Forced Marriages – A Shame on Some Sikhs
The issue of marriage is complex and has as many circumstances as there are combinations of people in the world. Recently, a langa(r)eader wrote:
Hi I as just wonderingif you are familiar at all with a sikh girl marrying a non sikh guy who is caucasian. Her parents banished her forever about 7 years ago and then finally contacted about 2 years ago but are still hung up on the fact. Just wondering what we can do to help them get over this faster. [received email]
Well I can’t make the parents ‘get over this faster’, but I can raise some observations and thoughts on marriage.
On the issue of interfaith or interracial marriages, I am pretty laissez-faire. I resent guys that believe they have ‘ownership’ of women from their community. Live and let live. Find who is best for you. The world is already complex enough. Find a partner that helps you grow emotionally, spiritually, physically, mentally, etc. I do believe that there are certain benefits of marrying another Sikh – especially in religious growth. However, each individual circumstance is different and your partner may help you grow in those other aspects. More power to you.
What I am completely against is so-called ‘forced marriages.’ The issue is hardly new, but a recent interview on BBC’s HARDtalk has recently brought the issue to prominence again in the UK. For those that are regular Langa(r)eaders, I have written about Jasvinder Sanghera before:
the founder of Karma Nirvana, “[an organization] with a view to create support project for women who experienced language & cultural barriers.” I have read Sanghera’s memoirs and although her particular story of her parents’ attempt to force her into a marriage and the consequences she experienced is more extreme than most cases, still it echoes the larger problems of “forced marriage” in our community and differences may only vary in degree.
Karma Nirvana, while focused on women, does offer support to men and even employs a man to head the men’s aid project, who himself was forced into a marriage.
Documenting her own story in her autobiography Shame, Jasvinder Sanghera has become a tireless advocate through her group Karma Nirvana to push for help against both men and women that are trapped in forced marriage situations.
The show’s host, at times, attempts to ask ‘hard’ questions that seemed really ridiculous. At times the old British v. Asian divide is exaggerated, as if many don’t have hybrid identities. Or the host’s line of questions that Sanghera’s work has the possibility of painting all South-Asian marriages in such a light. Although to be fair to the host, he may have just been following the logic of a common refrain by her detractors, still even if these are valid, it requires community self-reflection.
I always find it annoying when governments, some media groups, and institutions feign sensitivity to Sikhi or Islam, yet they support human rights violations and atrocities and often discrimination against Sikhs or Muslims. Also if Sikhs and Muslims claim they are offended by the wonderful work of brave individuals such as Jasvinder Sanghera, then I need to ask why we have such skewed standards when the brave seva of members of our own community is more offensive than the perpetrators of this violence.
As Sanghera mentions at the end of the conversation, I, too, hope that others groups in other lands – US, Canada, Punjab, India, and beyond – also take up the challenge to end the practice of ‘forced marriages.’
I pity the SIKH BOYS .
30 % of the girls their parents Kill before she is born.
20 % run away with some one else.
They wil have to be really innovative to find a life partners for themselves.
Any suggestions ?
why u guys making your own community down. you know langar hall website is now one of the most visible portal of community???? and when you generalize it , makes the worse
@Harinder, to add to your post:
- Too many Punjabi boys don’t know how to treat punjabi girls well.
Sincerely,
Punjabi Boy
I seek brides for our boys ;
Any constructive suggestion will be welcomed.
I don’t know why thelangarhall.com has decided to allow this article on this site.
What does this have to do with Sikhism? Other than give us a black eye, pretty soon the article will be picked up by those punjabi Sikh bashing gianis at Sikhnet, then
the nationalistic Indian candirus will get a taste of it and go places where we wouldn’t expect.
If a spouse can want a divorce for feeling betrayed by their significant other for doing things out of character then parents who feel betrayed by their kids have a right to react.
Doesn’t matter what part of the world the parents are from or what religion they believe, if any at all.
What’s really sad is that articles like this create a rift between Sikh sisters and their brothers, and it seems to be written by someone that doesn’t even know what it is to be a
Sikh in the first place.
Way to go thelangarhall.
I don’t understand why some readers are put off by this article in particular. Forced marriage is a pan-India syndrome. It speaks to the strength of our community to be able to put these issues on the table for discussion. We have discussed equally nefarious topics on this site that are concentrated problems of the Sikhs: female infanticide, foeticide, caste-ism, In some ways forced marriage seems small in comparison to the brides of NRIs waiting years and years for their husbands who they will never hear from, unless his parents come asking for more dowry.
The only way to strengthen our community is to discuss these issues and let voices be heard. If you’re looking for a more sugar-coated world, there are other sites to find it on.
You want to discuss indian issues no problem.
Discuss the over 12 million cases of A.I.D.S in india, and the affects that they have on all indians, particularly the innocent house wives. That doesn’t take into account the tip of the iceberg for all the venereal diseases that are being spread amongst the most wealthy of indians.
Discuss all the children under 8 years of age that are employed doing hard labour, and then the little girls that are raped by the rich and wealthy in india. Forced into a life of prostitution, and stigmatized for their natural life.
Discuss all the next generation of indian kids, who have an education, and no longer believe in the hocus pocus of the past. Do you think keeping them ignorant with stories of how the low caste serves the high will still work?
Compare that to this article..Where kids are suprising the
parents with the lifestyle they’ve picked up.
If amar is getting it on with barbie who cares?
If anamika is getting it on with ken who cares?
If they are all in a love rectangle who cares?
The person who needs a talk show probably cares.
Do you even think these people care about Sikhism, if
they’ve already bypassed their parents?
