~ Shallow.

[Mayana]

Salamooona =)

Yet another topic that popped into my mind,

~ Are we (Pashtuns) shallow people?

Many people in our society go after the looks of a girl and the degrees of a boy when it comes to judging them.. What do you think about this? Is it a correct way to analyze people?

What about social status? In some parts of our society, a persons social status solely depends on how fair their skin is, how tall hey are, how light their eyes and hair is. Dark people are stigmatized.. short people are stigmatized.. Other aspects to determine their social status include quietness for women and money for men. Are these measures accurate?

How has shallowness affect you? Have you ever been stigmatized for going against the "rules" and standards of our society?


Discuss awaaayy =)

[Mayana]

And also, not only in matters of education.. but in matters of Hayaa and Tarbiya.

I'd like to share an example.. I know this family, there are two young girls who are married into the family.. and both are drop-dead gorgeous, sha.. One grew up in the US and is the sweetest girl, mehraban, haayanaaka, has adab and tarbiya.. and the other grew up in Pakistan, is much taller than the first girl.. but unfortunately, she has very very little Hayaa, very little Tarbiya.. she is insolent in a certain way and she was proposed to solely base don her looks.. Now, even after years of living with both of them, the family STILL praises the second one more than the first one.. why.. because she is tall. It doesn't matter that she curses at her husband in front of his peers or doesn't have the manners that the other girl has.. she is tall and hence awesome.

[Mayana]

Ooooh and GoPashtunGo, I didn't mean only men.. I meant Pashtuns as a whole.. and not only in this matter of marriage.. but in total. For example our obnoxious racism against African Americans or Mexicans or Asians..

[Roshina]

I woudln't say "Pashtuns" are shallow. I mean, this kind of shallowness is prevalent all over the eastern world AND was also in the west until recently (though it is to some extent today as well). Why do you think we have the term "fair" in terms of looks? A "fair" girl is a light-skinned girl, and a light-skinned girl is a fair girl! lol.

Also, analyze some typical Indian commercial, for instance. A large percent of them are about bleach creams for women! How much make-up does the average female put on in a movie or drama -- or even in the news?! When I see the amount of make-up a female Pakistani journalist/news anchor has, I can only pity her. Sure, no one would listen to her if she didn't have make-up on :|

You see, while it is true that beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder and that beauty is a relative term, certain definitions of beauty are just way too shallow than others. Example: Seeing beauty by the skin-color of a person.

I don't think anyone would deny that there are many "dark-skinned" people who are very beautiful just as there are "light-skinned" people who are beautiful as well. I know many such people myself.

My niece, the most gorgeous thing on earth (nope, I'm NOT exaggerating :D), is supposedly getting "darker," according to a recent Pashtun guest we had. My nephew is much darker, and the skin tones of certain individuals tends to change for various reasons. Yet, NO ONE has ever pointd out my nephew's skin color, but they're pointing out my niece's. It's sickening.

I have female cousins whose mothers themselves are the ones taunting them for being dark-skinned :S The more they hear this from their own mothers, the more depressed they become, and the more their health and skin worsen. This, of course, means no marriage proposals for them, and that means more depression for their mothers! Well, look who brought the disaster on their own pitiful souls.

[Laila]

And also, not only in matters of education.. but in matters of Hayaa and Tarbiya.

I'd like to share an example.. I know this family, there are two young girls who are married into the family.. and both are drop-dead gorgeous, sha.. One grew up in the US and is the sweetest girl, mehraban, haayanaaka, has adab and tarbiya.. and the other grew up in Pakistan, is much taller than the first girl.. but unfortunately, she has very very little Hayaa, very little Tarbiya.. she is insolent in a certain way and she was proposed to solely base don her looks.. Now, even after years of living with both of them, the family STILL praises the second one more than the first one.. why.. because she is tall. It doesn't matter that she curses at her husband in front of his peers or doesn't have the manners that the other girl has.. she is tall and hence awesome.

I have two cousins raised in the USA. The eldest one is possibly starting medical school inshallah in a couple of years. Her second sister just graduated from UC San Diego.

Now that there are proposals coming for them. No one asks for the first daughter....why? because they say she is not pretty enough, she is not white enough. Even though she is the coolest person i have ever met, very well educated, she is like a genius, but everyone has put her in the shadow of her younger sister. Her mother and aunts have even done that.

[Roshina]

You want to know what makes my blood boil Mayana?

When those gorgeous girls from Afghanistan end up marrying an abusive,dumb,uneducated Pashtun in the U.S.A.

LOL!! Rrrrreally? What boils MY blood is when Pashtun families take their sons back home for marriage, marrying them cousins and other females from their villages/communities, while the Pashtun girls educated here can't find anyone compatible enough for them to marry! I hear this complain from so many female Pashtun friends, and almost all Pashtun families I know here are doing exactly that. The reason they give is: "We can't trust these girls because they're raised in the west." They might not know their cousins back home because they didn't live with them, yet the girls they lived with here for many, many years -- decades, even! -- they don't wanna marry them to their sons.

