Dating an American guy has certain risks; dating someone from an oppressive towards women culture has different, higher risks, and it sounds like Blackberry has a pretty good handle on what these are. In a perfect world, any human woman and any human man could get together and be happy together; we don’t live in that world, and I don’t think it’s racist or prejudicial to see the world as it is, not as we want it to be.
I don’t want to address every point made in this thread, but one in particular stood out to me. The couple with the Muslim husband and Catholic wife, where the suspicion existed that he may “forbid” her from using birth control? Yea, thats kind of unreasonably prejudiced. CATHOLICS are not supposed to use birth control. Muslims, as far as I know, have no such prohibition.
Other than that I will just say this, I myself am Catholic, my husband is Muslim, and from a country that is not known for its equality. People often seem to put the cart before the horse with us. I am a modest person, reserved, perhaps. People have asked me if I dress or act the way I do because of my husband. Its silly to me, I was this way when we met. Now, that is probably why he liked me, that I did already have these qualities, but I don’t think there is anything wrong with that. We are compatible with each other.
I’m kind of glad that a lot of women would dismiss him out of hand for being foreign and Muslim. It was less competition for me I guess. We have been together for twelve years, and sure we’ve had our problems and issues over that time, but who doesn’t? I’ll say this, all of the women in my family, and all of my female friends are crazy about him. I have a nice life. Most of the men also, but there are a few who I think kind of resent him for making them look like demanding jerks.
People are often surprised to learn that our children attend Catholic school. They are also often surprised when they get to know him and find that he is actually a reasonable and rational person as opposed to some caricature of Arab or Muslim men that they imagine him to be. There are plenty of American men who could also fit that image, so, you know, people are not solely a product of their environment. (Who would have guessed it?)
Having said all that, I’m not going to lie now. Most of the Saudian guys I know are jerks. This guy may or may not be. Go for coffee or whatever, if he’s an ass, don’t bother with him any more. Use your best judgement. Personally, I tend to be suspicious of the stories about the foreign guy who was so wonderful and perfect when in the U.S. and then turns into Mr. Hyde as soon as he travels. People don’t work like that in my experience. If he’s a misogynistic POS, theres gonna be a hint of that at least.
I have to agree with the above.
This statement: “American culture is a million times more enlightened in that area than Saudi culture.” Really sat wrong with me in the “MILLION TIMES” and the use of “ENLIGHTENED”. Saudi and American cultures are very different. But, I’d hardly say American men are a MILLION times better and definitely not more ENLIGHTENED on average. American culture is more permissive and individualistic. I don’t personally agree with a lot of Saudi culture regarding the treatment of women, but that grand generalization is pretty insulting.
Based on interactions with Saudi men in Bahrain, they’re quite capable of NSA hookups without suddenly being overcome with the urge to kidnap and prosecute women. So, you would probably be safe getting to know him if you really wanted to.
This is accurate. If you want a provider and a traditional she-stays-home-to-rear-babies life, I’d say go for it. But if not…
My dad is a good egg – I love him – but he does not, by any stretch, consider me “equal” to my brothers and always had unreasonable expectations about my upbringing that differed from my brothers’ upbringing. Fortunately I have a very socially liberal mother who he’s always deferred to, albeit grugingly. And even more fortunately, neither of them are religious. Dad’s a free thinker, not bigoted or racist in the least – but still mysogynistic.
But would I, a 25 year old product of an interracial marriage, ever marry anyone from a non-western style country (Israel, western europe, north america, etc)? Never, never in a million billion years.
Yeah, what manila is saying is not a joke. My dad’s parents did not attend their wedding because they disapproved of my mother wholly and completely. For all intents and purposes, my dad was fully prepared to live a life that did not have his parents in it. ((His siblings – he has a very progressive sister – were still in contact, but you’ve gotta have balls of steel to say sayonara to your parents and put all your eggs in your new spouses’s basket, so to speak))
Now, my grandparents came around – when I was born and they wanted to see me. But their ignorance reared its ugly head from time to time – for instance, they blamed my vitiligo on the “mixing” of my parents, which is hell on a 9 year old.
