Child marriage

[BlueDevil]

Some disturbing stuff.

Make sure you watch the video, it is compelling.

Before their wedding ceremony begins in rural Afghanistan, a 40-year-old man sits to be photographed with his 11-year-old bride. The girl tells the photographer that she is sad to be engaged because she had hoped to become a teacher. Her favorite class was Dari, the local language, before she had to leave her studies to get married.
She is one of the 51 million child brides around the world today. And it's not just Muslims; it happens across many cultures and regions.
Photographer Stephanie Sinclair has traveled the world taking pictures, like the one of the Afghan couple, to document the phenomenon. Christiane Amanpour spoke with Sinclair about a book which features her photographs called, "Questions without Answers: The World in Pictures by the Photographers of VII."

[Lilith]

Thanks for posting this, BD.. My daughter and I watched it together. I think we both feel unbelievably fortunate to have been born where we were.

[Aldaron]

I pointed this concept out to my mother some time ago, who was waxing lyrical about how much better things were in "the old days". I asked which old days she meant, and she sort of waved her hand and made reference to pre-Victorian England.

Funnily enough, this was right on the heels of her usual gripe that "children aren't allowed to be children anymore". So I pointed out to her that our then-15-year-old neighbour, who was at the time outside playing with her brother and my son in our pool, was quite happily "being a child". Yet in my mother's apparent-halcyon period of pre-Victorian England, our neighbour's mother would be trying to marry her off to a wealthy 40-year-old widower (whose wife had died in childbirth and left him alone with half a dozen children for whom he wanted a new mother).

But as usual, she couldn't see anything pre-1930s - 50s as being any different; in other words, she assumed that the entire history of the fucking world up to her own childhood was just like her childhood.

[rayne]

Thanks BD. Creepy yet compelling and so completely wrong.

[Darwinsbulldog]

Thanks BD.

I don't understand them, I don't want to understand them, I just want to kill them -pedophile rapists. "Cultural traditions indeed!"

[Glob]

Words cannot describe how disgusting and sad this is.

[EvilDRMike]

Thanks now I just feel sick. I really should not read these threads.

EDM

[CrazyAtheistFeminist]

My Legal teacher told me about this today! So sad... I can't imagine being married in year 5

There was a good TV show on the topic though called "The Truth About Child Brides" (http://www.throng.com.au/2012/05/the...-child-brides/)

It was even more of an eye opener to see what happens AFTER the marriage, and the regnancy complications. A common problem is tearing of the bladder and bowel causing incontinence and a bad smell.

It showed a hospital full of these girls whose husbands did not want them anymore because of the smell. No education, no job, no home.

But the show was a good one, very informative too.

[Bolero]

Originally Posted by Aldaron

I pointed this concept out to my mother some time ago, who was waxing lyrical about how much better things were in "the old days". I asked which old days she meant, and she sort of waved her hand and made reference to pre-Victorian England.

Funnily enough, this was right on the heels of her usual gripe that "children aren't allowed to be children anymore". So I pointed out to her that our then-15-year-old neighbour, who was at the time outside playing with her brother and my son in our pool, was quite happily "being a child". Yet in my mother's apparent-halcyon period of pre-Victorian England, our neighbour's mother would be trying to marry her off to a wealthy 40-year-old widower (whose wife had died in childbirth and left him alone with half a dozen children for whom he wanted a new mother).

But as usual, she couldn't see anything pre-1930s - 50s as being any different; in other words, she assumed that the entire history of the fucking world up to her own childhood was just like her childhood.

Yes, I often come across this phenomenon: people in my own culture are so unbelievably smug about how "we don't do that", they forget the "anymore" that inevitably goes along with it. They also often gloss over the fact that secularism and science have played crucial roles in establishing social circumstances whereby "we don't do that anymore".

[Seamus]

In pre Victorian and Victorian England,the age of consent was 12.

There was no such thing as 'childhood'; that was a bourgeois,mid Victorian invention. Children were considered and treated as little adults,which included being gaoled or hanged. Children began working in the fields,down the mines and in a factories from the age of 5 or younger.

In "Jack The Ripper's London" (1888) child mortality before the age of 5 was over 50%.

At that time ONE PERSON IN TEN in England had syphilis.That meant many thousands of children were born with that disease.

I grew up in the 1950's and have some very happy memories which have no doubt been edited by time,which has also softened some of the worst memories. (especially those involving pain)

Nostalgia isn't what it used to be,but then,it never was(anon)

References:

'The Victorians' A N Wilson,

"London:The Biography' Peter Ackroyd.