Arranged Marriages
Offline ...This was actually a more interesting conversation than I thought it would be when I had it after class tonight.
In a nutshell, arranged marriages were brought-up incidentally, and a middle eastern classmate was explaining to me and another classmate why he felt arranged marriages were a much better idea than the whole choose-your-own-spouse thing (...it essentially boiled down to 'fairness' and 'expertise'; a professional matchmaker, being an impartial 3rd-party, should be able to pick-out a more compatible match for you overall than you yourself can because of your 'visual bias'. Boiling it down to the simplest forms is perhaps giving the entire explanation a disservice; it really was engaging to at least listen to).
My personal perspective, based largely on intuition, is that 'visual bias' really does matter, and that 'fairness' is something of a cheap argument (we live in a relatively free / open-ended civilization; one of the costs to this is a lack of overall 'fairness'). An individual tends to know what they like (I think) a lot better than a third party, and potentially being put into a relationship that one party or the other doesn't enjoy will result in misery (...although apparently there are provisions for this in modern matchmaking. A sort of 'refund policy', if you will, which I thought was, well, neat, for lack of a better word). The element of free choice and consent just seems to have an overall sense of superiority to it (people prefer getting involved in things and do better at taking responsibility for things when they have more control - or they feel they have more control - over what they're doing).
But, I'm really curious now:
What do statistics say about it? If arranged marriage systems are compared to 'free market' marriage systems, which trend towards greater success?
"Natasha has just come up to the window from the courtyard and opened it wider so that the air may enter more freely into my room. I can see the bright green strip of grass beneath the wall, and the clear blue sky above the wall, and sunlight everywhere. Life is beautiful. Let the future generations cleanse it of all evil, oppression and violence, and enjoy it to the full."
- Leon Trotsky, Last Will & Testament
February 27, 1940
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...who entered into arranged marriages right after high school. one is still happily married to the same man her parents chose. He was from England, so i think it helped her in the sense that he was raised in a free society where women have a greater inherent value. plus, her parents would only agree to the match if she went to post-secondary. they are now both dentists. my other friend however didn't fair so well. her mother picked a man from India, and he used her as a chance to come to canada, that's it. he was horribly abusive to her, threatened to kill her, etc. eventually he just one day up and left her, and abandoned their child. she said the only benefit was that in her family's culture her parents would only help her because it was an arranged marriage and they made the huge error of judgement. if she had refused the arrangement and married for love, and things went badly like that, she'd have been on her own. however seeing as they were the ones that screwed up, they had to take care of her. for her this ment they paid for her to go to school so she could support the child on her own. she then met and married a man of her own choosing. her choice was a good one...he's raising her son as his own, and it's not that easy to find a guy willing to do that. Both of these friends of mine are of Punjabi descent.
as far as greater "success" you have to define what you mean by success. does this mean the number of marriages that end in divorce or not? i don't know that actual stats, but i'm willing to guess that arranged marriages are likely to have lower divorce rate. why do i think that? i think that because most cultures that permit or enforce arranged marriages also place less value on women as individuals. they tend to view women as needing to be "taken care of" in the best context (ie: Saudi Arabia) and as a burden at worst (rural India and Pakistan). not to mention that in many of these countries it is very difficult for a woman to divorce even an abusive husband, but a man can leave a woman for any reason at all. there are very few systems in place to help women who leave their husbands so they just put up with it. it seems to me that societies that place a higher value on women as individuals, instead of as just wives and mothers, tend to lend themselves to allow women (and thus men) to make their own choices.
I'm not saying either way is right or wrong. each society has it's way of existing. i do think that arranged marriages would not be supported in a Western society. it's just not compatible with a society that values individual rights and freedoms. on the other hand, choice marriages would not be well supported in rural India because it's not compatible with that society's value system.
One last point, love can still matter in an arranged marriage. it's just not the most important thing. the big keys to my friends parents were financial security and family respectablity of the husband to be. love was something that was to come after being together. both friends had parents that were arranged to be married, and both sets of parents were good people and very much in love with eachother. it was something earned from many years of dedication to eachother. I just wish my one friend's parents hadn't been duped by a psychopath, but many people get duped by such scum.
I'd rather be a moral atheist than an amoral theist.
Very astute observation.
Because arranged marriages tend to exist in less egalitarian societies, yes, they do have lower divorce rates. There's a really interesting phenomenon that has only recently been discovered. There are basically two types of arranged marriages, in terms of familiarity. In one case, the couple meet shortly before the wedding. In the other, they are raised together from childhood knowing that they are pledged. (I know it's not as simple as that, but this dichotomy was used for the purpose of a study, and doesn't intend to be a comprehensive survey of arranged marriage practice.)
Anyway, the arranged marriages where they knew each other from childhood were significantly more likely to end in divorce, or to become sexless. The best explanation for this is genetic. Children raised together during the imprinting years (most notably between 3 and 5, but as far as 12 in some cases) are generally not sexually attracted to each other later in life -- at least not enough to want to have sex. This is most likely an evolutionary adaptation to prevent incest. After all, if you've lived in most times in human history, the child who lived in the same household with you when you were a child was very likely to be your brother or sister.