I did not make the claim that I am interested in discussing Indian problems. You wrote that you are angered by a discussion of a problem that would be ‘picked up’ by other groups to further blacken the eye of the Sikh community. I simply pointed out that the problem extends beyond ours and that it is important to note that we at least are talking about it.
I’m unclear on how you think that not agreeing to a forced marriage is first ‘bypassing’ one’s parents and secondly implicates a person to not care about Sikhism. A lot of parents would want their daughters to get rid of a baby if it is a girl. If the daughter disagrees, and ‘bypasses’ her parents, is she wrong? What is at stake in this situation in particular is that many individuals in our community believe that a Punjabi Sikh should marry a Punjabi Sikh (often of their parents’ choosing), and force their children to follow the belief. This is what is up for discussion. The article also points to the insensitivity of the western media when attempting to be ‘culturally appropriate.’ Perhaps you could carefully read the article and then comment on it rather than lambasting the author for attempting to discuss problem that is prevalent in the community.
Yes, it’s noted that you don’t want to discuss Indian problems in the same manner you want to sensationalize this issue, perhaps you cant bear the shame.
Neither you nor the author should be penning this problem on Sikhism. Parents, that are practicing feticide of female babies are not doing so with the blessing of Sikhism, in fact its specifically against Sikhism.
I’m sure you and the author realize that but only as a matter of inconvenience, as neither one of you pointed that out.
Sikhism points out that a Sikh should marry a Sikh. If you don’t want to marry a Sikh, then why keep calling this a Sikh issue? It’s a personal belief issue at that point between you and your family.
To date, I don’t know of anyone ever getting a ‘forced marriage’, I doubt too many others have either. Arranged marriage I’ve heard of, but that is a far cry from ‘forced marriage’.
Now sati, ‘forced wife burning’ I’ve heard of being practiced especially amongst upper caste hindus, the wife would be burned to death when the husband died.
That was the Real Shame.
Of course Sikhism was at the forefront to extinguish that practice because it harmed innocent women.
Sahnewal,
There is nothing wrong with letting your voices being heard. There is something wrong with telling your neighbors about your house hold issues through such a media, if they are even issues.
I would recommend reading “Things Fall Apart”, very good reading for this topic, I would just like to leave by saying your mine and no ones cultural beliefs are the ultimate truth they are all equal in there own way. Because one disconnects and does not want to be part of their mother culture does not make their mother culture wrong, it just makes it wrong for them. The author states “Live and let live”, which is a statement of individualism, which gives a sense that this person has adapted to Western culture and left their mother culture with does not practice individualism but rather holds strong ground on family values and a family oriented life style. When you get a broken arrow the whole family is effected not just one individual.
thank you
Sikhs are experencing some thing new and that is what is disturbing them.
In a ancient Punjabi society everything was so well structured the jatts married jatts , ravidass married ravidass ,khatris married Khatris , Arora married aroras and Ramgarhia married Ramgarhia etc etc and life went on with out much hue and cry.
Now suddenly Sikhs began to encounter people which they had never seen before in their history like the whites ,africans.
In olden times their would have come as invaders and girls taken as booty by the winner of wars and changed our genetic make up.
Now times have changed and some ( ? many )of whites and africans have such desirable qualities like the whites innate brillance in science and technology and the africans physical traits would make some ( ? many ) of Sikhs girls attracted to them .
You cant deny merit if someone is good then he is naturally a source of attraction what ever the religion may say.
Also since our Gurujis preached the Universality of mankind the girls are further justified in their attraction.
Sikhs will so keep on evolving by this mechanism of genetic exchange and for the spriitual minded this is will of “WAHEGURU” as he is the Karta purakh.
This is not the end or road for the Sikhs .
Be prepared to meet some more exotic aliens from the many unvierses and dimensions ( 12 as per “M” theory” we live in to sprout out and offer our males further Biological challenges.
May Wahe Guru be ank dang sahi to our Khalsa to rise up to all challenges they will face in future.
Often parents undergo social pressure when daughters are not married by an age that is the social norm. Many parents consider marrying daughters a parental obligation in a traditional sense. Sometimes it leads to unwise actions like forced marriages. Some of these marriages end up in disasters for the girls’ family (check the holiday bride problem). It is totally unfair for the girl, who is trapped between keeping parents happy and being happy herself.
The other situation where the girl has found someone, and parents want to force her into marriage – sounds more like a personal problem of the parents with that guy! Meanwhile the boy in the arranged marriage finds himself in a mess.
Harinder- it’s comical and illustrative of how little voice women in our community have that you “pity the Sikh boys.” In most cases of abusive relationships, it’s the women who are abused. Both men and women may be unhappy in unwanted marriages, but women don’t tend to physically abuse their spouses as a result. Unfortunately, most public discussions that take place in our community do so in your male-centric framework rather than one that is gender neutral or inclusive of all genders.
Tajinder-
(emphasis added)
Who one marries is a personal issue if the potential spouses have a choice in the matter. If they choose their spouse according to a sense of duty to their family, community, cultural beliefs, that’s totally respectable and laudable, as long as they actually had a choice in the matter.
But if or when people are forced into relationships that are abusive, and if this occurs systematically, then this becomes an issue for the entire community. I’m all for traditionalism except where traditions lead to abuse. Where traditions create risks of danger or harm members of the community, the value of the tradition is less than the value of the health and lives of large #s of people who are harmed, in my opinion.
It’s an issue for the Sikh community, as Sikhs, because Sikhi demands that women and men live as equals. If we aren’t doing this, then we’re not living up to our Gurus’ teachings.
The problem doesn’t cease to exist just because you refuse to see it.
Harinder,
It’s not that whites, blacks, or the moghuls have/had good S.A.T scores. Punjabis have no less physical prowess, intelligence, beauty, or ego.