Why does the parent allow the marriage? because the boy is in USA. Our people would drop-dead(I had to borrow your word) for someone who is in the west. That I find annoying.

Yes! Oh the feuds back home, the competition! For selecting girl in the U.S. with a green card to marry their sons living there!

We hate the west because it's so, oh SO corrupt, SO infidelish, SO un-Islamic, etc., etc. but we love the green-cards and the life here and opportunities here. ugh.

Our social status has a lot to do with which family you are from. How much money your family makes, how pretty your dimples are.

Very true. I have a Pashtun friend who wants to marry this doctor (he's Pukhtun and wants to marry her as well), but while his parents have totally okayed it, her parents are like, "No! He's from a lower social status!" (She's a Khana, and he supposedly belongs to one of the lowest castes we have in Swat.)

So her plan is to reject all proposals until she reaches an age in which her parents will say, "Okay, okay, just marry this one but for God's sake get married!"

[Mayana]

LOL we can't trust these girls, because they're raised here in the West, down the street from me. But we CAN trust those beautiful strangers ALL the damn way across the damn globe because they are raised in a "Muslim" society and can't possibly be 'impure'.

[Roshina]

LOL we can't trust these girls, because they're raised here in the West, down the street from me. But we CAN trust those beautiful strangers ALL the damn way across the damn globe because they are raised in a "Muslim" society and can't possibly be 'impure'.

Exactly :| Funniest thing is this:

*Some* educated Pashtun men raised here actually refuse to marry a girl from back home if she's not educated and their parents want them to marry her, right, so guess what they do: They marry non-Pashtun girls who went to school with them.

The reason they marry the non-Pashtuns instead of the Pashtuns here is very simple: We're not allowed to see each other! I find it hypocritical that we're NOT allowed to talk to Pashtun males in our own areas but ALL parents know that we go to school with Pashtun males and may even have them as our lab partners from time to time!

Can't really blame the guys, then, for marrying outsiders whom they know and trust very well. This has happened to three Pashtun guys here (all are big professionals). Their wives are the sweetest people ever, SO hospitable, SO loving, SO friendly. We should stop assuming that all non-Pashtun women are this and that and aren't good wives for Pashtun men because these women prove them wrong.

[Admin Khan]

May I ask a question in your thread sister Mayana?

[Mayana]

Please ask as many as you want, Admin Khaana! =)

[Admin Khan]

How do you explain the reason why many parents go to Afghanistan and Pakistan to choose a woman for there sons? Is it because they simply hate everyone in the west? Wouldn't it be fair to conclude that they have witnessed such horrible activities from the woman in the west that they are now disgusted? I know of many parents who feel like Pashtana's in the west have dropped Islam, so they simply are looking for something they can't find in the west. I admit that a book should never be judged by its cover, But what do you expect from people who have a literacy rate of 15-20 percent? Do you think parents like spending thousands of dollars traveling to Afghanistan to find a bride? Am I the only one who finds such actions as enigmatic and rather tedious considering the expenses associated with it? I have even witnessed the Bride's side(From the USA)traveling back home and paying for all the expenses of the Groom's side. Now you and I both know that is not how it works in our culture, My question is why would they walk that extra mile? Can that truly be called shallowness? If Yes why?

An elaborated answer would be honored and appreciated. My question is out of mere curiosity, I mean no harm. My fiancé is not from Afghanistan or Pakistan, So no worries speak your heart. Sometimes I like to have a woman's perspective on such matters. Obviously you guys are one the frontline, not me.

Dera manana.

-Admin Khan

[Levanaye Zalmaye]

Arranged marriages result in this shallow behavior. Because when our peers arrange our marriages, they have our best interests at heart - they ensure that we'll both like each other physically and that the guy will earn enough money to keep everyone happy.

So automatically, a girl has to be tall, fair, pretty and a guy has to be rich and handsome.

unhiddentruth, dimples are hard to resist.

[Roshina]

Admin, it's perfectly fine when they seek a "pure Pashtana" from back home for their sons, but the problem is who they choose for their daughters :|

The families I speak of here were SO angry when they saw that the Pashtun guys had gone for non-Pashtuns for marriage. The families were like, "Do we not have daughters? Who's gonna marry our daughters now? We're not gonna give them to men back home!" (I once overheard them expressing this thought and resentment, and I was thinking to myself, "You want your sons to marry girls from back home, but why don't you marry your daughters to guys from back home too?")

The problem isn't that they think the girls here have gone astray. If they didn't know the girls here, that'd be acceptable (I completely understand the notion of having a daughter-/sister-in-law whom you know a lot about so that you're sure she'll take care of her parents-in-law and would never betray them and/or her husband). But it's that they live in the same neighborhoods sometimes! Many Pashtun families here live in the same apartment complexes or neighborhoods.

