I think you mean HIS brother, not hers?

Yeah, I think the article is talking about HIS brother. And I don't think it's necessary to be sad without more information than the fact that she was a teenager. In a country with a radically different lifestyle that we're used to, where village life expectancy is under 50, getting married as a teen makes sense. Also, "arranged marriage" doesn't equal "forced marriage." I have a number of friends from the Indian Subcontinent who married as teens. Some of their marriages are utter travesties from a feminist point of view. Many others have great relationships ased on a solid footing of equality.

It was "his" brother....

"getting married as a teen" however DOES nOT make sense... because when one considers human beings and Universal Human Rights.. what applies here applies there as well.

Arranged marraiges are not forced... funny that no women ever back out- social pressure is just too great... "Force" also stands for mental forcing.

Allytude, it depends on the teen. 18 year olds are still teens, yet they've reached the age of adulthood so I don't think we can prevent them from marrying. I don't think we can assume the worst based on the word "teen".

As the Indian-American daughter of Indian parents, I've noticed that arranged marriage as a system is capable of evolving, and isn't bad in and of itself. The problem is that it is abused in many cases, in addition to a culture where a woman is oftentimes by definition worth less than a man (This appears to be changing with the current generations, especially in the cities as opposed to small villages).

But arranged marriage is not, at this point, usually "forced." I think it's viewed now as the daughter/son using her/his parents' suggestions for people to date, basically like blind dates, either in addition to dating outside of her/his parents' suggestions or not.

Of course, the culture is still definitely very different from ours, and there is a much larger pressure to get married, but in the vast majority of cases the people doing the marrying have the final say in who they marry. I think sometimes we get so caught up in this foreign notion of parents being involved in a daughter's/son's love life, that we forget that Indian parents are parents too, and they love their kids just as much as American parents love theirs. And I'm thinking most loving parents would not force their daughters to marry anyone against their will.

I agree though, the child-bride phenomenon is really saddening. It's a tradition steeped in misogyny (child-brides are usually "given" to much older men), and I hope it will die out as India evolves.

Gitan312, i agree the "arranged" maariage system in itself is not bad, if the peopel be grown up, from a reasonably educated and free background. In this case however, it is more a "forced" thing because even though the young girl may be 18, she is not from a city, from a poorer socioeconomic background and her assent would not be after a "blind date" rather a chaperoned meeting with only small talk for conversation if at all.

The vast social differences in indians make us forget that we the English speaking, internet using ones are the creme delacreme layer, far removed from the reality that permeates.
for us, given the access to knowledge, growth and information we have had, we would make informed choices, for someone who is in a small town or village in india, even the idea of "choice" would be unusual. It does not hold for a lot of the men either, so for women it is lmost non-existant.

We need to look at the context.
I felt bad after rewading the story, because clearly her marraige was important, to whom it did not matter- there that is the level of choice she had.....

Gitan312, i agree the "arranged" maariage system in itself is not bad, if the peopel be grown up, from a reasonably educated and free background. In this case however, it is more a "forced" thing because even though the young girl may be 18, she is not from a city, from a poorer socioeconomic background and her assent would not be after a "blind date" rather a chaperoned meeting with only small talk for conversation if at all.

The vast social differences in indians make us forget that we the English speaking, internet using ones are the creme delacreme layer, far removed from the reality that permeates.
for us, given the access to knowledge, growth and information we have had, we would make informed choices, for someone who is in a small town or village in india, even the idea of "choice" would be unusual. It does not hold for a lot of the men either, so for women it is lmost non-existant.

We need to look at the context.
I felt bad after rewading the story, because clearly her marraige was important, to whom it did not matter- there that is the level of choice she had.....

I thought you meant her brother, and I wanted to cry.

I really don't see how arranged marriage can be considered anything besides bad, if for no other reason than it is heteronormative, and does not allow for the wonderful differences in sexuality that we all have

I'm sorry, I should have been more clear. The story here about the teen-bride was definitely not an example of what I was calling the evolved arranged marriage system. I agree that the system is very much abused, especially in the smaller towns and villages, and women oftentimes are denied any type of choice, either through force or coercion.

I guess I was just trying to draw attention to the fact that the arranged marriage system does have the potential to be a very positive thing, considering all we hear outside of India about it are sad stories like this one. The focus is held on the terrible injustices in small villages (as it should be), but on the other hand, the vast improvements in other parts of the country are largely ignored. I've noticed the conclusion people tend to come to in other discussions is that it's a barbaric custom wrought by a culture that doesn't love its children.

