I Was Forced to Marry My Cousin—It’s Normal in My Culture, But SO WRONG
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These days Khaleda Begum, 25, hardly leaves the confines of her one-bedroom flat.
And when she does, her heart thumps and she looks over her shoulder in terror. For, in the eyes of her Muslim family, Khaleda has done the unthinkable.
Disgusted by her arranged marriage to a cousin—a suitor found for her by her father—she has fled her family home and now, fearful of reprisals, lives under police protection.
Khaleda’s story makes shocking reading for anyone who is under the misguided belief that such marriages do not regularly go on in Britain today.
For Khaleda, who was born in Britain and took GCSEs and A-levels at her British school in the hope of becoming a teacher in this country, was forced by her father to go to Pakistan and marry his cousin—a man 20 years her senior, who spoke no English and whom she had never even met.
And according to Khaleda—who today, having escaped “the marriage from hell,” lives in hiding with her British partner, Phil—she is far from alone.
She says: “Virtually every Asian girl I have ever met has an arranged marriage and the vast majority of them are to their cousins.
“It is well known within the community that such marriages do produce deformed babies. No one talks about it, but it is one of the reasons why I found such a marriage to someone so closely related to myself to be so very repugnant.
“Just before I was forced to marry I heard of one of my cousins who’d been forced to marry her auntie’s son.
“They had a baby daughter who died and when they asked doctors why, they were told it was because of inter-breeding. They were told the parents were too closely related to have a normal baby.
“And this was just one of many instances I would hear of. Anyone who thinks it doesn’t happen is in denial. As I know from the most painful and personal experience, it is barbaric and unnatural.
“Marrying someone who is related to you—and being forced to do so—goes against all your natural urges. It is not racist to tell the truth. What I cannot understand is why it is allowed to go on in this country at all.”
Khaleda’s parents, Miryam and Khalid, came to Britain from Pakistan in the mid-1960s in search of work and a better way of life. The couple already had two sons, now aged 39 and 35, when they settled in a three-bedroom terraced house in the West Midlands near Khalid’s job in a steel foundry.
A third son, now 25, followed, before their much-wanted daughter, Khaleda, was born.
“I had a happy childhood. I was especially close to my mother and, until my wedding, I shared a bedroom with her,” she says.
“I loved it—we would spend hours talking, especially at night. I was the ideal Muslim daughter—I wore traditional Asian clothes and always helped with the housework.”
Many of Khaleda’s extended family lived nearby and weekends were often filled with family parties, some of them wedding celebrations.
“I was about eight when I remember the first ceremony I went to,” says Khaleda.
“I remember thinking how beautiful the bride’s dress was and I looked forward to having my own husband and family.
“But as I grew older I began to understand that any husband would be chosen for me. It was something I found extremely worrying. My mother’s marriage was arranged but my father was cold and dominant, and it wasn’t happy.
“When I was about 12, I remember saying: ‘You won’t make me have an arranged marriage, will you?’ I’d begun to realise that many Asian women were forced to marry, even forced to marry their cousins.
“The thought of marrying someone I didn’t know, and someone who was related to me, was disgusting.”
Yet, as Khaleda reached her teens her father became stricter.
“I went to local state schools but unlike friends who went to parties and clubs, I knew that wasn’t our way. It didn’t bother me—I accepted our culture was different.
“Instead, I concentrated on my studies—I was in the top set for virtually every subject and enjoyed family parties at weekends.”
Having gained nine GCSEs with top grades, Khaleda left school at 16 to go to college to do A-levels in English literature, Urdu and computing. Later, aged 19, she began courses in book-keeping and childcare.
“By now my father had begun talking about when I would be married and I realised that was my fate. I tried not to dwell on it but I purposely didn’t even bother with meeting boys as I knew it was pointless.”
Khaleda concentrated on her ambition to become a teacher, finding a job in telesales to fund herself through college. It was around this time that she met Phil Williams, a delivery driver.
“Phil lived down the road,” she recalls. “I used to see him when I popped to the shops or walked to the bus stop.
“At first we just nodded hello. I used to keep my head down—he looked so lovely but I knew it couldn’t go any further.”
However, after two months the pair began talking and Khaleda found herself falling for Phil.
