Child Brides?

Question

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/africa/article3948867.ece

http://marriage.about.com/od/arrangedmarriages/a/childbride.htm

Should something be done about this? In the US and UK...no one would even consider marry a child off at 10. Where is the line? when should the developed countries stay out b/c it's there business/culture...and when should we step in b/c of human rights?

Answer 1

I cant even look at the links , the whole title CHILD BRIDES makes me sick.

Answer 2

I find the whole "tradition" very bleak for the girls in question. It makes me terribly said that young men and women in impoverished countries aren't given that childhood they so rightfully deserve.The thing that I was particularly incensed about was this “We marry the girls so young to ensure they are virgins. If she was older we wouldn't marry her - someone might have raped her.” As if she would be a lesser human being because some criminal raped her. That makes me sick to my stomach. I understand most Africans live in squalor and maybe I'm not looking at the situation objectively enough but you would think if they had such a problem with girls being raped and subsequently no man wanting to marry them then you'd think they'd actually do something to try to prevent the rapes. Instead they pervert the innocence of childhood.

I don't think there is a lot we can do except educate people as best as we can. Education is the best combatant to ignorance.

Answer 3

Oh, the world has already clearly defined where the "line" is for a female to marry.  Fourteen years old is the World Health Organization's "line" primarily due to childbirth related morbidity and mortality rates among women especially in poorer nations who are under fourteen years old.  M&M really skyrockets for females at 14 and under.  ANY deviation from that "line" is a crime and violation of human rights.  Pity that 14 year olds can't vote. If boys should have the right to vote if they have the duty of the military draft, then girls should have the right to vote as soon as they are married.

Answer 4

If we do not think they are responsible, educated and mentally developed to vote, why do we think they should be able to begin to build a life long relationship?

In the U.S. I believe the age should be 18 and no parental consent can be given before that.

However I do think we (as a single nation) should leave this up to other countries.  We are not the world police.  The belief that we are has gotten us in the mess we are in now.  I do think it is a quite outrageous, but it is not our place.  However, if the UN believes something needs to be done, I would back it 100%.

Answer 5

As a mother of a beautiful 6 yo daughter, this subject makes me sick to my stomach. And I would personally murder anyone who might suggest that she could be in this situation. Now, also as a mother and as an American woman, I am so sick and tired of war. Let's let these cultures fight their own battles for a change. Let's bring our boys and girls home, where they belong.

Answer 6

Regrettably, it is not true that in the US "no one" would consider this.  We have sociopaths like Warren Jeffs and his brethren who hide behind a "religion" to justify their "spiritual marriages" to children.  

A proven source of poverty and it's related ills is the lack of education for women.  It is tragic any girl has to "marry" and reproduce before she is ready.

Should "something" be done about this?  That is not an easy question.  Should something be done about female circumcision or honor killings or any of the other global oppressions women suffer the world wide?

Well, yeah...but what?  We're not in the position to enforce our morality on other nations.  I'm aware we try.  We need to start sending teachers, not missionaries, to every place we can send them.  A secular revolution of knowledge...this is how to earn money, save money, use it wisely...this is birth control, reproductive choice, this is why to use it....

But, until we can do it HERE, I'm not sure we can do it somewhere else.  

Historically the US/UK and their allies (I hate to say this) DO NOT step in due to human rights violations.  We step in for money and military supremacy.  

Maybe we're looking at the wrong organizations.  Maybe it's not all the patriarchal places who can help.  Maybe we need an international coalition of women.  

Well...it was a nice fantasy there for a moment.

Answer 7

the line is at the borders of this nation.

it is a different culture

you like your hamburgers? thats a sin in india

in the far east, they eat fido the dog for lunch. would you?

look at your local mall and see the way the women are dressed. they would be stoned to death in some arab nations.

its different than our society, but whos to say they are wrong?

we are wrong in their eyes.

i dont agree with it. i have 2 small daughters. but its their house, not mine.

its been going on since the dawn of time. you look at them from your perspective,and they look at you from theirs.

and both parties say "youre wrong"

its just different

Answer 8

i kind of have to take "russel h"s stance on this too.

our culture has no place positioning our morals and ethics over theirs, basically i think where we should draw the line is exactly where the borders do. their country their decisions. same with us... i think we should step in only when a country decides to start reaching past their borders into someone elses place.

but even if this were the case, there are still problems with it. our country can currently prosecute one of our citizens for comitting a crime in another country... i dont mean it was a crime where they physically were, but something that would have been a crime if they were home in the states...

example i heard about 5 years ago . an american businessman goes to amsterdam and has s*x with a sixteen year old (its legal there) but then american authorities get word of it, and arrest him when he gets back...

thats soooo messed up. i mean whatever happened to "when in rome"? technically we should not have had any jurisdiction. i'm all for tracking down someone who commits a crime in one country and then flees to another to escape... but the prosecuting country should only ever be the one where the "crime" was committed.

basically i dont care for the difficulty it takes for people to immigrate to and from countries. imagine for a moment that moving from one nation into another legally was as simple as crossing the border and finding work... boom youre a citizen!

ok, so some country has a lower legal age than the u.s.... well thats their choice. obviously we dont agree or that would be our legal age....

but wouldnt it free up our legal system if our countries pedofiles could just move there instead of being over here with us? and vice versa, the women and kids who wanted away from their country could get asylum here.

i basically look at it this way, we can move into a coutry, we can move out of a country... say some racist only likes white people.... well if all of them decided to move to the same place... then they wouldnt have to deal with anyone else... and we wouldnt have to deal with them either. they could just sit happy in their isolation, and no one would put that country on their vacation list.

it would never work realisticly, but its a nice idea... its like parenting rules of "not while your under my roof" applied to foreign policy.

human rights are a wonderful marvelous idea... and it would be great if we could save the world from everything we think is wrong, but in the end... right and wrong are about as solid as the thoughts that perceive them... we cant all even agree in our own towns cities and states... how can we tell other countries what their morals should be?

Answer 9

the title make sick to my guts what happen to the old way of getting married when you are in love

Answer 10

Yes, something should be done about this. How do we reach and change the ideologies of isolated cultures? Education.

It has many forms and will eventually reach the most remote areas but it is a slow process and so many will suffer and think it is the "right thing" to do.

Speak up, speak out, and educate.

Answer 11

I don't know what's more depressing - the child brides or the reason they're child brides...

“We marry the girls so young to ensure they are virgins. If she was older we wouldn't marry her - someone might have raped her."

I personally think the UN had an obligation after the 1948 declaration of human rights - an obligation that it has failed to meet.  We can't keep going on letting people live in conditions that wouldn't have been acceptable in the west even 150 years ago, but the Un and Nato do so little about it.  I can only hope the spread of the internet will cause human rights movements to spring up naturally - but I don't have much hope :-(