About This Blog

         In colonial slavery the slaves were taken and sailed through the Atlantic Ocean, this was called the Middle Passage. The passage passed through the triangular trade, which was when slaves were traded for tropical goods (rum, sugar, molasses) and weapons. Slavery has been outlawed for many years now, but it still happens illegally today. There can be slaves tricked into it, smuggled, kidnapped etc. There are many different kinds, but the one I will be talking about is forced and early marriage. 

Tied Together...Forever

Two hands chained together,
defining the meaning of
forced marriage

Marriage. Kind of an odd word, considering the fact it means to love someone so much that you can legally wed them and become husband and wife. But sometimes, that's not always the case. In my past few blog post's, I've talked about early and forced marriage. A type of modern day slavery, where not just somebodies human rights are taken away but their happiness, freedom, and future. Most people want to go to school, get good grades, get a good job, and meet someone the want to be with. Overall everybody wants to have a happy and prosperous life. We are given the opportunities to do that in America. Yet in other places, some people that are not as fortunate and that are not as opportunistic do not have that chance. And yes- I'm talking about the people made to go into slavery. And I'm not just talking about forced and early marriage. I'm talking about servitude, sweatshops, and even some parts in the education system. We are lucky to be where we are, right here and right now. Still though, some people do not realize that. But it is never too late to let others know about what is going on in the world.

I'm sure many of you have heard of her. Malala. A quite courageous teen, speaks out for all the education and equality rights for females. She made quite the stir, since she is one of the few people who have stood up for education rights. Shot in the head by the Taliban, it was a miracle she survived. This is a {video of Malala on CNN} discussing the subject. She talks about how to treat others and to respond with peace, kindness, and education. Sounds a little bit like some of the social rules we are taught in first grade, doesn't it? I feel like she says this though because it seems in today's corrupt world, many people can forget these simple things to follow by. Therefore this leads to violence, greed, and selfishness. But how does this all connect with forced and early marriage? The education rights are connected to gender inequality, which is one of the reasons for forced marriage. It has been occurring for a very long time. Malala does not just talk about education rights but to be equal for future benefit.

When married as a child bride you are denied of your rights and freedom. While the freedom may affect your social life, it also greatly affects many young girls that want to go to school. Yes, I know school can be a bit of a drag. We wake up early everyday, go to a place with bright fluorescent lighting and sit there for half of the day. Then comes the homework. Like I said, school can get a little annoying. But we go to school for a reason. We go to school to learn. For what? The future. For the job that you may someday want to get. Maybe you want to be a professional athlete. A scientist, designer, or an architect. You can't become these things without going to school. So many people wish that they could could to school but they are unable to. School is the main place for knowledge, and it doesn't just fuel our intelligence but fuels our society and the economy. The world is progressing, and someday the earth is going to be the big planet full of awesome people that went to school and have amazing jobs. But how is this going to happen, when girls in some places are deprived of education and treated without compassion? This is what happens to child brides. Their futures are gone, stolen from them from just a marriage. 

"Get a divorce!" is what some of you may say. But the thing is...they can't. Once tied, you are tied forever. They cannot return and try to start a new life. That is one of the many things they cannot do, due to gender inequality. They are stuck with somebody that (most of the time) tortures, abuses and deprives them of their needs. Child brides have a sad life. You wed, you marry, you are abused, you are isolated of rights and needs, you do whatever your spouse tells you to do, and then you die. Simple as that. There are so many untold stories of cases like this, and many children who are taken away from their future. 

I think it is almost ironic in fact. The family needs a girl to wed her off. She is then married to an abusive husband, and neither of them even love each other. When are all of these wrongdoings going to stop? If a girl is pressured to make a child as soon as possible, how is that to happen when she is having a child with a large chance of death? How is a woman to carry out a future for her family when she cannot even receive an education or get a job? I assume that from all the hidden girls that there could be many of them with so much talent and capability that could benefit them and even the world! But it is not going to happen without equal human rights, and not just education rights. I believe all of these untold stories, are cases of injustice and crime. It is disgusting, in fact, the things that people think that they are entitled to do. But they are not. Nobody will ever have the right to do things like that. 

The Reasons for Forced Marriage

A statement that says forced
marriage is abuse and not
cultural. 