“He was so quiet and I just liked him so much,” she says. “I used to see him when I went to college or sneak around to his house, telling my parents I was seeing a friend. I even bought a mobile phone—something my parents had forbidden—so I could speak to him secretly at home.”
Life seemed fantastic. Adds Khaleda: “I had met Phil and also adored earning my own money and being independent. Within two months of working I’d been promoted to a junior managerial role.
“However, one day when I came home my father was waiting for me at the front door. As I went in he said I wasn’t to go to work any more. Apparently some family members told him it could bring shame on the family and that a woman’s place was in the home. I was devastated.”
From then Khaleda was hardly allowed out of her room. Ominously, letters marked “private” began arriving from Pakistan addressed to her father.
“I knew something was happening,” she says. “I would regularly hear my father on the phone speaking in Urdu in muffled tones. I worked out the letters were from his family in Pakistan, discussing my forthcoming marriage.
“I was terrified that my worst nightmare was coming true. No one spoke to me about it at all but at night, when everyone thought I was asleep, I’d hear my parents arguing about whether I should have an arranged marriage.
“I even used to hear my brothers rowing with my father about it. I would lie crying in bed, hearing them shout they didn’t want me to be forced into marriage. But my father didn’t listen to anyone.”
Worse, was Khaleda’s father’s choice of groom. “Haram, my husband-to-be, was my father’s cousin and about 20 years older than me.
“My brothers nicknamed him Fatso because he was so overweight. As he spoke no English and had always lived in Pakistan, his life was a world away from mine and I couldn’t imagine how my father could have matched me with him.
“By now, Phil and I were very much in love. We regularly met in secret and I saw my future with him, not with some ugly man who I’d never even met.
“I told my mother I couldn’t have an arranged marriage but she said I had no choice. I had no one to turn to. I knew then that refusing to get married would bring enormous shame on my family and that if I did, I may live in fear of reprisals from my family for the rest of my life.”
A date was set for Khaleda’s £25,000 wedding in Pakistan in December 2004 and preparations began in earnest with enormous shopping sprees to buy the ornate clothes, jewellery, decorations and food for the ceremony.
The celebrations, including dancing and singing, would last for two weeks.
“Almost immediately family members visited with gifts and greetings,” she says, “but I couldn’t stop crying. I was still seeing Phil and, when I told him, he was completely shocked. Like me, he couldn’t believe such a thing was happening.”
Four weeks later, the whole family flew to Pakistan for the ceremony. “My parents had a house there but once I was married, it was expected that I would go to live with his family,” she says.
“Haram had a large family of eight crammed into a tiny two-bedroom house, so there would be no privacy. I felt as if my whole life was ending.”
On the day of the ceremony, held at the family home, a priest arrived. Khaleda, adorned in a gold wedding dress and surrounded by family and friends, sat with her husband beside her, choking back sobs. She had only ever seen him from a distance before.
“I couldn’t look at him,” she recalls. “I didn’t want to speak to him. As a little girl I’d always dreamed of a perfect wedding day. The sick reality was I was marrying a relative. It was a nightmare.
“After the ceremony I sat on a bed in his home that was decorated with petals for our wedding night. Haram locked the door and began to touch my face and take my jewellery off. His hands made me feel nauseous.
I kept brushing them away, repeating ‘no.’ Tears rolled down my cheeks and, even now, I cannot talk of that night as it totally disgusts me.”
The following day Khaleda could take no more, running back to her mother—but she was furious.
“She told me I was married and I would just have to get on with it,” she says, “I was distraught and felt so betrayed. I couldn’t believe how my parents could have done this to me.”
For the next four weeks Khaleda lived with Haram and his family. During this time she regularly texted and rang Phil. Eventually, she was sent back to the UK, to find work. Haram would follow once he’d received his visa.
As soon as the plane touched down at Manchester Airport, Khaleda ran into a waiting Phil’s arms.
“Seeing Phil again made me realise how much I loved him. I knew then we could never be apart again,” she says.
Within four months the rest of Khaleda’s family and Haram had come back to the UK, living again in the three-bedroom house. Haram was expected to share the bedroom with Khaleda but she made excuses and always ensured she slept on the sofa.