But maybe I should not have brought my baggage from the Slate.com forums over here! :) So, I apologize for that.

I thought you meant her brother, and I wanted to cry.

I really don't see how arranged marriage can be considered anything besides bad, if for no other reason than it is heteronormative, and does not allow for the wonderful differences in sexuality that we all have

JenLovesPonies, I’m surprised I never considered that perspective. Though I think it would be possible in an ideal world for arranged marriage to encompass all our different sexualities in a way that would be positive for both families and individuals (in addition to the possibility that individuals could choose to opt out of the system as they pleased). Unfortunately, that’s probably stretching the ideal way too thin across the flawed reality at this point.

Based on my recent reading of Stephanie Coontz's "Marriage, a History," the marriage was egregious both for feminist and other reasons.

Coontz makes the excellent case that for most of history and still in much of the world marriage is decision between family economic or political alliances and not really about the individuals in the marriage at all.

Consider that not only the bride had no say in the matter (chances are slight that she was equally enamored with both brothers) but then either did (either of) the grooms!

I was in a public speaking seminar a month or so ago with a man from India who explained how difficult his recent marriage had been to arrange. He'd met a woman and after an extended courtship they'd decided to get married. He said "but getting her to agree was the easy part." It turns out that he'd divorced his way out of an arranged marriage at a pretty young age and, consequently, his parents had been disgraced. Once he finally won them over (I think it took more than a year) *they* had to convince *her* parents that he wouldn't screw things up again by divorcing her. This may explain the first brother's lamentations that he'll never be able to marry now.

So. You've got a bride that's callously parceled off to pick a brother, any brother will do. You've got a brother who may have had his own plans for who he'd like to have married but now can't. You've got another brother who, assuming he actually wanted to marry the bride now has to treat her only as a sister-in-law, and who in any case is going to have a very hard time finding a family that will agree to marry one of their game pieces, err, daughters off to him.

Sooo... checking our score cards we've got one seriously disadvantaged young woman who may or may not yet be out of puberty, and two men who didn't have much say in the matter either... and two patriarchal families happy with their cosy economic and/or political merger, minus a couple of awkward moments.

Yeah, not what you'd call feminist in the least. Also an excellent illustration of Amanda's principle that feminists not only care more about women, they care more about *men* than does the patriarchy!

figleaf

"In a country with a radically different lifestyle that we're used to, where village life expectancy is under 50, getting married as a teen makes sense."

The harsh conditions that lower average life expectancy also tend to make puberty happen *later*, not earlier. There's a good explanation of the math involved here:

http://plimoth.org/discover/myth/dead-at-40.php

"18 year olds are still teens, yet they've reached the age of adulthood so I don't think we can prevent them from marrying. I don't think we can assume the worst based on the word 'teen'."

Good point.

"I felt bad after reading the story, because clearly her marraige was important, to whom it did not matter"

"I guess I was just trying to draw attention to the fact that the arranged marriage system does have the potential to be a very positive thing,"

These also remind me of a double standard I've sometimes heard. Some people will call a white or black woman who enjoys sex with a man she barely knows slutty but call an Asian woman who enjoys sex with a man she barely knows a role model. Some others will call those white and black women liberated but call those Asian women brainwashed. Either way, it's bizarre. o_O

"I really don't see how arranged marriage can be considered anything besides bad, if for no other reason than it is heteronormative, and does not allow for the wonderful differences in sexuality that we all have"

"Though I think it would be possible in an ideal world for arranged marriage to encompass all our different sexualities in a way that would be positive for both families and individuals (in addition to the possibility that individuals could choose to opt out of the system as they pleased)."

Now I wonder how many generations it would take for those matrimonial ad websites to include same-sex pairing options.

"Coontz makes the excellent case that for most of history and still in much of the world marriage is decision between family economic or political alliances and not really about the individuals in the marriage at all."

Yeah. It's as if the ones in charge of the show think they're breeding two organisms together, with the extended families being the organisms and the actual bride and groom being mere egg cell and sperm cell.

"Yeah, not what you'd call feminist in the least. Also an excellent illustration of Amanda's principle that feminists not only care more about women, they care more about *men* than does the patriarchy!"

Right on!