If Punjabis could be represented by the dirt in a glass of water in regards to their purity, we would all be drinking mud.
In fact a Punjabi being racist should be unheard of, unfortunately its not because somehow a Punjabi will associate him/her self with some far off germanic tribe, but skin color and tone should always tell them the equation is incomplete unless they include their darker ancestors as well.
As we know Sikhism is not just for punjabi people, it is for those who desire to follow the Guru (10 Guru’s and Siri Guru Granth Sahib Ji).
What will be horrible is that as the rest of the World and Universe starts to embrace Sikhism and call it their own, Punjabis will be considered the most ignorant people everywhere in the cosmos because they actually started out with this Faith and still decided to get lost.
Hopefully with the Guru’s Blessing even if that happens we will serve as the rustic example of what not to do.
that you “pity the Sikh boys____Unfortunately, most public discussions that take place in our community do so in your male-centric .” (Reema reply) :-
I am being inclusive by agreeing with the girls who decides to marry out side the community.As for marriages all Sikhs dont have violence in their married life. As for violence against the females is concerned then it is some thing biolgical.You want woman to thrash men to prove woman are equal. I dont think it happens in any society including the matriachal ones.
——————————————————————
Reply to
Punjabis will be considered the most ignorant people9by sham article) :—
Early christian are not leading the christianity today .
The baton at some point gets passed on; as it has passed onto the africans.
Though if u ask my personel choice I would like people of Punjab to be the torch bearers with out sounding racist.
It is a kind of “Mitti Punjab the” bond.
But then Waheguru does not consult me in his scheme of things of life.
Thanks Reema,
This is an oddly male-centric discussion, and let’s face it, it’s women in the Sikh community who almost always face abuse. And just to say, this is a Sikh discussion group, and supposedly progressive at that, so where else are these matters going to be discussed and brought into the open? I’m always deeply offended by the defense that raising such questions brings shame on the community. Shame on those who say it, because they’re using their trumped-up indignation to defend families who would abort girl fetuses, condone forced marriages, and turn a blind eye to domestic violence.
I’ve watched, over several decades, the impact of forced marriages in my own family, on the girls and boys who were made to marry, and also on the children of those marriages, and it has been heartbreaking. Marriage is not an easy endeavor, especially in this modern and globalized world, and Sikhs face the additional hurdle of often being a minority within a minority, but this should not prevent us from speaking about these questions openly. It’s about time we stopped crying “Shame!” and faced the very real problems and challenges in the community.
Ranbir you can make yourself the prime voice of women on this discussion, but unless you look at Sikh History, you cannot call yourself the prime voice of Sikh women.
You and Jodha seem to be purposely attacking Sikhism out of sheer ignorance, or
without any care to the damage you needlessly inflict to a Faith that has instructed
women to rise.
What rules or laws in Sikhism are you referring to that allow for the mistreatment of women?
Hindus particularly Brahmins immediately called for the killing of a widow, Sikhism not only forbid that, but suggested that a widow could be remarried as well.
http://sikhiwiki.com/index.php/Sikh_Gurus_and_women
Some forms of Islam have women to cover their faces as a part of their belief system, Sikhism expressly tells women you are not to cover your face or hide it for any reason related to religion. Were you or Jodha aware of that?
http://www.sikhism101.com/node/273
Sikh women fought in battles, as they were encouraged with men to take Amrit.
Sikh women called into question the behavior of their own husbands (40 Mukhtias) and would not take them back when they abandoned Guru Gobind Singh Ji. The men realizing their mistake went back giving up their lives, and asked the Guru to forgive their mistake, which the Guru did.
In the late 1740’s-1753, Sikh women were given the choice in Mir Maanu’s prison, convert to Islam and your children will be spared, or watch the children being butchered for not converting. The Sikh women chose to watch the children being butchered, so they could watch them die as Free Sikhs. Their incredible sacrifice is still remembered.
http://www.allaboutsikhs.com/sikh-martyrs/khalsa-women.html
Sikhism is the Faith women turned to as they survived life.
Trying to understand the violence sikh woman face from a past persepective :-
Khalsa, the saviors of the innocent
Abdali returned from Delhi in March 1761 with lots of gold and more than 2,000 beautiful, young girls as prisoners. The Sikhs decided to save these innocent girls. Jassa Singh formulated a strategy. When Abdali was crossing the river Beas, the Sikhs swiftly fell upon them. They freed the women prisoners and escorted them back to their homes. The people felt that the Sikhs deserved to be the rulers of the Punjab. They alone could protect the people and their honor from the invaders.
http://www.searchsikhism.com/ahluwalia.html
Can we also interpret it as that sikhs have always guarded there woman folks.
Harinder Ji;
Your post was very nice and informative, thanks for sharing! It raised a question in my mind.
Nowadays do the majority of sikh women turn to sikh men as easily?
Or have the poorer habits of Punjabiism overrode it all via abuse of alcolhol, drugs, women?
Very few Punjabis stand up for women today as your post highlights. I wonder how we got here, and when so many approaches to help, especially a sikh female by a sikh gentleman, in any form, its met with suspicion. This often shows a change in perception. Where did it come from?
How did so many of the protectors of women give into treating them like objects, to be bought, used, abused, aborted and traded like baseball cards?
What do Sikh men do today for the plight of women? I ask with the thought that while it’s important to know our past, we are not making a future, by taking action today. So much around Sikh belief is turning into keyboard/weekend warriorism.
It’s easy to say, hard to do, Guru Nanak may have had a point when he said “Truth is high.. higher still is truthful living.”
Justasikh,
If someone could actually list down some examples of whats taking place instead of creating a rift between all Sikh men, Sikh women and society.
You called other people keyboard weekend warriors.
However you or the writers of this article have not provided any specific incidents.