Exactly.
It's kind of difficult to have freedom when others are making your choices for you. So yeah, I think you're right. Arranged marriages are basically incompatible with egalitarian societies. Now, we can talk about internet dating as a kind of surrogate arranged marriage, and examine the success rate of internet partnerships compared to those met in normal social circles. That might be interesting.
Yes. Love needs to be defined well for this to be meaningful. Women who repeatedly have sex with the same man generally develop feelings of attachment to him. This is biological, and goes a long way to explaining why it's so damn hard to get battered women to leave their husbands. Men, of course, develop attachment from sex also, but the mechanism is not quite the same, and the bond is different in kind. We can see this from what women and men fear most. Women are most afraid of emotional abandonment in a marriage, and are more willing to forgive infidelity than emotional distance. Men are exactly the opposite. They're willing to live with distance, so long as dinner is on time and the legs are spread when bedtime comes around. Men are most afraid, and get the most violent, about sexual infidelity.
Furthermore, working together with someone for a long time creates bonds. Marriage, as everyone who's been married knows, is work. Add to this that married couples, regardless of how they got together, will share a great many experiences, and will have many shared memories. They will raise children. They will bond with the same friends and family members.
We don't like to admit it, but love can be manufactured to a certain degree. It's a natural response to a normal set of circumstances. Put all the circumstances in place and love is likely to develop.
Precisely. The number one issue in failing marriages is money.
Atheism isn't a lot like religion at all. Unless by "religion" you mean "not religion". --Ciarin
http://hambydammit.wordpress.com/
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I know or have known about 15 couples whose marriages were "arranged", however, they were not totally predetermined. The two potential mates were allowed to meet, spend some time alone together (go for a walk or something) a couple of times at least. Then, if they both felt good about it things would proceed. If not, the parents would start looking for another potential match.
According to the couples I know there is a mis-conception that all or most arranged marriages are simply forced on them. In the experience of these people anyway there was no coercion or force. They are mostly from Bangladesh but 3 couples are from India. Maybe their tradition is different from Saudi Arabia etc.
Only one of all the Indian, Bengali, (and also Vietnamese or Chinese, although these were not arranged) couples my wife and I have ever known got divorced.
Strange, I was looking at these statistics. I never would have guess Sweden would be at the top.
World Divorce Statistics
Belarus
Finland
Luxembourg
Estonia
Australia
United States
Denmark
Belgium
Austria
Czech Republic
Russia
United Kingdom
Norway
Ukraine
Iceland
Germany
Lithuania
France
Netherlands
Hungary
Canada
Latvia
Moldova
Slovakia
Portugal
Switzerland
Bulgaria
Slovenia
Romania
Poland
Singapore
Greece
Croatia
Spain
Israel
Albania
Azerbaijan
Italy
Georgia
Armenia
Turkey
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Macedonia
Sri Lanka
India
(Source: Americans for Divorce Reform)
52.9
51.2
47.4
46.7
46
45.8
44.5
44
43.4
43.3
43.3
42.6
40.4
40
39.5
39.4
38.9
38.3
38.3
37.5
37
34.4
28.1
26.9
26.2
25.5
21.1
20.7
19.1
17.2
17.2
15.7
15.5
15.2
14.8
10.9
10.3
10
6.6
6
6
5
5
1.5
1.1
Well arranged marriages and what it represents is actually what is what is wrong with the world and it goes deeper than religion.
In 'eastern' cultures people want to live up to their parents , basically become clones of them
In 'western' cultures people want to do better than their parents who have basically screwed up the world , had their chance and now want to do better.
I remember reading 'Infidel' and one of the first things it describes was how young children in Somalia do is learn who their ancestors were to 15 generations. (Long before their learn about Islam). It basically says you are defined by your tribe, by your ancestors and your whole life will be based on this and you should never do anything to dishonour them. If islam doesnt attach itself to people brought up in that manner then something else just as bad will.
It's the same with arranged marriages, people saying their parents know best that their very existance is for their benefit
Depends what you define as "success". If sucess is simply staying in a marriage no matter what, then I reckon arranged marriages have a better survival rate. It also depends which country/area you conduct your research. Since most arranged marriages take place in cultures and conditions totally different to where most "free" marriages happen, it would be difficult to have a control group.
I was once having a similar argument with an Indian co-worker who was defending arranged marriages and boasting about the longevity rates. Suddenly an English girl butted in and asked "yes but are the people happy?" He seemed startled and disoriented by the question as if people's contentment was not even a factor that should be taken into the equasion.
What's the difference between Texas and Saudi Arabia? In Texas they execute you for murder, in Saudi Arabia they excecute you for having a Xmass tree.
...This isn't true, actually (not anymore).
