This past week in class we were talking about marriage and the diversity that has started to come along with it. Some classmates had explained that within their communities and friend's families, same race and ethnicity was important with marriage, whereas in a community that I grew up in there was not a lot of diversity and it made no difference who was dating who. I found it rather interesting how complicated marriage has became within our society and I wonder if it matters to marry for love anymore.
In the article, “American's Have a Different Attitude” it has showed that many of the families want their daughters to marry within the same ethnicity, and that they allow the men to go around choose whoever they want. The parents wanted to make sure that the girls upheld the name. To me I believed that it should be the girl's decision about who she chooses to marry. Who says that this arranged marriage is going to work out and that it is truly what's best for the family? No one can see into the future and I firmly believe that it should be the choice of the girl. Some girls had commented on the fact that their parent's voices were in the back of their head, and that they were afraid the parents would stop communication with them. I feel very bad for people in that situation, they want to be happy, but they are giving up their happiness for their parents. I know from personal experience that my old roomate was told to take her career as far as possible, but she went on to tell me that when her parents had found her a husband she was to get married and become a stay at home mom, and she could never tell her parents that she was dating someone. I felt so bad that she wasn't able to do what she wanted in life, and that she had to put all her wants and needs aside just to make them happy.
On the other hand, there are some people that choose to marry within their ethnicity and believe that the real women are those who are from their same ehtnicity. For example in the article, “Yellow Fever,” the author talks about how some of her boyfriends or even the white men that were at first interested in her, dumped her to find a girl who was more Japenese. Many men wanted a geisha to take care of them and one who was adventourous, and many felt that American women were too independent. My first thought was, what is this the 1910's? Women no longer are stay at home wives, however there are still some women who believe that that is how they can move up in the world, by being what men want. The article goes on to say that these ideal women do what men want and that many of them are middle age white men. It makes me uncomfortable knowning that there are men still out there that want women to only take care of them.
A last topic that I believe was really interesing involving marriage is the Exchange Hypothesis, and this stated that people are willing to give up racial status for economic status. I feel like this is a big contradiction from everything that I had just talk about, dealing with people who want to marry someone from their own race and ehtnicity. Some people in the class found it hard that there are people out there who marry just for money, or to move up in the social ladder. I can't get the thought out of my mind that no one wants to be just happy and in love anymore, and that all that has become important is power and fame. Whatever happened to working as hard as you can and at the end of the day you should just be happy with your life? I feel that we should reevalute the important of things and life and see that love and happiness comes first, then success and money comes later.
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