“My worst nightmare was that I would get pregnant,” she says. “But it wasn’t only the thought of having a baby with Haram that revolted me, I was simply terrified that any baby would be terribly deformed or even stillborn.”
Research has shown that babies born to cousins are twice as likely to suffer a birth defect than one born to a couple who are not related. While the risk is lowered if someone marries their father’s cousin, it is still “reasonably high,” an expert said.
So Khaleda refused to sleep with her husband and her whole family refused to speak to her.
“Then one day, about six months after we married, I went to my bedroom to get changed to find Haram lying on my bed,” she says, “I just looked at him and realised I couldn’t go on living like this, desperately unhappy, as an unwelcome stranger in my own home.”
The following day, when everyone was out, Khaleda plotted her escape.
“There wasn’t time to pack,” she explains, “so I quickly gathered up just my passport and a small make-up bag. Then, I took a few photos as mementoes of my family and walked out.”
Khaleda knew her family would report her missing so she fled to London, staying with a friend of Phil’s. A few days later the couple flew to France, staying in cheap hotels, and later with friends abroad, for three months.
When she came back to the UK, she found she was listed as a missing person and the police wanted to speak to her.
Once she explained her plight they put her in touch with IKWRO, an organisation that helps women in such situations, and it helped her and Phil find safe accommodation.
“But then a relative, a distant cousin, told Phil in March last year that my mother was seriously ill and had been asking for me,” she says.
Worried her mum would die and she’d never see her again, Khaleda went back home with a police escort, only to find her mother was well.
“It was just a trick to get me to come back,” she says. “This time I told them I was leaving and I wasn’t coming back at all. I haven’t heard from my family since and I have to accept that I won’t ever see them again.”
Khaleda went into hiding in London. Since then a friend of Phil’s has been threatened by thugs, who said they’d put a gun to his head because he wouldn’t reveal the couple’s whereabouts.
Consequently, today, they live under police protection, their flat alarmed to alert the local police station.
“While I know I made the right decision to leave, I have lost all my confidence and I am frightened that a relative will see me and find out where I am, and there could be reprisals,” she says.
“Sometimes I just sit and cry and I’ve since been prescribed anti-depressants by my GP.
“I feel so guilty at the shame I know my family has suffered and not a day goes by when I don’t wonder how my mother is. I miss them so much.
“Even as a Muslim I have no idea why families want to intermarry like this. I can only think it is to keep wealth within the family. But unless this practice is outlawed, more young Muslim women like me will have their lives ruined.”
Sadly, Khaleda’s future is far from clear. She longs to marry Phil but is still legally wed to Haram.
“I desperately want a divorce but I am too frightened to make contact,” she says. “And as for my career, well, I am too scared even to pursue my dream as a teacher.”
And so another young Muslim woman’s life is ruined by this outdated practice. Just how many more babies will have to be born deformed, or even dead, before it is finally stopped?
(Posted on February 12, 2008)
Comments
Oh well - another example of Muslim peace-loving men….forced marriages…rapes…all in the name of Allah, and their screwed up faith.
Posted by lydia at 7:21 PM on February 12
Another enriching tale of life in Multicult England. But not only is it a tragedy for this innocent woman, it’s another nail in the coffin for English people. Having married what sounds like an Englishman - Phil, they will have mixed race children and add to the melting pot mess.
Arc.
Posted by Arcadian at 7:33 PM on February 12
It will never be stopped. Islam means “Submission”, with all that such a culture demands. With the vast majority of her race with a lower IQ, more with no schooling except for Jihad schools and religious laws that make a woman property, she has no chance. Look for her to be found dead from a honor killing in a newspaper near you.
Posted by WhiteBread at 7:52 PM on February 12
THIS IS DISGUSTING!!!
Posted by Dan at 8:40 PM on February 12
And the Archbishop of Canterbury wants to legitimize sharia. Who is more disgusting, primitive muslims or White marxists who should know better (even if they hide in ecclesiastical robes they in which they have no faith)?
Posted by Flamethrower at 9:23 PM on February 12
“Khaleda’s parents, Miryam and Khalid, came to Britain from Pakistan in the mid-1960s in search of work and a better way of life.”
