My marriage was not arranged but my parents had to meet and approve of him (poor thing was interviewed) before we could go on a date. I really don't have a stand on it, if you have careful, thoughtful parents it could work out better that you picking a guy yourself (sometimes young people pick husbands for the wrong reasons). My grandparents were arranged and were very happy (My grandma's mom was close firends with my grandpas Mom) and my Uncle and Aunt picked my dad for my mom. I think arranged or pick-him-yourself...whether it works out in the end or not is just fate and probably both are equally happy or un-happy.
Arranged Marriage or Love Match: Where do YOU stand?
- Thread starter ShimmaPuff
- Start date
I personally disagree to the type of arranged marriage where one or both partners have no say at all over the final decision of who they marry. If I hypothetically were to have an arranged marriage I would want to meet the man my parents chose first to see if we have common values, goals and enough compatibility and chemistry to make the marriage work. In reality however I don't think my parents are capable of choosing a husband for me if I were to let them and I'd much rather have a love marriage.
Where's the option for against marriage completely? 
To me, the ideal that marriage is the ultimate goal is a bit offensive. As if my word of commitment isn't good enough, you need a formal, legal contract to make it official.
But hey, if marriage works for you, so be it. There are pros and cons for both arranged and non arranged. If both are done with a little thought and logic, I think they can work out for everyone.
To me, the ideal that marriage is the ultimate goal is a bit offensive. As if my word of commitment isn't good enough, you need a formal, legal contract to make it official.
But hey, if marriage works for you, so be it. There are pros and cons for both arranged and non arranged. If both are done with a little thought and logic, I think they can work out for everyone.
That's a very fair question, and may be part of the one I was asking, even though I didn't realize it.
At some point, I might like to start another thread about marriage itself, the history of it, how it related - and still, in some cases, in some aspects, relates, to women as commodities as opposed to standalone human beings.
The ideas of women as independent and equal human beings is, like the idea of marriage being based on romantic love between two people, being about their personal happiness, independent of their families, etc are both relatively new notions.
Your question is good because it raises another: For people who adhere to that romantic notion of marriage, why is a contract needed at all? Ususally the answers we give to that will have to do with societal issues, like taxes, and decocritter has, in this thread and in another in the Money forum, laid out some very salient points on the subject of how that old notion of women as commodity still colors societal norms to such a degree that there is a need for some instrument to protect the woman from this and that.
My own personal view is biased. I am a hopeless old new school romantic, and to me, marriage is something that exists in the hearts of the two people. Contracts are paper. They can be torn up, they can be dissolved in the courts. In some cultures, dissolution of a contractural marriage requires only that the man express his intention to end it three times. In others, petitions may be sent to Rome. But the various instruments of contract, nor their dissolution, affect what is in the heart. In my opinion, you know when you are married to somebody, whether you have a piece of paper that says so or not. To borrow from the Christian service, it is something that God has done, and nothing man can do can change it.
In the future, when laws, and hearts accept more completely that women are equal beings, maybe there will be no need for anybody to have any papers or ceremonies. Well, papers. Ceremonies, I think, are a sort of instinctive human behavior, and people will always enjoy having some sort of ceremony to proclaim and celebrate their having found each other!
Great post!
I too am romantic, so I can see myself having some sort or commitment ceremony, and I can also see myself being torn with the thought that if I love someone enough, shouldn't I sacrifice my anti-marraige ideals for the one I love?? Then again, if she loves me, should she sacrifice her pro-marriage ideals??
It's so complicated!!!
I too am romantic, so I can see myself having some sort or commitment ceremony, and I can also see myself being torn with the thought that if I love someone enough, shouldn't I sacrifice my anti-marraige ideals for the one I love?? Then again, if she loves me, should she sacrifice her pro-marriage ideals??
It's so complicated!!!
And several others have referred to "background checks."
This is such an important point, and one that I think constitutes maybe the most important element of modern arranged marriage, and might be something that love match people would want to consider borrowing.
Back in the day, when communities were smaller, more intimate, and everybody knew everybody else, whether mom or the girl herself suggested a particular young man, everybody knew immediately who he was, meaning they knew his family, they knew everything he had ever done in his life, they knew him, his strengths, weaknesses, accomplishments and failures. They knew how he had been brought up. There was no need for a background check. And the same went for the girl.
And all this quite independently of whether the marriage under discussion would have been arranged by the families or the young people themselves.
