Thoughts on Cross-Cultural Marriages

Assalamu alaikum, Tariq Nelson and Kalimaat both have interesting posts regarding cross-cultural marriages. I commented on Tariq Nelson’s blog about it, and I’m sure my thoughts weren’t hashed out properly so I’m posting something on my own blog, which might not make any more sense than the comments I left did, but I’ll try, Inshallah, anyway.

While I think that it’s naive for people to go running off to a foreign country to get married, for any reason, ya know, it’s kinda their own life, and their own business. It might be stupid, naive, ill-advised, etc., etc., etc., and I’d personally advise against it, and have done so on an individual level, however, I don’t think we should pan all cross-cultural marriages because of the some, or maybe the many, stories we all think we heard about. And for me, this falls into the pervue of “things that don’t concern me”. Yes, I know we can talk about the “good Muslim sisters who’re being passed up”, the kids who are born into this sort of thing that might have problems later, and any myriad of “problems” that can arise from this sort of thing.

However, there’s a fine line between “bringing problems out into the open” and bashing either cross-cultural marriages, or bashing whatever “other” culture we’re talking about in the said cross-cultural marriage, whether it be Arab, African, whatever.

What is it, exactly, that we are against here? Is it cross-cultural marriages, per se, is it the passing up of American Muslim women (most usually converts) by (usually) convert men for “something better”, “something more pious”, etc., because I’m sensing that it’s not just about being against cross-cultural marriages, in and of themselves, it’s something deeper than that. And whatever that “something deeper” is, I’ve really not quite figured it out.

And I don’t think that Arabs have the monopoly on bad treatment of women, racism, prejudice, etc., and it’s just really a fine line between speaking your mind/giving advice/stating your experiences and bashing whatever “other culture” you’re talking about.

I don’t disagree entirely with what Tariq and Kalimaat are saying, I just wonder how many times are we going to continually bring this sort of thing up, without descending into negative caricatures of people and their motives, instead of offering up solutions and trying to address, as in the case of these two articles, why this perceived “problem” of men running off to Morocco is happening in the first place.

And I’m very sensitive to the “we shouldn’t marry interracially”, the “we shouldn’t marry cross-culturally”, etc., etc. kind of comments/opinions because I find them to be for the most part generalistic and close-minded. It’s your choice whether you want to marry within your own cultural or racial group, but don’t pass judgment on cross-cultural marriages and the people in them because of your opinion that those of differing cultural back grounds shouldn’t marry, or your own bad experience in a cross-cultural marriage, or if not your own experience, the often anecdotal experience of “others you’ve heard of”. It’s one thing to go into a situation naively, but if the two people involved in the marriage have an understanding, they’re familiar with each others’ cultural practices, etc., then I don’t think it’s a problem. It’s only when you go into something, looking for some sort of eutopia, some sort of “happily ever after” “perfect pious Muslim”, that you’re going to have problems. And that’s not just limited to the brothers marrying the Moroccan sisters, many people are guilty of that.

I’ve been in two cross-cultural marriages, the first bad, the second going very well, Alhamdulillah. Perhaps I could have taken my bad experience of the first marriage and parlayed it into a diatribe on why we shouldn’t marry cross-culturally, that “all people of culture A have X issues”, for example, “they don’t respect so-and-so people”, “they’re all abusive and only want green cards”, etc., etc. But I chose instead to examine myself, learn why I ended up where I was, and to take responsibility for the mess I’d put myself in. Perhaps there were aspects of my first husband’s culture that led him to be abusive to me and treat me badly, however, I don’t think that American culture is devoid of any negativity, and all cultures that I can say I have any knowledge of seem to have their issues. And before we start talking about “the treatment of women and how they’re devalued” by whatever culture we want to discuss today, it occurs to me that even here in America, we’re still struggling with issues of women’s value, equality of the sexes, etc. and it wasn’t that long ago in this very country that women couldn’t vote, couldn’t own property, couldn’t do anything without their husband’s consent, i.e., purchasing a car, buying property, etc. So when I read things like “oh look at how bad those men treat women”, etc., etc., and it’s written in a condescending “look at me and how much better I am ’cause I’m a … ” It just bothers me because until the day domestic violence isn’t a problem in this country, until women’s bodies are not used to sell cars, until women stop being objectified, etc., looking down my nose at “the other and how they treat women” is just not a high horse I want to get on.

Because while things like women’s treatment by men in some Arab countries might indeed be a problem, and while marriage in the Muslim community might have some problems, and while men might be running off to marry women from wherever, there’s a way to discuss this without bashing a whole group or culture of people. There’s a way to discuss this without the resentment and anger I’m seeing just below the surface that IMHO needs to be explored just as much as the “whys” of men going overseas to get married to what they perceive as a “more pious” Muslim woman.

I just feel like I’m hearing a broken record of “Arabs bad” “cross-cultural marriages bad” “brothers marrying Moroccan sisters bad”. And no solutions, just a rehash of the negativity, the hurt feelings, etc. We all know these problems exist, we’ve been talking about it for at least a year that I can readily remember. So the question I have is, what do we do about it now? What solutions can we come up with in our communities to solve the perceived problems that we say exist?