No they didn’t, they wanted to bring their life with them and that’s exactly what they did. Moreover, they attempted to force their children to practice their beliefs even on pain of death. Why are people so foolish as to think they can relocate themselves to a completely alien culture, one that is practically diametrically opposed to their own, and hang on to their entire former way of life? Even if, through great personal struggle, they are able to cling to all the aspects of their culture there is no guarantee that their children will. If they wanted to live as Pakistanis and raise their children that way, then maybe they should have relocated back to Pakistan.
Posted by idareya at 9:53 PM on February 12
Marrying a relative is IN-breeding, not INTER-breeding.
Posted by at 12:39 AM on February 13
And if one were to speak of that which brings such evil into Britain, would he not call it mindless, protoplasmic, footstomping commercialism? None can convince me that wretched guilt over the Suez Crisis is the reason.
Posted by Robert Binion at 5:12 AM on February 13
http://www.answering-christianity.com/cant_force_marriage.htm
“The above Noble Verse 4:19 and the Sayings of our beloved Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him clearly explain that according to Islam, whether the woman is virgin or not, her permission is a MUST. Her father or older brother can not force her into marriage as the Pagan Arabs and the Jews and Christians before Islam in the Middle East used to do; see Deuteronomy 25:5 in the Bible to see how women are forced into marriage.”
Posted by Sonya at 5:51 AM on February 13
Islam is completely incompatible with the Western world, and it’s time for the West to accept it. Islam must be banned from all Western lands, immediately.
Posted by Visine at 8:47 AM on February 13
The scary thing about this article is its true, this backward asian culture is the future of the uk, but i still feel that the press is reporting more of this crazy backward stuff which might help show people the true face of islam and immigration, just today all danish papers republished the mohammed cartoons in solidarity with the artist who made them because of a plot to kill him by 3 arabs, also gert wilders is to release a movie about the koran in march the dutch goverment has put its police on alert for possible violence from turks and arabs, who knows maybe a awakening will come you never know
Posted by at 10:50 AM on February 13
Sadly, Khaleda’s future is far from clear. She longs to marry Phil but is still legally wed to Haram.
Use the Pauline privilege.
Oh wait… Europe is no longer Christian… d’oh!
Posted by Brendan at 1:44 PM on February 13
And the Archbishop of Canterbury wants to legitimize sharia. Who is more disgusting, primitive muslims or White marxists who should know better
Those useful idiots (the White Marxists) are going to be the first ones liquidated when Sharia law is declared in Britain.
Posted by qwerty at 2:37 PM on February 13
To Sonya: I would like to know just how many Christian women have been forced into marriage as this poor Muslim woman was. I cannot think of anyone I know that has been forced to marry a close relative and threatened by death when she left. If you wanted to tell the entire truth about Islam and marriage you would have said that the woman’s silence was her consent. In other words, she does NOT have to consent.
Posted by Spartan24 at 3:42 PM on February 13
To Sonya
Out of interest are you a convert to Islam? If so then you do know they find dogs unclean. In Islam a woman’s primary role is to be a good housewife and mother so out of curiousity do you fit those two categories at least? Finally please don’t give me a lecture on the virtues of Islam as every Muslim man I’ve met have held extremely misogynistic, homophobic and outdated views.
Posted by dom21 at 4:16 PM on February 13
What a far-sighted person Enoch Powell truly was.
Posted by at 10:48 PM on February 13
Phil is a race traitor.
Posted by at 12:27 AM on February 14
“see Deuteronomy 25:5 in the Bible to see how women are forced into marriage.””
This well could have been true back in biblical times but we are talking about today. How many christians are forced into marriage today? The answer, none. Tiny bizarre sects that call themselves christian don’t count.
Posted by kc at 2:53 AM on February 14
Spartan24 wrote: I would like to know just how many Christian women have been forced into marriage as this poor Muslim woman was.
Back in “the day” it did happen, and it is sanctioned in the old testament. These days it does not happen in most Middle Eastern countries either, Pakistan is a Hindu/Indian hybrid and they still mimic much of the Indian culture with regard to females.
dom21 wrote: Out of interest are you a convert to Islam? If so then you do know they find dogs unclean. Finally please don’t give me a lecture on the virtues of Islam as every Muslim man I’ve met have held extremely misogynistic, homophobic and outdated views.
