When are you getting married ?
If you were to be a girl of my age, in her later twenties, having completed her degree and amidst the struggle of establishing herself as a career woman ; I am sure you would have encountered this question 'n' number of times by now - “ So, when are you getting married? ”. Yes, I have definitely gone through a lot of this in almost every other family function that I attended. I used to get annoyed the minute someone starts advising me to get married that I literally started avoiding attending any functions. A recent study has shown that about a quarter of millennial girls do not want to get married, ever.
I then wondered why marriage has become so undesirable? Marriage, in its ideal sense is about sharing our lifetime with our beloved where we enjoy trust, respect, commitment, understanding, sharing, friendship and faith. Marriage opens its door to love and life. However, in the real world of data, things shake out quite a bit differently.
From being mere housewives to holding big positions in the society, women have grown in their professional fields through these years. But however, the ideology of home being woman’s real domain and marriage being her ultimate destiny hasn’t changed much. Today women are allowed to the public space yet she is expected to manage it on her own, while maintaining her role as a homemaker.
In India, the marriage preparation course for a girl starts from childhood. She is expected to be timid and obedient at home. She is expected to learn all the household chores as the primary qualification to get married and her job would only be an added asset. Once she gets married, she is expected to change her surname. She is expected to move out of her family and get adapted to a new family, consider it as her own and spend the rest of her life living by the standards set by her in laws. She is expected to let go of her dreams when there arises a need. Her passion gets confined to the family.
If we were to ask those nosy aunties who always advised us to get married, if they were really happy with their married life, I am sure the answer would be a big “NO”. A recent paper by Stanford sociologist Michael J. Rosenfeld shows that women initiated roughly two thirds (69%) of the breakups in marriages and also women in marriages reported lower levels of satisfaction. Women experience the institution of marriage as oppressive.
Every girl dreams of finding her soulmate, getting married and living together until the end of time. It is the oppression and inequality that makes marriage undesirable for women. It is bitter when marriage becomes an end in itself. If marriage can assure respect, dignity, understanding and equality in sharing responsibilities, there would be no more need for the question “When are you getting married?” .
