Love marriage or arranged marriage - the perpetual question in group discussions and the favourite of debaters and perhaps one of the most clichéd argument topics in India. I was dreading the day when I will take up my e-quill to spray my take on this subject all over the blog. And finally for me it all fell into a single piece and here u can have my arguments on this. But I’m sure I have no where read about a similar argument and as far as I know I’m pretty authentic with this one...
So ask for the greatest advantage of an arranged marriage and the elders will undoubtedly say “stability”. Perhaps Indian subcontinent might be the only place where arranged marriages are practiced in such abundance. In the west and the 'other' east, its “man vs. wild” in the fight for woman or vice-versa.
I remember learning in history classes that in India during the Vedic period women were much freer than they ever were in the 19th or 20th centuries. But something terrible happened after the Vedic period and there was the Dark Age the passage of which meant more of darkness for the Indian women. Finally it all boiled down to a state where women were no longer considered part of the homo-sapiens. They were just a tool to produce off-springs so that the male child can help the father in his business and girl child can be burdened off to some poor male soul so that he too can have offspring.
It’s in this so called patriarchal or male centric society that women were considered subservient and their dignity and stature as humans eroded in the long run without education, social contact or any other forms of action with a scope for emancipation. The woman too adjusted to this and they surrendered their dignity to the male society and started coping with the way they were treated – a rather sad kind of Stockholm syndrome. It is in this context that I believe arranged marriages became common method for stable marriages with the choice lying solely with the groom. It is this setup where the women who were down the chasm of social recognition and lacking total support not even from fellow women, that arranged marriages soon translated to mean stable marriages.
As the country progressed socially with the arrival of British raj and later after the independence, economically with a more inclusive social growth, the women were granted rights to education, social status, recognition and dignity. With this her level of awareness grew and after the wake of the millennium she stands almost in par with the men (at least in certain highly educated societies and cities). She no longer feels the compulsion to stick with an un-adjusting or moronic husband just because she is a woman. I would be lying if I don’t mention the fact that Indian woman are more conditioned to adapt, suffer and tolerate compared to their western counterparts owing to the mental and psychological conditioning she has received through centuries of consistent ill treatment and brain washing (and it may still be present in their DNA for decades to come). The society as a whole has become more liberal and as a result divorcees from arranged marriages have also increased.
So in all, the so called stability of the arranged marriage is a farce act by the so called protectors of the society’s moral fabric. When, in this society women attain the same status as that of men in all places, all conditions and in all strata of the society, the facade and the whole structure of this dumb charade will crumble. Then it will be a victory not for those who argued against arranged marriages in debates but it will be a victory for the better half of the world.
So ask for the greatest advantage of an arranged marriage and the elders will undoubtedly say “stability”. Perhaps Indian subcontinent might be the only place where arranged marriages are practiced in such abundance. In the west and the 'other' east, its “man vs. wild” in the fight for woman or vice-versa.
I remember learning in history classes that in India during the Vedic period women were much freer than they ever were in the 19th or 20th centuries. But something terrible happened after the Vedic period and there was the Dark Age the passage of which meant more of darkness for the Indian women. Finally it all boiled down to a state where women were no longer considered part of the homo-sapiens. They were just a tool to produce off-springs so that the male child can help the father in his business and girl child can be burdened off to some poor male soul so that he too can have offspring.
It’s in this so called patriarchal or male centric society that women were considered subservient and their dignity and stature as humans eroded in the long run without education, social contact or any other forms of action with a scope for emancipation. The woman too adjusted to this and they surrendered their dignity to the male society and started coping with the way they were treated – a rather sad kind of Stockholm syndrome. It is in this context that I believe arranged marriages became common method for stable marriages with the choice lying solely with the groom. It is this setup where the women who were down the chasm of social recognition and lacking total support not even from fellow women, that arranged marriages soon translated to mean stable marriages.
As the country progressed socially with the arrival of British raj and later after the independence, economically with a more inclusive social growth, the women were granted rights to education, social status, recognition and dignity. With this her level of awareness grew and after the wake of the millennium she stands almost in par with the men (at least in certain highly educated societies and cities). She no longer feels the compulsion to stick with an un-adjusting or moronic husband just because she is a woman. I would be lying if I don’t mention the fact that Indian woman are more conditioned to adapt, suffer and tolerate compared to their western counterparts owing to the mental and psychological conditioning she has received through centuries of consistent ill treatment and brain washing (and it may still be present in their DNA for decades to come). The society as a whole has become more liberal and as a result divorcees from arranged marriages have also increased.
So in all, the so called stability of the arranged marriage is a farce act by the so called protectors of the society’s moral fabric. When, in this society women attain the same status as that of men in all places, all conditions and in all strata of the society, the facade and the whole structure of this dumb charade will crumble. Then it will be a victory not for those who argued against arranged marriages in debates but it will be a victory for the better half of the world.
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