Was there any research done for this article? This should not be a he said/ she said article.
This article and your post comes across as gossip, ineundo, and propaganda. Learn to matter.
“This is an oddly male-centric discussion, and let’s face it, it’s women in the Sikh community who almost always face abuse. And just to say, this is a Sikh discussion group, and supposedly progressive at that, so where else are these matters going to be discussed and brought into the open?”
Thanks, Ranbir, for trying to focus the discussion on this thread. In general, readers get caught up on the title of posts and fail to understand the concept of the content. Yes, Sikhs are culpable of inequality and yes, it does go against what our Gurus attempted to teach us. However, we need to accept the reality of our community. People in the community (like commenters on this thread) become distracted from the real issue and focus on defending Sikhi against blame. The only real defense is for us to take action and stop these things from happening. Unfortunately, useful conversations always seem to get distracted from the real issues…
This is all very interesting.
I live in the UK and I am christian and np.
I work/live in a multi-cultural area and meet many folks with turbans, having recently moved from Scotland, where there were none.
Is there still a problem in the UK with arranged marriages?
There is much help available here for women who are abused and all they need do is ask, not the police, but any ss department.
I know from my own experience it does take a little time (2-3 months) of actual hell and form filling (another hell) but there is a light and you will get there.
I dont know what kind of freedom sikh woman are asking from sikh men.
Violence against woman till 80′s was heard and well known amongst sikhs especailly over dowry which lead to a tragic bride burning cases.
This all has stopped since 1990 due to several reasons Iisted below.
Since 1990′s sikhs girls have had advantage over there men due to following reasons
1) Sikh girls got equal education and became financally independent and self confident.
2) The skewed sex ratio went in their favour due to scarcity of girls.
3) As sikhs emigrated into sexually permissive societies lot of taboos became redundant.
The only remaining freedom that sikh woman can today ask for is
1) Sexual freedom
2) Freedom to smoke and drink
3) Freedom to not bother about family which includes children and parents.
All this would negate the core values of SIKHISM and marriage as a institution.
So I see this article more as a propoganda to incite woman to revolt.
The question is against whom ?
??SELF.
Harinder,
You and others in the comments have spoken that this article– which seems rather a straightforward piece about the prevalence in some limited way of forced marriage for some individuals in the Sikh community — is somehow causing a rift between men and women and an incitement to a women’s revolution? Could you please explain how exactly this is going to happen and where in the article the incitement to revolution is to be found?
It sounds as if you’re saying that any woman who complains of unfair treatment or abuse should be silenced because she is inciting revolution. Is that your argument here? I thought Sikhs were bound to speak up in the face of injustice, not muzzle the oppressed.
And oh yes, “2) The skewed sex ratio went in their favour due to scarcity of girls.” Excuse me??? You say this is a reason women have “the advantage over men” — because they are ABORTED at a disproportionate rate!??? What planet do you live on?
I will tell u that no statistcs are quoted to support the claim that this issue is a major problem confronting SIKHS.
My personel opinion is that “SIKH GIRLS” are doing what ever they feel like these days much to the helplessnes of sikh men.
That scarcity creates demand is a well known fact by all so the skewed sex ratio goes in favour of Sikh girls in latter life is easy to understand .
Having said that I do abhor this practise of “female infaticide” amongst the cowards in our our community and I hope we are able to overcome this problem as soon as possible.
Harinder,
How about no one thrashes anyone?! That, dear sir, is what I had in mind.
Your perversity makes my head spin.
Reema,
Once again, you did no relevant research, your examples are about other women in other communities being abused by men whose religion you cannot affirm but they are not Sikh males.
But some how Sikh men are grouped in with that group, of course Sikh men should be used to this by now.
Since it happens to Sikh men when we are grouped in as muslims and hindus in the rest of society, at airports, restaurants, work, why not from the likes of you.
I guess a few of you females at thelangarhall.com figured you could lay this at the door step of Sikh men in any kind of way.
Sikh men can’t take this one though, because you are pitting us against Sikh women.
And you accused Harinder of perversity because he doesnt want Sikh women to fight with Sikh men?????
Like I said, I do not believe these articles are being written by Sikh women, these articles are written by punjabi women, who are more than willing to cut themselves off from Sikhism in more ways than one, but it seems thats not enough, they want to cut up all of Sikhism.
Hey Sham – learn to read: I said no one should fight anyone. Let’s just all get along, ok?
You don’t like the fact that we talk about issues you don’t think exist. We have personal experiences confirming that these issues do exist.
Don’t start saying that we’re out to euthanize all the elderly and make death panels now, ok? Thanks.
You’re not comfortable with changing the status quo of silence. Sorry. Get over it.
Reema,
Read what you wrote about Harinder, you said he was perverse for writing “You want woman to thrash men to prove woman are equal.”
Abuse of women does exist, however you have no stories of abuse of Sikh women by Sikh men highlighted in your article, nor does Jodha.
However, if you know of personal situations where it has happened, then discreetly state what happened, highlight what needs to take place so Sikhs can act in preventing this.
While this is happening to Sikh women, ironically, it will be Sikh women that will still need to remember to protect the image of Sikh men. The person who should not be getting lynched in the media or by anyone else are their innocent Sikh brothers, uncles, and father.
Just as Sikh men should realize that protecting Sikh women at all times should be our top priority in our hearts, mind, and soul.
here is an example that jodha highlighted – in fact a whole book – but i assume in not reading the article, you probably missed it.
No one needs to discreetly do anything. Many silently suffer. Make noise! Jasvinder Sanghera is doing that! The Langarhall is doing that! Hope all continue.
Mewa, unlike what you may have assumed I did read the full article and followed up to the links.