Yes many Muslim men are chauvanists. Many non-muslim men are chauvanists too, the fact that western laws protect women from much of that comes in handy. Believe me plenty of the men on this forum would love to do away with those “evil feminist laws” that prevent them from forcing women into lives as house wives and baby machines.
Regarding dogs, nothing in the Quran itself disparages dogs.
Posted by Sonya at 8:07 AM on February 14
Another thing, as twisted as this whole forced marriage to relatives thing is, in societies such as rural Pakistan it does have benefits for the females.
They are vulnerable and very ripe for abuse among the husbands family, if they are genetically related to that family it provides some natural protection from abuse. The grooms family is less likely to abuse a woman they are related too, and the close family ties discourage it even further. Women that marry get married off to complete “strangers” are often much worse off.
Posted by Sonya at 8:14 AM on February 14
Mark my words, the suggested cure to this inbreeding culture will probably be to further encourage them and white people to breed with each other.
Islam is a major problem in Europe and religion and culture are important factors, but the really important factor in the longer perspective is race. Even if all these people gave up their backward ways and became “modern” and “westernised” over night they are still of another race. If ethnic Norwegians or Dutch became muslims in droves it wouldn’t be good, but it wouldn’t be a disaster. It would not result in turning Norway into a third world dump. Many don’t realise, or dare to realise, that the core issue in Europe and America is race, not religion or culture, but race. We are not all the same, we are not all equal, we are not all blank sheets at birth.
Posted by Swede at 8:33 AM on February 14
Sonya is probibly a single convert to Islam. I knew plenty like her when I was a Muslim almost 20 years ago, she has pie in the sky ideas about what Islam is like and is listening to what the other Muslims say about how women are to be treated in Islam. Once she marries a Muslim man, especially one from the Middle East, she will learn about just how badly most Muslim women are treated. She will either be slapped around for any and every little infraction, even if it is made up or ignored except for sex. If she is not a good breeder she will be exchanged for another model. She should forget about dinners out or other activities with her husband out in public, this is not done. The four walls of her home will become her prison since she will not be allowed outside unless necessisary. Sonya, I am not saying this to be mean, get out while you can and you can have a good life. Not all men will abuse and isolate you.
Posted by Spartan24 at 10:39 AM on February 14
The reason that all societies have required women to bear children is because it is a necessary task that only women can do. Liberal societies have freed women from this duty, and are declining as a result. And the smarter the woman, the more likely she is to forgo childbearing for a career. We are still bound by the laws of nature, stupid people will tend to have stupid children, and smart people smart children. The greatest contribution to society that a woman who intelligent enough to become a doctor can make, is to have eight kids. Biology trumps politics, with regard to sex as well as race. What is labeled “sexism” is simply common, and scientific sense. WN should recognize that feminism is just more of the anti-White cultural poison that we’ve been fed for decades, and accept that a lot of breeding will be necessary if we are ever to recover from the damage done to us. Don’t call me names, just explain how the White race can compete with the Chinese if White women, especially the intelligent, don’t have White babies.
Posted by Schoolteacher at 2:10 AM on February 15
It may well be true that cousin marriage has the advantage for the woman in Pakistan that she is less likely to be abused by her husband and his family if she is related to them, in fact I find this highly likely. However, considering the low position of women in such societies, the protection of women was no doubt the least of the reasons for this system of marriage. Further, even if this was a reason for cousin marriage it would just go to show how violently misogynistic this way of life is that a daughter would be so at risk from an unrelated man and his family that she has to be married to a cousin.
Many people have been wondering why a senior Labour figure has raised this issue. I fear we are going to see a turn away from “multiculturalism” towards “integration” in which the political elite promotes the merging of the immigrant population with the native one by miscegenation. I also fear people may be misled by this, in that they may not see such condemnations of immigrants for not “integrating” for what they are.
Posted by Ed at 6:50 AM on February 15
To Sonya
Please visit www.faithfreedom.org to learn more about Islam and their noble(cough,cough) Prophet so you can develop a balanced view on the religion.
