simba

bigmain you are confused about what an arranged marriage is. Trust me it is not a slavery.

rhonda63

Simba is right. And arranged marriage among Indians in the US, and among many urban, educated Indians in India, is nothing like what some Westerners portray it as -- parents choosing a mate for their child and the child having no choice in the matter.

I also saw Bride and Prejudice recently, and Ashwariya Rai had a great line defending arranged marriage as it exists today -- she said "it's really more like a global dating service." Today, the extent to which a marriage is "arranged" may only be that the parents will seek out potential mates for their child to meet and get to know. The child has the ultimate approval (or veto).

The Washington Post magazine had an article about two years ago on arranged marriages in the Indian community in DC. Several of the young people WANTED and ASKED their parents to "arrange" their marriages -- this consisted mainly of lining up potential partners, and then it was up to the kids. Frankly, I don't think this is that different than what many families do, of all ethnicities.

rhonda63

Bigmain -- I don't know if you were responding to my comment that my parents wanted me to date only Indian boys in college. You may not have caught my first sentence -- that my husband is American. And my parents love him!

mercurysquad

I don't believe that. All parents will say so, but I don't think that's the majority. Arranged marriage, more usually, is passive acceptance of this "mate" the parents (undoubtedly the girl's parents) choose for their child. Objection is highly unlikely, unless it's the guy who objects.

TheIndianThread

Hmmm….as much as I have tried to avoid getting involved in this topic…I feel the urge to throw in my two cents…no offense to any1.

First, thanks to Vaish, Simba and Rhonda for the insightful discussion. As a matter of introduction, I am an Indian student from India, but the last person from my immediate family left in India. My immediate family pre-dominantly lives in Europe and the U.S. and I have listened, participated and enjoyed the whole dating debate from our family’s living room to family get together parties. Currently, I have equal number of cousins with brown skin and black eyes, as I do with white skin and blue eyes. So now that I have introduced myself, here are my thoughts.

- India is a country of a billion+ people with billion+ personalities – you can’t generalize 1/6 of world’s population in one category.
- There are families (and not only urban, educated, hip crowd) who are very open to the whole concept of dating and encourage their kids partake in that adventure. It is especially very obvious, when anyone were to visit one of the metropolitan cities’ restaurants or gardens.
- There are families (and not only rural, uneducated, non-hip crowd) who considers ‘dating’ as a corrupt concept and discourages (read: forbids) their kids to get involved with it.
- There are Indians who choose their own significant others (perfect example: 75% of my family)
- There are Indians who goes through the whole arrange marriage thing (perfect example: 25% of my family)
- There are arranged marriages where the boy/girl has a veto
- There are arranged marriages where it is forced on the boy/girl
- Statistically, at least in India, it has not been proved about what type of marriage has more success. But from my family’s experience, because of the social pressure, arranged marriage couples tend to be more ‘adjusting’ and have less ‘convictions’ about their partners and has had more success. Similarly, ‘love marriages’ (after dating) tends to bring with it a degree of preconceived notions and expectations resulting in a higher failure rate (my best cousin just finalized his divorce in December after 14 months of marriage with the girl that he had dated for over 7-8 years)
- The other thing to remember is that Indians tend to be more family oriented and share a stronger family ties than most people in the Western hemisphere. Due to this, arranged marriage could potentially survive more because of it is considered more as a ‘family responsibility’.
- Also, ‘love marriages’ could face suffocation in a joint family system, that a larger % of Indians follow, because it is different to date a person than to actually live with his WHOLE freaking family.

I can go on and on, but damn I have a physics board exam tomorrow, so cant do it. All I will say is, arranged marriage or love marriage, its all good. No kid of my generation (boy or a girl, rural or urban) is going to heed to their parents advise of not dating, if they desire to.
Like every culture (don’t want to go in details about many ‘practices’ of other culture that I despise), Indian culture has its own idiosyncrasies, but it is those same habits that unites these billion+ community. At the end of the day, its upon the kids. Build a relationship based on trust and confidence with the parents, and I don’t see why they would not agree with most of the stuff that you’d like. Also, if they don’t, think about it – they are usually more right than wrong.

Vaish, as far as your ex – if he is such a ‘girlie man’ that he cant even have a logical debate/discussion with his parents, it all happened for your best interest – coz think about being married in that kind of a family.