And I looked up the book, and read what others thought of Jasvinder Sanghera’s plight.
Here’s an excerpt on Amazon by one reviewer who seems to give a female perspective after reading Jasvinder Sanghera’s autobiography book….
Heer Kaur Heer (22, March, 2007) writes:
The poor guy who rescued her, Jassey, couldnt have done more for her. He was a blessing for her, its just a shame she didnt appriciate that and had affair after affair! That would have made me ashamed of her if she was my sister, and i too would have cut all ties.
I was really dissapoined with this book and felt almost ashamed to be asian, after the way she described us all.
@sham article – relax and listen. Victims of abuse speak in whispers – if at all. How does it matter even if Sikh men are wrongly accused, if it improves awareness and saves lives ? There always will be rotten apples in communities.
Let me give you a personal example:
I have a cousin(maternal aunt’s son) whose grandfather lives in a village in Punjab. The grandfather is widowed and wears a kirpan from the outside. At dusk he takes the kirpan off, hangs it on a hook, and opens his bottle of whisky. In the morning he wears his kirpan back again. This is only half the story. The old man has girlfriends, and my cousin was saying that he is embarrassed and shocked by their behavior and can’t stay in the room when they are there. He thought he knew more about such things.
For every such case there are countless others that serve as good role models. But it’s the outliers that stand out.
It’s also not about the community being “male centric”, it’s all about society becoming “self”-centric. We are worried mostly about ourselves. Increasingly people want best of all materialistic worlds, enjoy every “short cut”, but don’t want to pay the price/sacrifice/hard work necessary. For example, There is rampant corruption in the State govt. of Punjab, and corruption is a way of life. Is there any indignation from the beneficiaries/families of these activities ? It is accepted, and even rationalized!!. The human mind has a wonderful ability to believe whatever it “wants to believe”. It is possible for a murderer, rapist, abuser to rationalize his/her actions and vigorously justify and believe them.
Similarly there are so many clever people who use false indignation to achieve their own materialistic objectives. For example, we know so many people died fighting for Khalistan , but so many others who filed political asylum papers (“New Immigration Category Open”), but had nothing to do with the movement. There was a gujarati fellow in California who got his papers like that.
Despite ALL this, the only thing that really matters is the VICTIM. We as a community should be willing to pay any price, face any insult, accusation, whatever for them. The rest are capable of taking care of themselves….
Reema your minor stories make my head spin.
Issues which really confront our community as per me are :-
1) Female infanticide
2) Drug addiciton
3) Increasing Patitness
4) Deerwad
5) Blatant casteism
Harinder;
I’m afraid all of the 5 things you’ve listed are driven, amplified, spread, and fed by men more than women. Before writing that off as a blatant generalization, examine where so many opinions come from that men may think women “blindly” follow.
Where do those pressures or incentives to be a certain way come from?
I don’t meet many guys who are willing and open to take a look at themselves, and when there might be, I’m not sure if there’s enough gals willing to do the same. This is a problem affecting the entire planet, not just one immigrant group.
Love is being cheapened, devalued, defiled so we all start looking elsewhere.
@Harinder, Saw your top 5 list. Never heard of deerwad (a new strain of lyme disease ?). How come you missed pervertwad after deerwad?
I agree that if the sex ratio is not fixed, punjabi boys will be going to Guatemala jungles on research assignments. We might even run into Brother Sham Article over there too.
Rajinder,
I’ll tell anyone going to gautemala to search for your indian family there since you seem to be the one directing people in that direction, perhaps your dad set up base there, which probably means you don’t need to be single to be looking.
You stated at the top “what does it matter if Sikh men are wrongly accused”.
Thats usually the approach an indian takes, but I dont know of any Sikh woman that would want that to happen to Sikh men.
In terms of perversion, even you Rajinder should realize that perversion has its limits, nonetheless it must be diffuicult for you to accept rejection.
JustaSikh,
I did not read anywhere in Harinder’s post where the blame was placed squarely upon Sikh women for any of those 5 issues.
Harinder just stated the opinion that these are the 5 biggest issues affecting the Sikh community.
Casteism doesnt affect the rest of the world like it does indians in general.
Female infanticide seems to be related to the whole dowry system, the type of dowry system in india is unique to the subcontinent and that women have generally been thought of as lesser human beings in hinduism.
Increasing Patitism is primarily an issue that Sikhs are facing, with the men and women. It could even be argued that Sikh women are geared towards being patit, when its figured out who they are going to marry then are to adjust.
Love is not being cheapened, there is never a cost for it, if there was, none of us could pay it.
Reema,
You stated, “The problem doesn’t cease to exist just because you refuse to see it.”
I do not believe anyone on this form after reading the posts including my self, believes this problem does not exist. The problem with this blog is how the Sikh men are being targeted and summed up as abusers, from a Punjabi women’s view point not so much a Sikh women’s view point all being done without proper supporting data. Sure the issues exists, it exists no more then it does in the non-Sikh communities. What we need to concentrate our energy and time especially people at langarhall.com because you are the younger more aggressive and educated generation is what is the root cause of this abuse? Is is alcoholism, Punjabi media portal of women, what is it? We can not just summarize it as “Punjabi Culture”, there are elements with in this culture or any culture which have been adapted by the community over time which influence these out ward results of abuse. Men do not get up in the morning with the mentality of abusing someone there is always a trigger point, what is the point of these men who do abuse? Has anyone ever written a book or article, about them with their opinions? If there is a wide spread issue in the community then it should be looked at further then just pointing fingers at each other and causing a divide in the community.