So really, what is the point of this thread again?
I’ve been approached by at least three people who wanted to practice English with me (I’m American). None of them kidnapped me or threw me into any compounds. “Practicing English” amounted to spending time together, learning about each other’s backgrounds and cultures and my paying attention to his skills and correcting him.
One was a married Korean (wandered up to me in the street) guy studying for his MBA. He ended up showing me around Soul Korea for three days straight (all at his expense). We had a great time and his wife was lovely.
One was a German Technician (asked me on a ski lift) migrating from British English to American. We spent several weekends skiing together and he ‘forced’ me onto black diamond slopes while I corrected his confused terms.
One was a Turkish man (asked me at a drive through) and we became friends for about two years. Twice he hosted me in Turkey and it was a wonderful way to see the country.
All of them could have easily asked any of a couple hundred other Americans in the area. I was happy to spend the time with them because it was fun and I learned something new.
Jerks as in their treatment of women, or some other way…?
And yeah, I always think there had to be some red flags when American men turn out to be jerks even when people claim there weren’t. Same for foreigners, I’m sure.
I say “a million” about everything, so don’t take that too seriously. But if allowing women to speak to unrelated men is not more enlightened than not allowing women to speak to unrelated men, among a million (see?) other examples, then I must be really confused about what the word means.
Well, I did say “in that area”, as in the treatment of women. I didn’t say in every way.
Yeah, I don’t think he’s going to kidnap me, I just hate the awkward phase of getting to know someone (and the language barrier doesn’t help) and don’t want to do it if there’s zero chance of us being compatible. And I don’t want a NSA hookup either.
I’ve been trying to figure out how to say something in this thread without getting jumped on from five sides, and it’s this:
Not all of us who would not date a Saudi Arabian man are doing it out of prejudice.
That doesn’t change the fact that it’s a huge cultural clash. I’m not saying American culture is bad…but let me put it this way.
I am Indian, and barely second-generation - that is, my parents came here when they were adults, but I was born in India (though raised here). I was immersed in my culture. By dating and eventually moving in with a non-Indian guy, I’ve cut myself off from a thousand and one things. Sure, my family still loves me, especially the extended family, but I and my SO will always be an outsider. He doesn’t speak the language, he doesn’t have the culture, and basically, he’s American.
Now I made that choice for myself, and I’m OK with it. I do miss some of the aspects that I would have gotten had I married a nice Punjabi boy. My family would have loved him; we would have flown to India far more often, etc. And there are things I don’t miss. Like not having kids - I think for sure I would have had a much more difficult time had I married an Indian man with the clear expectation of not having kids.
I guess what I’m trying to say is, there’s more than just him and her to consider. Cultures do matter, and clashes do happen. And the question is really - do you want to go through all of that? Are you willing to?
Now my family could forgive me almost anything but I know one thing that would totally cut me off from them is if I married a Muslim man. Yes, that’s prejudiced on many levels of them, but I am not willing to give up the last bit of family support and the love I have from them. I was willing to compromise on it; hence my current SO, but not lose them entirely.
Said Saudi Arabian man is going to have to make similar choices. Maybe he already made them. Maybe he won’t decide yet. Maybe he won’t realize until he’s 40 how important his family is to him - I know now that what I have of my family, is just enough and also, I don’t want to lose it. All of this needs to be considered.
I don’t think it’s as simple as just saying Muslim men are less enlightened or American men are the greatest thing since sliced bread. It’s a difference in culture and values and it’s a good thing the OP is considering it, and not just going blindly into it. The fact that she is considering it actually might mean the relationship has a better chance of working.
Let us know how it goes!
You should probably also explicitly ask whether he’s talking to (in preparation for marriage) or seeing anyone as a lot of people may seem single but really aren’t. A lot of people from the Middle East and South Asia don’t declare their girlfriends/boyfriends publicly until right before the marriage or a formal engagement-I’m sure it’s for many reasons, but part of it is that when you publicly introduce someone to friends and family it’s generally assumed you are going to marry them, so couples tend to be sly about it till they are formally out about their engagement. My sister and brother-in-law were together for three years before they got married and my parents didn’t say a single thing to any one of their friends until the engagement was announced. One of my fiance’s best friends just contacted him four days ago and said “hey I’m getting married in November, I beat you to the altar” and this was a month after my SO had called him to tell him of our wedding, and his friend didn’t even let slip that he was with someone or trying to meet someone.
