Comments on: On Saudi Marriages

By: jhossem

jhossem — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 03:37:02 +0000

mariage long temps

By: The Good news, the bad news, and the ugly news « Saudi Jeans

The Good news, the bad news, and the ugly news « Saudi Jeans — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 21:52:36 +0000

[...] Since no knot is being tied, I will consider this bad news, too: Asmaa has a nice post on the dilemma of young Saudis who want to get married. Well, she specifically talks about her cousin, but I think many of us can relate to what is happening with him. Probably most of you already know how I feel about the way people get married back home. [...]

By: Groomy « Saudi Jeans

Groomy « Saudi Jeans — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 12:34:38 +0000

[...] I don’t like going to weddings. But in every summer I get to go to more than my fair share of them. It’s just one part of [...]

By: The Dunce and the furious

The Dunce and the furious — Sat, 29 May 2010 20:32:42 +0000

*sigh* AmazonBaby, if only it was just our families preventing us from marrying Non-Saudi’s..

Even if the family agrees, there’s a whole bunch of obstacles set by the govt. and let’s not bring the kids’suffering into the picture..

relevant article:
http://arabnews.com/opinion/columns/article27106.ece

By: Amazonbaby

Amazonbaby — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 06:02:01 +0000

The real reason Saudi girls won’t marry non-Saudi men is prejudice and Saudi culture of marrying inside their family’s cultural financial/power level. Maybe, if the girl is from Hejaz and her parents are very liberal you might have a chance. But if you are from Nej, forget it. The number one reason is no one will marry your children because their blood isn’t pure Saudi (more important in Jej – because there are just so many families related down from the King’s family that only marry into each other’s families, again to keep the money inside the family’s lineage). And, marrying outside of your family means the money (dowry) moves leaves the family line. Also, it means that the Saudi passport can be given to non-Saudi’s, too. When you are dealing with a long line of traditional, tribal affiliations, marriage is arranged because it solves a lot of issues and continues business connections and consolidates power structures. The further away your family blood is from the royal bloodlines in history the easier it is to be able to marry outside of the strict ideas of what marriage is for. Love really had nothing to do with marriage for thousands of years. If yor arranged marriage happened to develop into love then you were one of the lucky ones. Men are more lucky because it is far easier for them to divorce or marry more than one woman at a time if they weren’t disappointed in the marriage. Divorce isn’t frowned upon where arranged marriage is the norm, or thought of as quite the failure as it is in the West because your partner was chosen for you based on different criteria regardless of what the two marriage partners were told. When you choose who you marry, after time spent getting to know each other, then divorce is thought of as a personal failure. That is how the arranged marriage method came into existence. It was used to connect tribes together and consolidate power politically and keep control of who has money and power in the country, Also, debts were paid by arranged marriage. Look at Afghanistan where women are used to pay back blood money debts when one family’s member kills a different, separate family’s member. The killer’s family will give some of their women, along with money and material goods to pay the blood money debt. So, Saudi girls, you are luckier than you know!

Fight hard to change your system or your culture will become more and more shallow as it becomes too easy to get married and throw people away if it doesn’t work out. Oil money’s wealth is changing your ancient culture’s meanings/reason for arranged marriages in the first place. It also explains why when a couple can’t produce heirs, the blame in the past always fell on the woman by the husband and his family, before medical information came and showed it was the man’s fault (low or bad sperm), not the women’s fault as in the past she would be divorced and everyone would feel sorry for her and no one would want to remarry her. Reputation and appearances are the most important issues in your culture and that is why so many secrets are kept when two families are in negotiations for their children to marry. Especially, the richer and more powerful the families are in the culture, as the marriage usually means the two families will consolidate their business and power in the future as more marriages will take place in the future. Remember, the best marriage for thousands of years has been the two first cousins on the grandfather’s side. Unfortunately, this has resulted in a small gene pool producing much birth defects like hemophelia, etc…
Just an American’s view on your culture.

By: heraish

heraish — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 03:03:10 +0000

The reason is that their parents usually wont give them permission if they happen to even consider it. Ill leave it at that.

By: Iqbal

Iqbal — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 20:41:37 +0000

Salam to all. I want to know that why saudi girls dont go for marry with Expatriates like Pakistani

By: Jazz

Jazz — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 16:09:29 +0000

I totally agree with you.. love takes time. Getting to know someone and finding out that the aren’t the right one early, is better to me, than finding out once you are already married that you can’t stand to be in the same room with the person you have married. lol

SO… I agreez!

By: Outsider

Outsider — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 21:32:17 +0000

There really is something wonderful about falling in love. I don’t know if you can get that in an arranged marriage. I think being in love helps you take the tough times together and be good parents. I also think it decreases the chance someone will cheat. I waited until I was 38 to marry. I love him and we will have 1 child. He has never been married before either. I really dated very little. I wish I would have found my husband when I was younger so I could have had more years with him when I was younger, but I am happier yet just to feel as close to him as I do. I think everyone has different emotional and intectual needs and they have to be true to themselves to be good to a spouse.

By: Flora

Flora — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 19:48:06 +0000

I do not like the tradional way either. Parents shouldn’t force the kids the marry who they dont want. And i think it won’t be sucessful.. I’m glad there r people like u thinking in that way. And i support it 100%. Everyone should marry for love not by arranging. Good luck!