Sham Article,
I really find your posts more punjabi than sikh for the following reasons:
#1)You are more worried about your “image” than the victims of any kind of abuse. Look, we can debate the number of cases 1:1000 or 1:million. The ratio is meaningless for the victim. It is a mistake to care about how we “look in the eyes of other communities”. Sikhs never believed in holier than thou nonsense to begin with.
#2) You are quick to make personal attacks about space alien impregnation,etc. , and involve parents of others, Isnt that more typical punjabi than sikh ? Then why would anyone believe the rest of your prescription for women ?
You are fortunate to have lived in a “bubble of perfection”. As long as you have parents, and grandparents around to keep you in an inflated bubble- you will be isolated from reality (No matter where you live in this planet). I’ve seen that kind of life too, and it seems like a perfect life – but in my case it didnt last.
PS:
(I am assuming you are a guy, because lately I’m beginning to have doubts. In case you are a guy, take an extra large pack of mosquito repellants from Costco before your trip to the jungles of Guatemala. I heard they have toe sized mosquitoes trying to get inside the kacha.)
Rajinder,
It seems you are not a Sikh/punjabi, but probably an Indian.
You seem to be an Indian, because you are more satisfied with having any Sikh sacrificed for something that does not directly involve us in the article.
There is a difference from being sacrificed and giving your own life, to be sacrificed by someone else means you are expendable, to give your life means you realize what priceless gift we are given.
You are upset that your father was sent to Guatemala, because that suggests abuse to women. But before my post you were accusing harinder and I of being abusers as if its an off handed insult that is easyily accepted.
If you can be upset that an innocent man is lumped in with real abusers, then you should understand what should be disturbing to Sikh men and Sikh women.
If you are a Sikh sister and/or a person that has faced this kind of abuse, than I apologize for even trying to have you see things from a different view with the example above.
The “space alien impregnation” suggests that Sikh audience members of the writers at thelangarhall.com are wide awake.
sham article,
Singh naam hunda Sher Da.
What is the point of being a “society” sikh with zero empathy for the weak, and communication that changes according to search engine technology and market share of search engines ?.
My family has movie-star looks, but are camera shy. Its the one with the Snoop Dog looks who is a real publicity seeker.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-T1dYrq0uo
Okay, I didn’t really wanna get back in this discussion as much of it seems unspeakably inane– but Sham Artcile– or is that Sham Singh Article? Sham Kaur Article?– what is all this about all the good things Sikhs do being somehow solely Sikh, and all the bad things they do, being Punjabi? And now you’re throwing Indian into the mix??? Please explain, maybe with a helpful map of relative brain sizes and eugenic traits of all the above. God forbid I should run into someone who claims to be a Sikh but is in fact merely a Punjabi– or horror of horrors, an Indian!!!
Enlighten us, do!
Rajinder,
Women of the at large ‘Asian’ community in England have read Jasvinder’s book and have stated that they are ashamed to have her as a member of the Asian community.
None of Jasvinder Sanghera’s 5 sisters will speak to her, in fact she says only one of her nephews talks to her, and he’s decided that if he gets married he will never bring his wife near her.
In Jasvinder’s Sanghera’s 30 minute interview with Stephen Sackur, she states that her father was not the type to ever get upset, and her mother was teasing her with a picture, and the conversation was that one day she would get married to a man, this upset her, not beat downs, but being told to go in her room.
Sanghera used the help of a cop to runaway at age 15, in her own words as a runaway she got herself into one bad situation after another.
She finally married a guy at 21, Jassey, whom she stated “loved and supported me”, but Jassey learns that during their marriage Sanghera is cheating on him and having multiple affairs behind his back.
In the picture with this article she is now wearing a cross, her organization helps muslim women, her organization rarely deals with punjabis let alone Sikhs in abuse cases.
She gets government funding, and she’s joined right wing and left wing groups in such a way to create a xenophobic environment for the whole asian community (watch the interviwers response to asians at large).
According to your comments rajinder, when Sanghera’s looks starting going thats probably when she decided to exploit her community on television.
What happens when little red riding hood turns out to be the big bad werewolf, and she ate the grandmother?
You best sit this one out with your family and hide rajinder. The rest of society will take care of the matter.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN7-u8VlsV0&feature=related
[...] issue of forced marriages and domestic violence clearly struck a chord with many of the TLH readers. But somewhere deep in [...]
Sham,
Can you substantiate any of your claims or are they just libel? Fault the messenger in order to not have to deal with the message.
Ashamed? Why shouldn’t they be ashamed of the families that force their children to marry people against their wishes? Also, your basis of this ‘ashamed’ comes from 1 review on Amazon.co.uk. Interesting how you dismissed the 23 reviewers that gave it 5 stars to present one of the 2 reviewers that gave it 1 star. That is intellectually dishonest to attempt to negate the overwhelming approval in order to propagate your own point of view.
One of her sisters committed suicide due to her unhappiness in a forced marriage. Her youngest sister, Lucy, stayed with her, when she was fleeing being in a forced marriage. Can you provide a link to substantiate your claim about the remarks of her nephew?
At best this is a misrepresentation, at worst an out and out lie. I linked to the interview with Stephen Sackur. I urge all viewers to watch it again. None of these remarks attributed by Sham to the interview are true. True she was not victimized by violence, but she was repeatedly threatened by violence, taken out of school, and locked in a room. There is no mention of ‘teasing’ etc. Sham, this is intellectually dishonest.
Can you substantiate this claim?
Can you be any more of a male chauvinist? Is it even possible to be more mysoginistic? Is this a Sikh-like comment.
