An 18 year old Saudi girl on May 24th shot herself with her 50ish husband’s rifle only a week after the nuptials. She left a note asking her family to forgive her and to pray for her. She also requested that her mother be the one to prepare her body for burial. According to the family, she had agreed to the marriage but had shown signs of depression the weeks leading up to the wedding and the first few days after marriage.
I thought about not writing about her but then I remembered what one social worker told AlRiyadh Newspaper that she knows of 3,000 child-bride marriages to much older men just in the past year. If an 18 year old would rather die, can you imagine how those 11 and 13 year olds feel?
I can pretty much guess the tactics that the family used to get acquiescence. I’ve seen it happen time and time again. One girl I know when she refused a suitor that her family liked, they ground her while her mother nagged her about it and her teen brother refused to eat or drink until she agreed to marry the suitor. This was a girl fresh out of high school. Â Although the groom was in his twenties, the girl was obviously not ready. While they were dressing her for the wedding, she told everyone that she will be single within a week. Surely enough a week later she came home and locked herself in her room until her husband divorced her. Unfortunately she had gotten pregnant and their child was raised by parents that should never have been.
Depression and suicide are a sad reality no matter where you live and whatever your background. However they should not be caused by being deprived of choice. Pressuring young women to get married might be a lesser evil than child marriages but it is an evil nevertheless.
Sources:
Saudiwoman's Weblog 
Do these people forget in their ignorance that the whole point of asking the bride & the groom at the time of marriage in Islam if they agree is that both are getting into this relationship with complete concent & if either one is being forced the marriage is incomplete.
Dear Sameera they don’t and didn’t forget, just chose to ignore that rule of God. Don’t worry God is watching.
Very sad. I read it in Al Madina Newspaper and I really felt sad for the young lady. I think human rights should sue her parents or who ever forced her to marry the dude!
Maybe when parents, brothers or the gurdian knows that there are legal issues with forcing women to marry, they will stop doing it.
Breaks my heart…
it is disheartening to read news like this. Where is “child-rights”/freedom? in our country Nepal we have 1000’s of paper orphans and 1000’s of girl child being sold for prostitution to India, Thailand and other countries. It’s depressing to read stories like these.
May her soul RIP.
salam
the first time i’m online & reading how foreigners criticizes saudis – i actually defended you. i thought highly of you since you have mecca, medina. then i met some saudis online & somehow… i want to love saudis so much coz you’re my brothers. but these stories coming out of saudis, from saudis – & not from the foreigners anymore – i don’t know how to process it.
perhaps saudis is more well versed in islam since saudis actually understand arabic – deep in my heart i long for saudis to shine the light of islam like your ancestors did.
forced marriage is not right in islam. sucide is forbidden in islam. marriage should be a happy occasion uniting two families.
When any society bases all actions, rituals and association on material benefit, this sort of this happens. This is not specific to KSA, it happens in other Muslim Countries too. It has happened in Pakistan many times and it continues to happen. Fact of the matter is: These girls do not speak out because they have NO faith in our judiciary and decision makers. And rightly so. That is a REAL SHAME.
It is one thing to be a non-muslim society and learn through trial and error over a long period of time, like western countries and it is another to CLAIM to be MUSLIM countries that FOLLOW the Holy Quran and then have such issues in societies that are totally OUT of ISlam in faith and action.. is Hypocricy, which is worse then being a non-believer to begin with.
It is sad and it is a shame. May Allah have mercy on this Ummah. It is LOST!
sorry..grammer mistakes.. got emotions..
” this sort of THING happens..”
Such a loss! A human soul gone from this world because of avarice, conceit, misguidedness…
Shameful.
May all parents who force their daughters into marriages be haunted by the thought that they will rot in hell for causing such oppression and misery, Insha’Allah!
Assalamualaikum,
Most of the time I read about child brides, and sympathize with their ordeal. This time around, I’m startled that the youth resorted to suicide. Surely a life shouldn’t be lost due to forced-arranged marriages. How many more lives must be lost in the name of forced-arranged marriages? I shudder to think the unthinkable …
It is sickening to hear such things coming from your own society. When a person’s life is controlled, death becomes a way for freedom … because they can control it.
Over the last 6 months I have become increasingly immersed in my interest of Islamic countries, cultures and it’s people. I enjoy my stuies and the few pressious friendships that I am forging with Muslims born into the Islamic life. It is easy for me to regard Muslims as my equals, indeed, I have come to be very fond of one individual, and my respect for those Muslims, that have kindly befriended me, only grows with time and shared experiences.
My feelings have another tune to play. And over this time it has grown into a deep sadness and perhaps dispair. Where ever I have dug deeply to learn and understand thoroughly, the dark and inhumane realities of Islam form the bedrock that underscores the lives of Muslims. There is no way to burrow through.
If I could do one thing before I die, I would release Muslims from the their bondage.
Lars, you wish us well. Thank you.
But, I need to tell you this: Islam gives freedom to humans. Muslims are the ones who are not free from culture, ignorance and ego. That is why they are stuck. Not even God can free such creatures!
All that you see in Muslim countries is NOT ISLAM. It is Muslims abusing Islam. To understand Islam, you must read the Quran, not look at the muslims.
Just like the Christians and Jews, Muslims have also violated their Holy Book and gone against it. What you see in “Islamic” countries is what has ALREADY happened in Europe and the West. Experience, suffering and failure brings people back to their reality and we are bringing this on ourselves with our actions, hypocricy and twisted perceptions.
Bondage? That is the bondage: IGNORANCE.
When ignorant people become to religious, it is ugly – when educated people have no religion, it is also VERY ugly.. and that is the issue with Muslims all over the world today – not Islam.
alshah40, you say Islam gives freedom to humans, but you also than point out that it doesn’t. And it doesn’t. Islam may not be the bondage, but it is part of the problem, and offers no solution. It looks to me that Islam has a destinct leaning towards permissibility of oppressive cultural practises. Islam lacks definitive moral values that overide cruel, and unfair treatment of others. Compassion and kindness are of little worth, compared to getting up early for prayer, or following correct procedures when going to the toilet. The mind that is enslaved to this kind of distortion of priorities, can see the problem, but is held back from change, by Islam. ?
Is Allah not simply the textbook manifistation of a Dictator, with rules and punishments in the extreme, and is not Allahs dictatorial rulership every Muslims house of bondage?
I feel that the character of Allah is one of a ridgid, uncaring, and cruel taskmaster and I wouldn’t want to go anywhere near him. And if he cannot set his people free, as you point out, than I suggest that he doesn’t want to. I’m sure he has You right where he wants You. And I find it very sad. I read Qur’an, and I engage many muslims in courtious debate, and very few Muslims read or know Qur’an at all. In my very limited experience.
Yours sincerely.
I hope you get rid of this horrible pressuring soon. It takes something like 40-50 years to get rid of it in Italy. You will way out.
Very interesting blog.
An Italian from Italy.
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Salam Eman.I just got into your blog by accident.Iam not a Saudi or ‘Arab’ but I grew up there(Jeddah) and was in Al-Manarat.
I don’t understand this thing of Saudis marrying off
their girls to 60 something and girl is 18.Okay in Islam it is permissible but the thing is you have to take permission of the girl.Why not reverse also
since it is also permissible in Islam Saudi male youth marry them off to 60 year old women.This is
also permissible.In this case too,father knows best.
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