Double Standards
Two days ago I found out from a friend that he had secretly been engaged and was planning on getting married soon. The reason he reveled all of this was because, unfortunately, the engagment was called off abrupty by the girl around the New Year holiday.
My friend is from Pakistan (only being in America for roughly 13 years) and the girl in question was like me, first generation child of Indian parents, a Western-raised Pakistani girl. I expressed my sympathies to this friend when I heard about what had happened, I think any normal human being would do that no?
He wrote back with this long diatribite about how horrible all Western raised Pakistani/Indian girls are - how we are not true Muslims cause we don't follow the rules and stay in our place per Islamic law, we are indecisive, how we want a career and don't want to stay at home and raise families, we are always unhappy. He also than said "I'm going back to Pakistan to get married," because girls there are young, pretty, innocent and will be happy with any guy, especially one who can bring them to America, where they will have a better life."
I am so tired of hearing these stupid arguments from stupid Muslim Indian/Pakistani men. Women, people, are not so black and white. We Western girls are not the spawn of Satan and the girls back home are not all Stepford wives. It is a double standard that these guys hold for us Western girls, they want us to be everything, smart, pretty, religious, funny, heart-warming, never get mad, perfectly cultured but they themselves don't need to be any of the above. We should just be grateful that these mini-Gods, these men, deemed to allow us in their presence (can you tell I'm pissed?!). And when they go back home, they will pick the first girl they meet, she doesn't have to have all these standards that we Western girls must meet just because she is from back home (where getting married is a career sport).
I'm writing all of this because I didn't say anything to my friend. I know he is hurting and wants to lash out at anyone and anything and if I don't vent here, I'm prone to deck my friend the first time I see him, or worse say to him, "hey Brad Pitt, why don't you look at yourself, maybe there is something wrong with you?! What makes you think you are such a damn good catch that you need to be so picky?! Do you follow everything according to Islam and your role as a man?"
He's my friend but right now I'm hoping he does back home and get some girl who cleans his clock (and is fat and ugly to boot!).
Right, glad to get that off my chest - I'm going to go back to my desk now and eat children and spread the plague, per my Western girl upbringing.
posted by Virginia Gal @ 7:56 AM
8 Comments:
VG,
Welcome to America!
Every new ethnic group that comes here, has a similar problem ... my one uncle never got married and he used to say, "If I was in Italy, I could find a nice girl who ‘knows’ her place" -- turns out my Uncle was/is gay but they never talked about that back in the 50's and 60's.
One of my best friends growing up was a kid named, Marty and he was Jewish and his mother was something of a matchmaker and she was always telling the local Jewish women, that she was going to Israel to find them "good husbands" (because “these American men are no good”, she would say!)
Furthermore your friend needs a good smack upside the head; he does not want a wife, it sounds like he wants a piece of property that he can show off ... he should be so luck!
I meant "he should be so LUCKY"
Sounds like someone just found out that Santa Claus doesn't exist and he thinks if he goes to the shopping mall, then that'll be the "real" Santa, and not some part-time actor who just really really needs to pay the bills because he got kicked off of Medicaid and the commercials aren't coming in like they used to and oh-by-the-way, he really hates kids. Yup. Someone's been fed the fairytale to the gills and now can't stand it when someone wants to comfort him when it's backfired.
There's something wrong with a man who will settle for a girl who will, "Be happy with any guy." It means that he can't connect mentally and emotionally. He's insulting himself more than anyone else.
Bless you for ignoring him this time around, but don't let him get away with too much passive-agressive anger dumping. He knows that he's taking pokes at you, and you should think better of yourself (we all do) than to allow him to insult you.
Yeah, what everyone above me said goes for me, too. Twice!
Right-o.
See, this is what I get for commenting on my friends' blogs so frellin late.
You know U, that I'm right in line with you on this one. I have a great friend (a female Pakistani-American) in Cleveland who said the same thing to me a couple of years ago. I think of her as one of the bravest people I ever met. Cleveland is a crazy city in that it has both the second largest Orthodox Jewish population and the second largest Palestinian population. Muslim women get crap from men in both groups. My friend, Aisha, started wearing a hijab only after she was in high school.
I'm late, too.... but I agree with everyone else.
And I like Pie.
Mmmm.....Pie.
**hug**
Pax - oh good observation, actually my sister and I have often thought the same thing (that he is gay), who knows maybe he is screaming all of this to smokescreen the truth? hmm....isn't the man doth protest to much...?
Divine Calm - oh welcome! Yes a good sense of humor is exactly what is needed here or violence, no just kidding : )
Molly - I wonder if he was already going into the situation with a bad attitude. I'd be interested to know what he said to this girl, might have scared her. Yeah acting like a spoiled child indeed!
POP - His behavior this week is just perpuating the stereotype of Muslim men, it is a shame, what is wrong with these guys?! I definitely think it is an influence of our "boys are the best" Indian culture. I hope your girls never have to deal with this kind of crap.
Laurie - thanks for the credit, I'm just not communicating with him right now. You know I want to be a friend but I refuse to sit around and be insulted, no?
Merci - thanks for the vote of confidence (how did you know I had already internalized onto myself?). I think once he has hopefully calmed down, I will say how hurt I was by his comments.
Maidink - thanks - I do wonder if he understands what marriage means, not just getting a housekeeper but a partner. That is what makes me think he might be gay. Putting up a front on all of this.
Melas - a-ha! Thanks for the confirmation, I'm not the only Indian-American girl who encounters this bs. We Muslim girls need to band together and turn the tide on this behavior by our Muslim men!
Adorable Tony - Thanks. I like pie also : ) We should do coffee and pie one day (and than I can visit Little Rock).
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