Here are some actual statistics of the widespread problem:
according to sham article our Sikh community is perfect and all the indian or Hindus are bad….hurray to the perfect Sikh community worldwide….so what if we Sikhs fight each other…so what if the gurudwars around the globe have become political bases….so what is our Sikh brothers are ripping each other apart in gurudwara elections worldwide….so what if some Sikh brother and sisters have gone hay where in justifying everything good or bad they do in this world….but we are perfect….write all the articles against india write all the articles against Hindus……they are our biggest enemy???but we Sikhs are perfect…in fact whiter then white….plz don’t write anything against us
indian sikh and proud of it,
I don’t see eye to eye with sham article on this topic, or perhaps its how he/she is presenting it.
However, your response is laughable. It’s a weak attempt at using sham article’s posts as some kind of argument or justification against pointing out the very real problems, deficiencies, and mind-blowing corruption in India.
I’d say India deserves to be ripped and ragged on for a whole slew of different things.
When India stops honoring butchers like KPS Gill, and giving impugnity to criminals like Tytler, and stops being an abuser of human rights, maybe your post can be considered something other than ridiculous.
Intro—
To Sikh men and Sikh women, we need to “watch out” for each other.
Jodha states: “ Sham article… Also, your basis of this ‘ashamed’ comes from 1 review on Amazon.co.uk. Interesting how you dismissed the 23 reviewers that gave it 5 stars to present one of the 2 reviewers that gave it 1 star. That is intellectually dishonest to attempt to negate the overwhelming approval in order to propagate your own point of view.
Jodha these long detailed posts will be dedicated to answering your questions and accusations. Here’s my research sister. I will split up the posts, this is the first post to answer why the Amazon reviewers post is more significant than the other reviewers…It’s the one that started making me take a look at your article and approach the subject in this manner.
The strongest disapproval on Amazon comes from Heer Kaur, why does this matter, it matters because it is the name of a Sikh, and not just any Sikh she is a Kaur.
Kaur criticizes Sanghera because with all the complaints about marriage, Sanghera gets married to a man that loves her, Jassey, and while Sanghera’s parents tried to reign her in however Sanghera runs away from home between the ages of 15-16 with a 21 year old Jassey (asian male). Jassey goes about proving to Sanghera that he will stand by her side.
Jassey is trusting, hard working, caters to her needs, forgiving and courageously naïve….
“Then the seemingly inevitable happens: Jas(Jasvinder Sanghera) becomes pregnant and decides to finally accept one of Jassey’s frequent proposals of marriage.”…
“The couple marry and a daughter, Lisa, is soon born.”…
“Although Jassey certainly seems like the model husband and father, Jas cheats on him with a man she meets while at a disco with Lucy(sister). Surjit soon reveals himself as a violent control freak. When he breaks her nose with a vicious punch, Jas confesses everything to Jassey and begs for his help in ending the affair.”
“Jas’ half-hearted attempts to hold her marriage together for Lisa’s sake soon fizzle out when she meets Rajvinder and, in short order, starts another affair and moves in with him.
“Ten years before, he’d rescued me and now, in return, I’d left him weeping,” Jas matter-of-factly says of Jassey, evidently quite unhesitant to display herself to the reader “warts” and all. After a divorce from Jassey, she and Rajvinder marry. (Although she will have two children with Raj, Jas’ second marriage will also eventually end in divorce. Unlike Jassey, Jas is not of a forgiving nature when she discovers Raj has been having an affair.)”
Excerpts taken from:
http://www.sikhchic.com/article-detail.php?id=611&cat=11
1st Question by Jodha after initial comment:
I had wrote earlier
“None of Jasvinder Sanghera’s 5 sisters will speak to her, in fact she says only one of her nephews talks to her, and he’s decided that if he gets married he will never bring his wife near her.”
Jodha states:
“One of her sisters committed suicide due to her unhappiness in a forced marriage. Her youngest sister, Lucy, stayed with her, when she was fleeing being in a forced marriage. Can you provide a link to substantiate your claim about the remarks of her nephew?”
———————————————————–
Jodha this is Sanghera’s own statement about her nephew.
A lot of the hate comes from some members of her own family: 26 years after she ran away they still cross the street to avoid her. Her only real contact is her nephew Sunny. “He’s hip, he’s modern, but he still says, ‘If I get married I wouldn’t want my wife to speak to you’.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/article1294841.ece
I originally wrote:
“In Jasvinder’s Sanghera’s 30 minute interview with Stephen Sackur, she states that her father was not the type to ever get upset, and her mother was teasing her with a picture, and the conversation was that one day she would get married to a man, this upset her, not beat downs, but being told to go in her room.”
Jodha responded:
“At best this is a misrepresentation, at worst an out and out lie. I linked to the interview with Stephen Sackur. I urge all viewers to watch it again. None of these remarks attributed by Sham to the interview are true. True she was not victimized by violence, but she was repeatedly threatened by violence, taken out of school, and locked in a room. There is no mention of ‘teasing’ etc. Sham, this is intellectually dishonest.”
Jodha here is the link to the Jan29, 2007 video. Jodha just watch as Jasvinder Sanghera tells you my lies, I detailed the exact time of her statements. Download and watch.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/hardtalk/6309489.stm
11:50 Sackur asks about when she was presented with a picture by her mother.
Sanghera: I came home from school one day and I was presented with a picture of a stranger I was to marry, and she did in a joking way…
When at the age of 15 Sanghera realizes that her mother is thinking of an arranged marriage for her, she tells her mother the absurdity of the idea of marrying a stranger in the future, Sanghera explains that she has a 21 year old boyfriend.
The parents shocked by their daughters revelation, have her stay in her room, where Sanghera says she had to stay for 3 days. Her parents worried about her seeing a 21 year old man, have her chaperoned when she goes out.
17:30 Sackur asks about her special relationship with her father.
Sanghera states “ I asked my father “Please tell mamma I don’t want to do this. my father was a very silent man, and he was very slow to anger. Like he was saying there is nothing I can do here”…”My mother was too powerful and he couldn’t break that.”