Its all good! The world is fair and at the end of the day…everything happens for the best!

rhonda63

mercury, I can't speak for every single Indian, of course, but I can tell you that in my experience, the child has definitely made the ultimate decision. The parents were really like a "pre-screening" of candidates more than anything else. I know one girl (she is a doctor) who provided her parents with a written list of characteristics she wanted in a mate, which she told them to use in selecting people!

And really, I think the Indian girls in the US are MORE likely than the boys to push back against parental pressure, if there is any (see my post above). I think many people have a very outdated idea of what Indian parents here are like. No dating may still be the preferred approach (at least in HS), but I think the days of forcing your kids to marry people is not really the reality here.

Vaish88

yay! this tread is finally seeing some action. One thing i should mention that i had forgotten is that my parents had a "love marriage." That is they were introduced by my grandmother but once she knew how close in age they were (11 months) she didnt consider it further, but they went on some "dates" and then...well my dad proposed. but again it was all very clean-no contact till after my dad proposed. This was in India in the 80's. So in that context obviously my parents arent going to make me have an arranged marriage, which isnt even such a bad idea. Its just a way to meet people that you share a lot in common with, and you can persue the relationship if you like.

As for dating Americans, personally while i have lots of close white friends and i have dated an american guy...i feel like there is just so much more of a connection with an Indian boy.

and Simba my name is Vaishnavi, not Vaishali....but its close.

simba

actually, it is getting cold. i was hoping to hear from other boys and girls as well.

well let me throw another curve ball. i have heard that teenage drinking amongst indian kids is higher than general population. is it true? why?

few other questions. do you have open relationship with your parents? do you often use the phrase, 'you indian parents wouldn't undestand' to get what you want or blackmail them? do you really want to study what you want or your parents have singificant influence in your career choices? why do most of you want to study medicine?

TheIndianThread

Simba, to answers your questions
a. I dont know about Indian kids in the US, but I would agree that Indian kids in UK drink more than the general population. Also, drinking and drugs is a very wide spread problem in metropolitan cities in India like bombay/pune.

b. I do have a very open relationship with my parents. There is nothing (i repeat, nothing) that i would hesitate to discuss with my parents/sibling. Very recently, i was inducted in our family's 'drinking dudes' which includes my dad, brother, uncles, cousins, etc.

c. I dont even think my parents know which colleges I am applying for. Selection of my major is totally upto me and my parents dont and have never tried to influence my career choice

d. I dont want to study medicine or anything that is even close to medicine.

i dont know what you are trying to derive from these answers, but if it is what i think it is, then let me also make a point that the tremendous freedom given to me by my parents has also brought with it tremendous level of self-responsibilities and trust. And I got to live upto it.

sucharita

Ditto for Calcutta ... most of the kids I know have experimented with both and some of them have taken it to a level beyond experimentation. That said, they havent told their parents and I dont want to think about what would happen if their parents did find out especially about stuff like marijuana.

aim78

It's a lot different in the UK. I doubt alcohol and drugs is a problem at all with Indians in America, at least up until college. Most don't even have the means of finding any booze. UK Indians are nutty, or queer as they would put it. Awful accent as well. As you can tell, I didn't like Bend it like Beckham at all.

harri

Although I haven't seen this movie recently, I just remembered how great it is. And it looks as though not too many people have seen it since it's not on any of the previously posted movie lists.

The movie is simply called: The Game

It came out in 1990 and it stars Michael Douglas. The movie is a great psychological thriller. I highly recommend it.

harri

Uh, sorry, wrong thread.

aaratimonster

i tried to convince my parents dating was ok

i see a therapist for clinical depression and she was really the one who pushed them to say it was ok.

even so they slowly started to hate me but STILL said it was ok

they found a picture of me and my boyfriend kissing (my boyfriend is spanish)

and i almost got kicked out of the house
they verbally harrass me
my extended family cut off relations with me

im a highschool senior im grounded my last year at home will be remember as the worst year of my life

more than anything in the world i wish i wasnt indian.

that is a sad fact but these conservative parents have pushed me to it.

TheElliott

aaratimonster... I think I understand your feelings. Only I am a little different. The boy I am in love with is Indian, and I am white. His parents recently told him that if he were ever stupid enough to date a white girl they would slap him. It's really hard, feeling like you are hated by people you want to impress. They've never really spoken to me, and have no idea about my relationship with their son. He wants to marry me, but he is scared of discussing this with his parents... His mother has said, "white girls are just a bunch of stupid, gold digging, slackers." so this is a bit of a problem... More than anything, I wish I could be Indian. If only there were a way to make his parents see that I'm not just looking for an "easy ride" but that I truly care about him. Is it impossible?