Today, however, the world we live in is a different place. The prospective groom, like the prospective dinner date, will have large unknown quantity areas even in the best of circumstances, even when there are mutual friends, old family ties, you name it. We still don't know what may have happened in Vegas.
Yet in some cultures, the idea of performing a background check on one's sweetheart would be offensive - not only to the sweetheart but to the girl herself, even her family would balk at such an idea, might call it extreme. Even a formal interview would be more likely replaced by informal conversation in a family setting.
Despite the popularity of "the sweetheart with a Terrible Secret" as a plot twist in movies and TV shows, and despite the fact that due to the nature and mobility of American society, even the vastness of the country itself, all combine to make the keeping of Terrible Secrets pretty easy, about the closest to a background check the prospective groom - or bride - is likely to get will consist of mom and/or dad making a few phone calls to a few old buddies of some kind with some connection of KevinBacon-esque tenuousness to some entity connected with the "suspect."
And some will criticize doing even that!
Should anyone in the family suggest calling upon a professional to perform a background check, horror-stricken palms would be raised all round, and the "suspect," even one entirely without Terrible Secrets, might be so insulted that he or she feels obliged to rethink the relationship completely, now feeling entirely put off and frankly frightened - by the deranged family of the beloved!
Great topic, Shimma! I have to admit that I am a bit of a cultural chauvinist, but I don't feel strongly for either side of the debate, posed in this way.
As you have already pointed out, later on in this thread, these two (western "love" vs. arrangement) in practice are not mutually exclusive. Western marriage has, for hundreds of years, not been solely based on romantic love. People married for economic,social and other reasons that had nothing to do with romantic love;they married for economic stability, and they married within their own social caste. In a way, you could think of Western marriage to have been historically "arranged" in a way, that kept people within socio-economic castes and preserved societal norms.
That is probably true for many people in this country who are very privacy and security conscious and may find it offensive that their backgrounds are looked into throughly before marriage.
In my country people view it much the same way as a prospective employer views a resume and reads recommendations for a
job, and maybe consults the people who provide the recommendations for more details on the person applying for a job. So background checks are to be expected, and no big deal. If background checks are perfomed for high security jobs or applying to live in co-ops in NYC among other such situations I don't see why anyone should object to having one (unless they have something to hide, of course) prior to marriage.
After all, people do have to have blood tests, don't they?
i'm against arranged marriages solely because the woman in 99.9% of the cases does not have the ability/right to reject the match and say no.
I have nothing against families trying to find someone suitable for their children and coming from the same background, experiences and all that sometimes does make it easier to relate. that much i can accept.
but the part where the woman has no say in it is why I'm against arranged marriages. the woman is like a pawn, pig, cow or whatever. just there to be traded and used.
I have nothing against families trying to find someone suitable for their children and coming from the same background, experiences and all that sometimes does make it easier to relate. that much i can accept.
but the part where the woman has no say in it is why I'm against arranged marriages. the woman is like a pawn, pig, cow or whatever. just there to be traded and used.
Exactly! You can find posts right here from people - western, USA born and bred people, that indicate that the prospective groom's finances, future earning potential, what they perceive as his social status, and that all time favorite - "economic security" are very much alive and well in the factors considered by modern young women when they consider choosing a spouse.And I bet that if you, or I, wanted to start a thread specifically on that subject, we would hear the personal stories of many people who had on at least one occasion ended one relationship - or pursued and nurtured another one, with "practical" considerations in mind.
I will also bet that there are people reading this right now who would not consider someone to be "marriage material," regardless of their personal romantic feelings about him, if he did not meet certain criteria in areas both economic and what an elderly insurance underwriter I once knew would call "the so-shee-yo."
Still in betting mode, there are people reading this right now who are aware of at least one USA born and bred marriage that occurred as a result of a longtime "understanding" between the families. The understanding, of course, that the young people would grow up and fall in love all by themselves prior to realizing the understanding, of which they would of course have been made aware since childhood.
I am very pleased that you used the term "socio-economic castes." Despite the best efforts of Gandhiji to aid England in extracting itself from a b
usiness situation that had become less profitable than some "old hands" might have hoped, one does not have to even set foot in South Asia to know that the caste system - Dalits ("untouchables") and all, is alive and thriving - even despite religious prohibitions against it, and has crossed the ocean and made a new home for itself in the US, which has one of its own, though we are fond of insisting that we do not, and taking great pains to produce for display just the right shining sprinkle of examples as illustration.