Jasvinder Sanghera walked out of her home, and ran away between 15 –16 years of age, with a 21 year old Kuldeep(Jassey).
She showed up at the work place of her boyfriend Kuldeep (Jassey), and asked him to quit his job and run away with her if he loved her, he did without question
Sanghera would call her family to ask to take her back but they refused, and they told her that she was dead to them.
At 19 Sanghera would be pregnant. She would marry Jassey, then cheat on him, he forgave her, she cheated on him again, then divorced him, married another man, lost custody of her daughter, the second husband would cheat on her. She had two more children and divorce again.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1581481,00.html
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/woman/real_life/29782/I-fled-from-a-forced-marriage.html
Finally,
23:00 Sackur: asks Sangheras about her relationship with her family now, if things have healed with her five sisters.
-One of the seven sisters committed suicide and even at that time Sanghera says the family wouldn’t recognize her.
-Her mother shooed her away while on her death bed, and her father passed away from a heart attack.
Sanghera: I don’t think I’ll have a relationship with my family they totally disregard me.
This is Typical Punjabi Sikh Female who wants to have her cake n eat it too, She ran away from house at age 15 or 16 , She did what she wanna do and seeking approval from her parents and the community,We aint havin that ,This is for men and women, if you do your thing Take responsibility move on with your life, Real men n women do not take step backward,Move on do your thing and be happy with your new found happiness cuz you weren’t happy with your own people.
Who’s saying anything of happiness?
This is not a typical punjabi Sikh female response. Her family didnt consult a bhai much less a Sikh on these matters.
Even Sanghera realized later that her mothers approach(caste garbage) was not based in Sikhism (look at Sikhchic article).
So if Sanghera and her family understood virtually nothing about Sikhism then..
How can you think you’ve left something behind when you never knew it was even there?
I have to reatract some of my statements made earlier.
My Sikhism is not reperstnatitive of a typical sikh.
Their is a problem of violence in our marraiges.
A distant realtive of mine and a mother of 2 has committed suicide after being harassed for giving birth to a second daughter and possibly dowry. Police are investigating.
I share with Jodha that this problem of violence in maraigaes be added to the many woes that inflict our community.
Regret and retract my earlier remarks.
Harinder,
No part of Sikhism allows for a woman to be mistreated for having daughters. Dowry is forbidden in Sikhism.
Women that are in these situations, need to Stop thinking of these kind of family people as Sikhs.
Use Sikhism to not only get away but to defend your life.
If you have to die take the enemy with you.
Sikh women need to live and die as Sikhs.
Let those other dead family members contemplate their tragedy in the hereafter.
Sham
I think there is a mismatch between our
“Theory and our on Ground situation”.
1) Dowry :– I think reflects a incomplete man and his family which cannot fend for himself on this planet.
It is not worthwhile girls going into such home.
I think one solution is that SIKH parents and girls must not get their daughter married into homes which demand dowry.
2)Female phobia ( Femphob) :— Again stems from three factors
a) The worry of dowry
b) The link between family honour and Virginity.
c) May be thought of “Old age” woes that who shall look after us.
I dont know what is the Ideal answer;
but any suggestions to over come this violence and
pursuit of an Ideala family and society is welcome
Harinder,
In this case the theory and ground game are reflective of each other.
Its the inability or refusal to call out what is taking place that is the major part of the problem.
The old problems are still there, people are standing in the ganges river sending water to the Sun. Only now people want to call this Sikhism. Thats false.
This is where anyone who has Love for Sikhism should take issue.
Dowry is not a man and his family that can’t fend for them selves.
Dowry is the rights and privileges of a family that has male children. Just like slavery in the West was once seen as the right of the white race to subjugate the black african race at their discretion.
It’s the male that determines the sex of the child and tossing the coin, the females coin is the same on both sides.
The ideal and realistic answer is, we need to practice Sikhism.
When someone is practicing these behaviors against a Sikh woman, she needs to be taught from the Sikh Faith standpoint that this behavior against her is something her faith cannot tolerate. As a Sikh she has the right to defend herself or move away from the situation.
Guru Nanak Sahib Ji did not just teach men about Waheguruji, the teachings are for all genders, and races.
Every Sikh is responsible for seeking a relationship with Waheguruji. When we start taking this to heart, is when we start taking a step towards the Truth of Living.
We need to protect the Sacred Message of Sikhism, even if it means protecting it from ourselves.
If my generation is scum, then let Me be scum, not Sikhism
This issue has more to do with our social life rather than our spiritual goals of SIKHISM.
We need to discuss with our Sangat how to over come this evil of “WOMAN VIOLENCE” ( Janani Kut ) admist us.
No one likes a victim. All Punjabi Sikhs should understand this more than anyone else.
Its only after we noticed the Guru standing up against the incredible amount of tyranny,
did punjabis finally rise.
But now some punjabis believe they have an image to uphold minus the Faith. This is whats partially behind the abuse of women.
Do you harinder or jodha actually believe these types of people care what happens to Sikhism?
If they are willing to further the demise of a wife to the point of death, and make their
daughters feel that they are the downfall of the whole family, what makes you think that they care about Sikhism.
What makes you think that a mother-in-law, or women-in-law cares about womens suffrage. They are like queens and duchesses of an evil empire whose men rape, and they are yelling for more cruelty.
A victim is the consumer of someone elses guilt.
These women are being hung or burned alive for the crimes of the men and/or their families.
What do you think the Guru would tell Sikhs if Sikh women were being murdered like this?
Sham it looks like that your are trying to defend Sikhism when that is not the question being asked.
The question here is of defending our woman ( and may be other too) from
“Domestic Violence”