Secondly muslims do hate dogs because when I was at High school Islamic friends refused to visit my house simply because I had a harmless Bull mastiff. In Iran the Mullahs even threatened to start hanging dogs because they are “Un-Islamic”.
Finally by referring to mothers as “baby machines” shows you have a contempt for motherhood ( Un-Islamic again).
Posted by dom21 at 8:48 AM on February 15
Spartan24 you are amusing, thank you for your condescending concern but it is truly not necessary. Your views on the neediness and vulnerability of women show that perhaps your mind is still polluted by your Muslim upbringing. I am probably older than you, so my view on life is not nearly as simplistic, and I am not vulnerable to the manipulations of “superior males”. Well okay I can be manipulated for a few hours, when in the mood, but that is the limit.
Posted by Sonya at 8:50 AM on February 15
“The above Noble Verse 4:19 and the Sayings of our beloved Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him clearly explain that according to Islam, whether the woman is virgin or not, her permission is a MUST. Her father or older brother can not force her into marriage as the Pagan Arabs and the Jews and Christians before Islam in the Middle East used to do; see Deuteronomy 25:5 in the Bible to see how women are forced into marriage.”
Posted by Sonya.
Please Sonya, as a Muslim you know that the Koran is subject to interpretation by (male)immams and not women like you. But, in any case, as you and I know, these forced marriages really do exist. Therefore it is a fact that in Europe in 2008AD the interpretation of the Koran is an endorsement of forced marriage - unlike the thousands of years old comparative example you quoted from Deuteronomy in order to make the point… that Christians were/are just as evil as today’s Muslims???(careful!); and yes we all noticed the change of tense in your final sentence.
In Medieval Europe arranged marriages amongst the nobility and aristocracy were accepted, but I don’t recall tales of girls/women who were hunted down and murdered if they refused to marry the suitor, and if there were instances way back then, it was certainly not practiced to the extent that this crime is committed against women and girls by the practitioners of Islam today.
Arc.
Posted by Arcadian at 9:55 AM on February 15
Arranged and consequently forced marriages have nothing to do with islam. But they definitely have something to do with indian subcontinent patriarchal society. It affects all religions /christianity included/ in indian subcontinent. It is to do with medieval mindset of people living there regardless of their education or social status. Just have a look at america and all these highly educated indians shipping their arranged brides over. So let’s not be deceived by the veneer of education. It is only a utilitarian tool, on the inside they are deeply sunk in the middle ages.
Posted by at 11:42 AM on February 15
Arcadian wrote: you quoted from Deuteronomy in order to make the point… that Christians were/are just as evil as today’s Muslims???(careful!); and yes we all noticed the change of tense in your final sentence.
That paragraph was quoted from the site I linked too. Sorry if it sounded like I wrote it, I am not Muslim so I do not add the flowery “beloved piece be upon him” at every mention of Mohammed.
Arcadian wrote:In Medieval Europe arranged marriages amongst the nobility and aristocracy were accepted, but I don’t recall tales of girls/women who were hunted down and murdered if they refused to marry the suitor
You are right, arranged marriages were generally limited to the aristocracy. However what about common marriages? Even 150 years ago western society stripped women of nearly all rights when they married, all of their money became the property of their husband, men often had the legal right to beat their wives, and if their wives couldn’t stand it any longer they would leave with just the clothes on their back (forfeiting their children and any money they had). Compare that to the laws set forth in the Quran, a woman’s money is her own before, during, and after the marriage, dowries benefit the bride only. The Quran sets forth strict rules to prevent women from being married off for financial reasons, if a man were to marry a rich woman he can only benefit from her financial power at her whim, never as a matter of legal right.
Posted by Sonya at 7:21 AM on February 16
Sonya, you remind me of the ‘useful idiots’ I went to college with — the ones who would pull out the Soviet Constitution to ‘prove’ that the USSR was the freest country in the world.
Posted by at 11:30 PM on February 18
There is no point in having a debate with Sonya as she has obviously believed everything her muslim friends tell her. I used to hold positive views about Islam until as a British soldier during the “Aden emergency” I was nearly decapitated by one of them (I was only 17 years old).
Posted by at 4:21 PM on February 24