner. Most importantly, it is totally illogical for the government to intervene to stop people having the marriages that they and their family have chosen in the name of freedom of choice. This is exactly why the distinction between arranged and forced marriages is so important in providing protection for those who really need it without authoritarianism creeping in.

Arranged marriages in Europe and North America have idiosyncratically low levels of abuse and marital violence. The institution of marriage always creates interdependence and therefore scope for abuse and danger and the police and outsiders always find it more difficult to intervene where violence is within a marriage. This is a criticism of marriage per se, and not arrangement, and we can’t ban marriage. The vulnerability of those without language skills is an accepted fact of immigration policy, again it applies to all immigration and not to arranged marriages. Finally, most marriage organisers are actually women, as in the ‘Auntie’ system in India. They gain prestige and authority through their role. This doesn’t seem to oppress women. What you are really saying is that Islamic societies are patriarchal and that Muslims have arranged marriages. The latter does not in any sense cause the former. They are discrete social facts.

It is not just groups practising arranged marriage who maintain cohesive communities. Afro-Caribbean and Jewish people in Western Europe both maintain a distinct cultural life while taking part fully in the life of this country. In fact their cultural contributions are one of the most valuable additions to the societies in which they live. The basis of multiculturalism is to understand the social and even economic value that can accrue from having people with different perspectives and traditions living together. Furthermore, in the second and third generations of immigrant families from the subcontinent we can already see barriers breaking down so that there is greater understanding and cross-fertilisation of the ideas these immigrant communities have brought.

Both young and old people affirm the fact that arranged marriage is a cultural tradition and any ethnographic data confirms it, not to mention the frequency of arrangement throughout the world. As we have pointed out there is no conflict between arrangement and a guarantee of free choice, the two are entirely consistent. Who is going to stand up and tell ethnic minorities that they don’t know whether they want arranged marriages and whether or not it really is part of their culture? It is just ethnocentrism writ large. Furthermore, how can we possibly insist that immigrants respect our virtues of ‘toleration’ if that amounts to denying them cultural freedom?

We have made pathetically small progress in stamping out mail order brides which just goes to show how completely unenforceable a much more complex system of regulation over arranged marriages would be. More important to remember is that these marriages last in exceptionally high numbers beyond the time required to receive a passport so they would be legitimate even in countries where marriages which are for the primary purpose of immigration are barred. Finally, it is totally legitimate that husbands and wives should be able to choose the country where they have the best chances of making a good life to set up their homes, and this only serves to prove why brides from the third world might make the free choice to marry.

Motions:

This house would ban arranged marriages.
This house believes a true marriage is a free marriage.
This house believes marriage should be for love nothing else.
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- A gem is not polished without rubbing, nor a man perfected without trials-

Fort Europe · Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2011 11:40 am Post subject:

I can see no positives at all in forcing two people who have not met, and may not get on at all, to marry. Everyone has the right to do precisely what they want, so long as it doesn't infringe on the rights of other people to do what they want as well... forcing another to do something against their will is to remove that right of freedom, so I am definitely against.

However... certain forms of arranged marriage do still have a place in modern society. There are a large number of cases where relationships between two people who's marrage was arranged has been extremely successful. It could be said in fact, that a great many people are less likely to choose wisely for themselves than if others chose for them. The problem is, that most people have desires and ambitions with regard to marriage than what they are actually capable of. We are all guilty of it from time to time. Lusting after people/celebrities that are generally far out of reach.

There is also the idea that every single person has a partner, a soul mate or something similar... If everyone is meant to be paired off and spend their lives with their one true love, then why do so many people never find love at all?and why do those find love get divorced, or even cheat?
The answer goes back to those unwise choices... when we are able to choose for ourselves, we have a natural belief that the grass is always greener on some other field... even with the best relationship possible, a person can still believe there is something better out there, as mad as it may sound.

What if all marriages were arranged? People matched up like on a dating site depending on their likes, dislikes, hobbies and interests... would this not solve the problem?
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