[Admin Khan]

Admin, it's perfectly fine when they seek a "pure Pashtana" from back home for their sons, but the problem is who they choose for their daughters :|

I have a problem with this "pure" concept. How do you describe the word pure? What makes a woman or a man pure? Does a man who messes around with every girl on the block deserve a "pure"(whatever that means) wife? If yes why?

The families I speak of here were SO angry when they saw that the Pashtun guys had gone for non-Pashtuns for marriage. The families were like, "Do we not have daughters? Who's gonna marry our daughters now? We're not gonna give them to men back home!" (I once overheard them expressing this thought and resentment, and I was thinking to myself, "You want your sons to marry girls from back home, but why don't you marry your daughters to guys from back home too?")

I know how that feels, trust me I do.

The problem isn't that they think the girls here have gone astray.

Which I for one, disagree with whole-heartedly. I don't think all of our girls have gone astray in the west. There are also MSA's in universities and many other programs that work on building Islamic values which we have here present in the West. Dating is inevitable, If one is interested in it,He/She will find his way through. It exists in Karachi as well, Have you ever visited the "Love corner" of Safari Park, Karachi? The point I am trying to make here is good and bad exists in all. Let's never generalize.

If they didn't know the girls here, that'd be acceptable (I completely understand the notion of having a daughter-/sister-in-law whom you know a lot about so that you're sure she'll take care of her parents-in-law and would never betray them and/or her husband). But it's that they live in the same neighborhoods sometimes! Many Pashtun families here live in the same apartment complexes or neighborhoods.

Again, Many girls are also sneaky. They appear to be modest(Again, the term "modest" is also up for grabs in a discussion)and they also appear to be ethical with Pashtun values and morals but in reality they have committed activities that would be frowned upon, Once a parent heres about one bad case, They begin to generalize. We don't come from an educated past now do we?

"What? So and so girl had pre-marital sex? Now, I will never let my husband marry a girl from the west" If you try to offer a rebuttal, They will call you jawab-gharay. So is it better to take it with a grain of salt, eh?

[Mayana]

How do you explain the reason why many parents go to Afghanistan and Pakistan to choose a woman for there sons? Is it because they simply hate everyone in the west? Wouldn't it be fair to conclude that they have witnessed such horrible activities from the woman in the west that they are now disgusted? I know many parents feel like Pashtana's in the west have dropped Islam, so they simply are looking for something they can't find in the west. I admit that a book should never be judged by its cover, But what do you expect from people who have a literacy rate of 15-20 percent? Do you think parents like spending thousands of dollars traveling to Afghanistan to find a bridge? Am I the only one who finds such actions as enigmatic and rather tedious considering the expenses associated with it? I have even witnessed the Bride's side(From the USA)traveling back home and paying for all the expenses of the Groom's side. Now you and I both know that is not how it works in our culture, My question is why would they walk that extra mile? Can that truly be called shallowness? If Yes why?

An elaborated answer would be honored and appreciated. My question is out of mere curiosity, I mean no harm. My fiancé is not from Afghanistan or Pakistan, So no worries speak your heart. Sometimes I like to have a woman's perspective on such matters. Obviously you guys are one the frontline, not me.

Dera manana.

-Admin Khan

Brilliant question..
How I explain it.. hmm..

Here's my theory.. the girls over here adjust to this lifestyle, meaning, they wear jeans, they go to school, they wear make up, they plug their eyebrows, they wear high heels, they become independent, they start to have a mind of their own, an opnion of their own a will of their own. This is considered Western and very very VERY bad in many families. A woman is not supposed to have a mind of her own. She is not supposed to be critical. She is supposed to pop out babies and take care of her mother-in-law and husband and look like a doll while doing that. That is her role in many many families. Why is a doll called "Nawaki", the belittlement of "Naweh"?

Of course there are PLENTY of girls who have lost their culture and Islam in the West.. but that doesn't mean that all of those girls are like that.. just like it can't be assumed that all the girls in Pakistan/Afghanistan are 'pure'. But those people are inconsiderate of the fact that.. the SISTER of that very guy who is getting his wife from Pakistan is born and raised in the West as well.. that she herself falls into that generalization. The daughters of those women who say that girls in the West are bad ARE girls in the West. By saying that, these women don't only slap all these girls in their faces - no they slap themselves in their very own faces saying that they were incapable of raising a daughter to be a moral woman.


On a different note, those people want obedient women. They want submissive and dependent women. It's difficult to find that over here, difficult to find dependent women in the West. And the people are scared that.. if something happens and the guy makes a mistake (or tons of them) that she'll leave and they'll have to go through the hassle of finding a girl again with a bad reputation. They just want a daughter-in-law who does the Khidmat for her husband and his family, doesn't want anything, doesn't say anything.. and since the girls over there were - supposedly - brought up in such an environment they are willing to walk that extra mile, just to be sure that they are taken care of by a submissive daughter-in-law. =)