Forced marriage happens everywhere. Once you think about it, it's pretty sad. A parent sends their child off to be married without choice and then comes the abuse and the imprisonment...it's as if you have no life. Then they are made to have children and they know that the same thing might happen to their children too. A person forced to be married lives their whole entire life in fear. By now I know how they live, which is not very nice. All of this comes from a simple marriage. But why does this happen? Sometimes it's not all for the reputation. It can always be so many more things.

I found a {BBC article} about the motives for forced marriage, and I was a little shocked to see all the reasons. One of them was to keep the culture and tradition strong. In my opinion, this is ridiculous. Taking away somebodies life is wrong and shouldn't be because of culture. Yes, of course you should keep your culture but you can always present it a different way instead of making your child unhappy and depressed. Forced marriage is abuse, and is never cultural. Of course, that is only my opinion. This reminds me of a book I recently read, Copper Sun by Sharon Draper, a very realistic book about slavery from an African American perspective. There was this one young lady, Mrs. Derby who was married to a plantation owner, just because her family had arranged it. She lived most of her youth in despair. Mrs. Derby was also married because her family wanted to keep the wealth going in between the rich families. Isn't that sad? To marry just for wealth? It actually does happen quite a bit in our world today, and not just in slavery.

Often times in India, a place quite common for arranged marriage, they marry just for a family name and reputation, and also if the child has a mental or physical disability they are married to find a "guardian" so the family is not disgraced in having a disabled child. Here's something kind of lame:  they also arrange marriage because of peer pressure. Now that is pathetic. I mean seriously? Giving in to peer pressure? That's middle school stuff, not real world! A bit of advice for those people, Be your own person and make your own choices! The marriage planners are usually the bride and grooms parents, who are adults that should be quite capable of making they're own decisions. Not only does this seem like they have no confidence and can't make their own choices, but this also strengthens yet weakens family ties at the same time. They strengthen some families together because the family could be large supporters of arranged marriage. On the other hand, this weakens the relationship with the child getting married to the parents.  I feel as if the parents are ignoring they're children and ignoring they're well-being and feelings. I don't know about you, but that's some bad parenting. Bad parenting can also be not keeping an eye on your kid enough. Look at  this {story}, a young christian girl was kidnapped and forced to become a bride. Isn't that crazy? She was tortured and raped multiple times and was made to "accept Islam." This is almost just like the slaves back then in Africa. For example, the girl was kidnapped just like how the African Americans were taken. She then was tortured and raped, like the African Americans. She was also made to accept her fate, similar to the Africans who had no choice but to accept their gruesome destiny. It is weird how everything today can seem so similar to the past, yet be so different.

 Forced marriage doesn't always happen when your family sends you off or you are kidnapped, this can happen when you are tricked into it. Yes, that's right. You can be tricked into it. This is common in Southeast Asia when a person is going on a "vacation" with their family, only to unfold the plans for marriage. Unfortunately they do not have any way of going anywhere. No money, phone, or passport leads to limited movement.

During my time about learning of forced marriage, I noticed that it is mainly concentrated on girls. This is probably because of gender inequality. Females have a lower ranking in societies, which can often lead to denial of their rights and paralyze their ability to do anything important in society. This also includes getting a job. They cannot get a job with regular income pay and this can also go straight to poverty. If a family is poor and do not have enough money they can always wed their children, therefore less of a burden on their financial issues.

The Health Risk of Early Marriage

Honestly, thinking about forced and early marriage just make's me tired. You think about all the things that happens like the treatment, the purpose, how many people are affected by it...But does anyone ever think of the health risk's that come with it? According to the {International Women's Health Coalition}, girls that marry under 14 and give birth have a very big health risk.

A map of where forced marriages take place 

All right so we all know the kind of physical abuse that can come with forced marriage. Rape, beating, assault, lack of human rights but there can be an Internal thing as well. Such as when a young girl is wed with a man she is pressed to bear a child as soon as possible, even before she is fully finished growing. This is a problem, since this can hold a lot of hazards to a young female. Since she is not done growing, her bone structure [pelvis] and reproductive organs are not fully developed this can cause some major problems in the pregnancy and birth. Such as when she is giving birth, it can be postponed due to blockage and insufficient bone structure. This can lead to hemorrhage (a burst blood vessel), a severe infection, and also maternal death. During a pregnancy the mother can also suffer from Eclampsia, a condition when there are random sudden jerks of any limb the body that is caused by high blood pressure. Often times a coma can follow this and would very well endanger the mother and child.