It's funny that Hamby mentioned internet dating - essentially, this is what modern arranged marriages in most middle-eastern countries have become like (apparently), which is what I found interesting.
After coming of age, you are entered into a dating database, and from there a professional matchmaker (often NOT the parents) for a man selects the brides most suited to him (in their professional opinion). The male then selects the bride from the list, tries her out, and if the match is good it's a done deal.
Now, the obvious problem here is that the system is outrageously sexist (...ours is sexist too, IMHO, but to a less extreme degree), with secondary likely-problems coming in after (overall happiness likelyhood, limited consent, etc).
Uh. Well, if that's not obvious (and given the responses, I'd say it was), I'd define 'success' as a happy marriage (where both parties genuinely enjoy the arrangement).
That's not necessarily a fair rebuttal. How many people in western culture with a more 'open' system are happily married? How many are unhappily unmarried?
This was, in fact, the crux of what I was asking. What does the actual data say about this?
- Leon Trotsky, Last Will & Testament
February 27, 1940
I don't have much of an opinion on this subject as yet. I see many advantages and disadvantages to both sides of both sides of the equation. No, that was not a type-o. I'm referring to both male and female perspectives in the context of both arranged and unarranged marriages.
Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.
You know that happiness and love as a primary concern in marriage is a relatively new concept, right? For most of the history of marriage, it's been primarily about property and childbearing. I mention this because most of the countries where arranged marriages are still common are really old cultures -- much older than any Western cultures. The data you're looking for might not exist at this time. There are many, many parts of the world where the Western concept of marriage is viewed as rather strange.
Basically, what I'm saying is that your definition of success might be causing you to ask a rather nonsensical question. If the cultures that practice arrange marriage define success differently than you, their beliefs and practices within marriage would be different enough to make Western style "success" statistics more or less meaningless.
I'd suggest that the place to start is to ask what the cultural definitions of a successful marriage are in countries that have them.
Atheism isn't a lot like religion at all. Unless by "religion" you mean "not religion". --Ciarin
http://hambydammit.wordpress.com/
Books about atheism
Divorce rates are based on one factor only and it isnt the manner of marriage its the ability to divorce both legally and acceptably in society.
In the modern western world divorce is legally relatively easy and with almost no stigma so lots of divorces (50 years ago this was different , wasnt much harder to get divorced but there was massive stigma in doing so, hence few divorces).
As for happiness in marriage its natural selection, those marriages where people arent happy just die with nothing to keep them alive if they don't provide happiness (no social stigma again).
I would suspect the divorce rate is far lower with arranged marriages as the stigma is too great to leave , in some cases women tend to get killed if they want a divorce and I'm not just talking about Saudia Arabia here UK has plenty of honour killings
Well... damn!
*shakes fist*
Hm...
Well, okay: as a sort of 'rough' idea of how well the overall conept does or doesn't work, is there reliable data for how well internet-dating relationships from more 'controlling' sites like, say, eHarmony turn-out? Even just the divorce rates would be marginally indicative of a trend here, since cultural boundaries wouldn't be a factor.
- Leon Trotsky, Last Will & Testament
February 27, 1940
I don't think there's 'reliable' data. As far as I know, the only data commonly available is self reported. If I get some free time, I'll see if I can scour the journal indexes to see if maybe there's something a little more concrete. I suspect that dating sites aren't anxious for their success rates to be published scientifically because I suspect they're probably just about the same as the rates for non-internet daters. That is, I think divorces don't happen so much because we marry the "wrong person." They happen because time goes forward and things change. They happen because we're not programmed to be with one person for fifty years.
Possibly, but there would be a lot of variables to eliminate. Unless memory fails, Eharmony is run by Christians, which means that it's entirely possible that their selection process is colored by Christian ideas about marriage. That could conceivably screw up the correlation. Also, you have to consider that most people who try internet dating are probably trying it after failing at regular dating. This means they're coming in with a different mindset than bunnies fresh off the farm. Supposing you got a lower divorce rate from internet dating, it might be because internet daters have learned more about relationships than non-internet daters. I'm just throwing stuff out off the top of my head, but the point is, I don't think you're going to get much meaningful data even in the west just going by divorce.
Atheism isn't a lot like religion at all. Unless by "religion" you mean "not religion". --Ciarin
http://hambydammit.wordpress.com/
Books about atheism
Ugh. Arranged marriage? No thank you. A third party, no matter how good things look "on paper" will never know what you want deep down inside. What's also creepy is when parents pick a spouse ("Here honey, we thought the sex would be good!"
India's situation just seems like straight up repression. I don't like it.
*Our world is far more complex than the rigid structure we want to assign to it, and we will probably never fully understand it.*
"Those believers who are sophisticated enough to understand the paradox have found exciting ways to bend logic into pretzel shapes in order to defend the indefensible." - Hamby
I don't like the idea, as when I was in High School there were girls my mom said were "cute" who were either totally fugly, fat as shit, or both.
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