Bear in mind that I am, for the purposes of the above remarks, (with the exception of the bit about the caste system crossing the ocean), setting aside all "immigrant" groups, absurdly but aptly including those in whose veins courses blood indigenous to the Americas, as well as those whose ancestors made "non-consensual act of immigration" from Africa.
So, yes, I am asserting that even among the mainstream US demographic there exists a caste system, and it exists as a very real "bar" to not only matrimony, but close personal relationships in general.
What separates it most from its South Asian counterpart, in addition to it being something that it is not polite to talk about, is that it is rooted more in economics than anything else, more than occupational group, more even than religion, and the sharp downward trend in our cherished concept of "upward mobility" and its transition to an event with higher odds than PowerBall, has only cemented this.
So not only do traditional arranged marriages and love matches have more overlap than many of us may have thought, the twain of east and west have indeed met, gotten married, and just might be pregnant!
On the off-chance that it's not a humorous hyperbole, I would have to question those figures. In fact, while nobody could really give exact statistics, my guess is that the opposite would be closer.
The arranged marriage of sensationalist fiction, and the occasional true story, reflect only a very small slice of the global human culture pie. And again, I am saying this just in case you were not exaggerating to emphasize your point, and for the benefit of lurkers who might not know, or might not have picked up on it from other peoples' remarks in this thread, while news reports of awful doings in this regard in the remote villages of Uttar Pradesh or Pashtunistan or Colorado are true, they do not reflect what goes on in most families, even the most conservative.
For example, you might find very conservative families whose faith tradition is Mormon or Mormon-inspired, in the rural areas of the American west, whose beliefs preclude the traditional American dating process, and where the parents, and possibly also the local religious leader, might take an active role in choosing a potential spouse for a young girl, but if upon meeting the young man, or being in a family-based group social setting with him, she did not feel inclined to get to know him better, or pursue a friendship, the arrangers would move on to Bachelor Number 2!
This is not to say that her parents will not encourage her to want to get to know the young man better. That happens in a lot of families in a lot of places, even ones where mom and dad step aside, at least relatively speaking
However, all this does bring up the question of how strongly the giving of her consent might be influenced by a sense of duty and/or an eagerness to please her parents and gain or keep their approval - a question that might also be asked in the case of her Old New England counterpart, whose mother would fall right over in shock if anyone suggested she was arranging her daughter's marriage, when all she had ever done was express her sincere affection for the son of her old college friend, and point out how quickly he had advanced in his career, she is thinking only of her daughter's future....
BTW this whole discussion reminds me of the mother in Monsoon Wedding who tells the daughter, "I don't want you to be happy, I want you to be MARRIED!"
. BTW this whole discussion reminds me of the mother in Monsoon Wedding who tells the daughter, "I don't want you to be happy, I want you to be MARRIED!"[/quote]I know this is completely off topic but....I LOVE that movie!!! Oh and interesting thread too BTW Shimma!
I know this is completely off topic but....I LOVE that movie!!! Oh and interesting thread too BTW Shimma![/quote]
LOL ! Yeah, I love that movie too as it reflects wonderfully how marriages in middle class India work. An Indian myself (from a rather conservative & traditional family that too), I ended up marrying a an American (from a staunch Mormon family). Both of our cultures promote "arranged" marriage. In Mormondom, you only marry other mormons and in India you marry somebody from the same caste/ethnicity.
In a lot of ways I feel arranged marriages are easier as there are set rules and expectations. Also you don't have to play dating "games". I, for one was really put off by this (perhaps due to my dating inexperience and only being used to the idea of arranged marriages). However, all this being said "love marriage" has worked out for me fabulously ! I feel that there would have been no way to get to know my prospective partner in the most deepest ways possible just by interacting superficial as is usually prevalent in courtships that ensue before an arranged marriage. Also, I didn't have to worry about the "family shame" I might have invited had I broken off my relationship. Hence, it was a lot less stressful and a lot more fun.
I think both the systems have their pros and cons. More than 50% of these "love marriages" here in the US fail miserably within a few years; but then again there's the other 50% thats amazingly happy. My parents had an arranged married 35 years ago and they are still blissfully happy in their marriage. I also have seen a lot of unhappy arranged marriages where people stay in it simply as to not "disgrace" their "family honor".
Ultimately, its up to the person as to what suits him/her depending on that person's background, hopes and other such related factors.
It depends on your culture and personal drive. For me it would never work, but for others it might.
It probably would have been a disaster if my parents picked a spouse for me. They are very out of touch with what makes me happy as a female.