Younger married girls are also being less immune to sexual transmitted diseases, such as HIV and AIDS. This is due to the fact that since most young girls are married to men older than them, there is a bigger chance the men have had more partners so then the disease would be spread to the girl.

Health risk is also not always the problem. Young girls married under fourteen can also experience other problems, such as no freedom, abuse, little education or no learning experience at all. There are also things like small social life and unable to get a job with a daily pay.

 Reading about all these disease’s and lifestyle’s these young women are given is so irritating! Here's what I think: the people that abuse them, they need to have these girls in good condition or they're going to become sick. If they are forced into a marriage and to have a child...how are the women going to have a kid when half the time there is a huge chance they could end up dyeing from pregnancy at such a young age? These girls are forced to keep the family generation going, but how is this going to happen when they have a large chance of a stillborn child and maternal death? The need better lifestyles if they are to keep families going. The thing that annoy's me the most is that these families sometimes don't even care about the child. They don't understand the though process he/she is going through, and experiences that will come in the future with this "relationship" I just hope that one day these parents will come to see the light and become more understanding around their children.

Forced Marriage: What's so Great About it?

A picture showing an early traditional marriage

Alright so looking back on my previous blog post, I talked about forced marriages and my included some on my opinions in there. I looked at a video from a perspective of a young girl; it was about her story on slavery. But what about other perspective's? I think there may be forced marriages that are actually non-abusive and decent. 

What Type of Slavery is There Out in the World?

This image shows some of the many treatments of that can possibly
come with the forced marriage.

So the other day I learned about slavery in my class and that really got me thinking. What if that was me? I looked more into the subject and found out that slavery still goes on, even to this day. This shocked me, considering the fact of how gruesome some of the treatments that these victims receive.

One of the types of slavery that caught my attention the most is {forced and early marriage.} The idea and practice is so ridiculous, it makes me wonder. Who would have such a mind? To think of a system where someone has his or her personal rights taken away? Especially a child! And to force them to marry somebody they do not love, they do not cherish, and somebody that could even very well possibly abuse them. This takes away all happiness in life and life is supposed to be celebrated, not tolerated. It's as if their lives are just taken away and they cannot do anything about it. Take a look at this {video}, a courageous young girl no more than 10 or 11 years old was threatened, by her own parents, to be sold to some far much older man then her. Twice her own parents threatened her that they would kill her if she would try to run away. She says that she will kill herself if she is sold. This is quite saddening, yet she speaks the truth for many other children like her. This is not normal, for children to take their own life. This takes away all purity in childhood. A child should worry about whether or not they will get the toy they want for Christmas instead of stressing about being sold or committing suicide. 

 Now to finish on that part of the topic, there is another reason forced marriage is practiced. Forced marriage can come from culture and tradition. Some places, such as India, marry off their children in an arranged marriage. Sometimes the child could have never even met their soon-to-be spouse! Whether it is arranged or forced, the practice is still wrong...or at least I think so. Often times the victim is usually a young girl. When she is wed she is considered as 'property' for her spouse, therefore leaving him to do anything he desires. On the other hand this all can lead to intense abuse, rape, and even murder.  There are so many treatments that these females endure can go from {acid throwing} to denial of food and to lack of {education}. No matter the abuse, they are forced to stay with these men. If they try to run away they are stamped as "bad women." 
The thing that bothers me the most is that I know that after these men abuse their wives, they will walk away happy. Just give yourself a moment to think about it. How would you feel if this happened to you?  These women are robbed, cheated, lied to, sold, and abused. Whatever the case is, this happens all around the world and in often times in exchange for money, tradition, or just lack of interest in his or her own child. To deprive these human beings of their own freedom is disgraceful. They have thoughts and feelings. They have human body parts. What sets them so different from everyone else that led to crime of these people? What makes these people entitled to do such things? They are just like everyone else.

I don't think that I will ever understand the treatment of these young victims. It is an awful thing to do and no matter where it happens, no matter if it is forced or part of a tradition, it will always be an very unfortunate event.