While forced marriage is not an entirely invisible problem, it is largely under-reported, and while most victims of the practice are female, male victims are often treated with suspicion and disbelief. One of the chief reasons men are forced into marriage is that their family have discovered, or suspect, that they are gay or bisexual. This violation of basic human rights and freedoms serves as yet another example how the most powerful members of society seek to control the affections of the most vulnerable members in order to achieve their own aim.
The problem has gained particular attention in the Middle Eastern, Indian, Eastern European, and African communities of the United Kingdom, which introduced forced marriage protection orders in 2008. Victims’ families often subscribe to fundamentalist Muslim beliefs. According to Amelia Hill and Karen McVeigh of The Guardian, “The Albert Kennedy Trust, a charity for homeless lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual young people, recently reported a rise in the number of young gay Muslims contacting it for help.” In addition, Britain’s Forced Marriage Unit (FMU), a joint Home Office/Foreign Office agency, reported that 14% of forced marriage cases involved men, but they believe the figure could be as high as one in five. Although the majority of victims range in age from 15 to 25, one case the FMU received involved a 62 year-old whose family tried to marry him to a 35 year-old woman because they did not want to care for him any longer. Another case involved a man from Leicester whose family locked him inside his room because he was gay and went downstairs to discuss whether to kill him, abandon him in India, or marry him off. In yet another case, a young man was flown to Pakistan by his family, where they had arranged a marriage for him. When he refused, they locked him in his room, where his father came and beat him daily, breaking his legs and abusing him sexually.
One might wonder what fuels such desperate (and hypocritical) measures among families who seek to rid themselves of their brothers and sons in such a way. Reputation is a pre-eminent concern for these families, who view these young men as burdensome, deviant, or in some other way eccentric or abnormal. As Hill and McVeigh report, forced marriage “can . . . be a result of family commitments to relatives abroad or their own expectations, securing visas or an attempt to control their son’s [behavior] or protect a family’s reputation”. Of course, such examples of holy matrimony and wedding nuptials have nothing to do with love—nor even alliance-building between families—but merely serves as a means of discarding unwanted or despised family members, or of shoehorning them into traditional roles in order to save face. Ultimately, it is the opinion of other family members and members of society that prevail, not interest in the well-being, or even the life, of the family members themselves. It is an ancient social structure which has proved difficult for Britons to challenge and dismantle even on their own soil, especially given the covertness of male forced marriage.
Male victims of forced marriage are often an invisible minority. Only adding to the challenge of prejudice and entrenched social structures is the fact that men have more difficulty than women in getting help, as Jeremy Browne, Foreign Office minister for consular policy, points out. “Professionals and communities can be very intolerant towards men being forced into marriage, even if they have learnt to be sympathetic to women in the same situation,” notes FMU’s spokesperson. “It can be hard to persuade people to believe it even happens.” Despite the growing secularization of Europe, the largely religion-based problem persists in these very havens of freedom, thus it is imperative for communities to shed the preconception of men as invulnerable and take male victimization more seriously.
Although the practice of forced marriage can prove clandestine and shadowy enough to frustrate efforts at its elimination, with the FMU Britain has succeeded in setting up valuable resources for helping the women and men who become trapped in exploitative and often life-threatening circumstances. Perhaps other nations can follow suit by instituting government programs aimed at stemming the tide of forced marriages among vulnerable women and gay men.
Individuals in Britain who are being forced into a marriage can apply for a forced marriage protection order or contact their local authorities to obtain similar protection.
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I have sympathy for those in forced marriages. Both sets of my great grandparents were in arranged marriages and in one case in worked out (though my great grandfather died early) and in one case my great grandmother and great grandfather did not get along. They made the best of things. They took pride in their children. I believe there were originally 8, but in those days because of illnesses, they were left with 4. My great grandmother was a cleaning woman so my great grandfather could become a dentist, my great uncle an architect and my great aunts clothing designers. One also became a famous painter as well.
Being in a forced marriage when you are a Gay or Lesbian person and that is your culture must be a horrible thing. In this country it would be possible for you to leave your family, your culture benind and adopt a new identiy and live as what you truly are a Gay person – but that is also very difficult to abandon your family and possibly cause them shame. In countries which are Islamic and which operate under Sharia Law, it is a nearly impossible situation. I do not pretend to have the answer.
Years ago where I worked a young girl worked in my office. She was from Saudi (she worked as a file clerk). She was in the U.S. along with her dad, a chemical engineer, her sister and her mom (wife #2). Wife #1 was home tending the homestead back in Saudi Arabia. She told me a story about a girl in her village who secretly dated and became pregnant. When it was found out, the girl was stoned to death, and when they found out who the boyfriend was – they castrated him and burned him to death. I asked her, “Sure they made a mistake, but couldn’t they just have gotten married?” She replied “No, they broke God’s Law and must be punished.” I found this very scary. Not only because it was Sharia Law (which I expected) but because the young girl telling me the story was an intelligent young woman in high school who wanted to be pre-med. If this is the kind of compassion that Saudis raise their future physicians with, there really isn’t much hope for change of any kind there.
She then invited me to come and visit her country. I told her I would not be welcome because I am Jewish (Jews are not permitted in Saudi Arabia [unless the King Faisal Hospital has a need for a particular kind of surgeon and then he/she is]). I am not a physician. My mother is Jewish so by Jewish law I am Jewish, though I do not practice and was never Bar-Mitzvahed.
In essence this is a short-sighted country where the King drives around in a custom made gold (I kid you not) car while many of his subjects starve tp death. This is the country that is conswidered the most important to the Muslims because both Mecca and Medina are here and they go on Haj here – i.e., make their at least one in a lifetime pilgrimage to Mecca to see the kabba.
Women are veiled to the face with only their eyes showing because to show more skin publicly would be provocative. If this country sets the tone for the rest of the Muslim world, how can Muslims who are going to be forced into arranged marriages have any hope of breaking free?!
This is not a commentary on the Muslim religion in any way. I know many fine and kind and charitable Muslin people. There is a book written by the Muslim author Irshad Manji, called “a Letter to Islam” that is worth reading. Irshad (a wioman) is gay and lives in Canada with bullet proof windows because she is afraid of repercussions against her for what she has written – the truth. She also lives with her lover.
I think tolerance in any religion is the way to go. I think each religion must relax its stronghold about it’s members who are Gay. They are intelligent, vital members of any religious community ahd have much to share!