Sorry to disappoint but I’ve looked at most of the apologetic or exculpatory stuff put out by Mahmoody and his supporters. Don’t happen to buy it.
Sure there is a difference in dating a Saudi man today and marrying an Iranian in 1984…but not much difference in how those societies treat women, then and now. And the only Saudi’s I’ve personally known have very close ties to their home country, culture and relatives. So any woman getting intimate with such a man better be prepared to deal with his culture and its expectations, sooner than later.
I also vividly recall one Saudi officer I met in a US military school who would take out photos of his wife and children back in Saudi at the drop of a hat and pass them around the classroom…and within hours would be prowling the streets of Memphis looking for white (he specified the color, not me) women to take back to his quarters so he could regale us the next day about how these women did this and that to him. Not a behavior exclusive to Saudi men I’m sure, but nonetheless something I distinctly recall.
Don’t see Muslims as scary, only some of the behavior some of them practice.
Have some female friends whose personal experience tends to make me more comfortable on the cautious side of this argument.
Also know at least one conventional Christian American woman who has been happily married to a Muslim man, and who even converted to his faith. They still live in the US and frequently travel back and forth, with their children. One boy (now a man) went sideways and became a ne’er-do-well but that can happen to any family.
In any event, my personal experience and that of those I know, makes caution in this area justified. As the saying goes, trust - but verify. Know what you are potentially getting into.
I have a university friend that will be celebrating her 25th anniversary soon with her husband who is U.S. born of Iranian immigrant parents. Of course, his parents left Iran specifically because they were basically atheists and opposed the religious nature of the government there. His mother sometimes wears a headscrarf because it’s “damn easier than fixing her hair,” but she often physically touches (hugs) non-family men.
We went to a bar and had a couple drinks, so that answers that question. I was really worried about it being awkward, but it was no more awkward than any other first <whatever>. We had a nice time and laughed a lot.
But I brought up the subject of women’s rights in Saudi Arabia and as it turns out women are pretty happy not working and don’t really need to drive (but he thinks they’ll be allowed to drive within a few years and didn’t seem at all bothered by that). He said I’m very shy and that it’s good for women to be shy. He’s 29 and assumed I was about 21, and didn’t seem overly pleased to learn that I’m 30. Didn’t act rude at all or anything but just kept saying how good it was that I look young. I get that from American men too though, often ones several years older than me, that were still hoping I was even more years younger than them, so whatever I guess.
We probably definitely (yes, probably definitely) have unresolvable differences, so I don’t know what will happen next, but he still seems interested even though I’m old and not religious and have a kid and hate the desert, so I feel non-rejected and that’s nice even if it’s still not going to work.
The underlined part made me laugh out loud.
In 1968, my father got hired as HR manager for a new factory; they needed to hire the whole crew. Making a long story short, every single manual laborer in the Production area ended up being a woman (more than 60% of total workers were women). A lot of their husbands, and of the husbands of women who got on the “call for temping” list, were surprised to discover that their women hadn’t been perfectly happy as housewives. This was the first factory in the area to offer permanent jobs to women with no administrative training; the jobs previously available to women required being a nun or unmarried (single/widowed), or training these women didn’t have and could not get.
Only because someone isn’t bemoaning a fate she can’t change doesn’t mean she’s happy with it.
Yeah, ‘pretty happy not working’, is shining you on, he doesn’t want to talk about this, any further, as he will look misogynist. He knows it, too!
The only possible response to the statement that “Women are pretty happy not working” is “What, *all *of them?”
Looking at the lifestyles that some upper middle class and rich Saudis have, I am sure many are delighted to not be working working. Work would interfere with those great shopping outings in Knightsbridge, South Kensington, Oxford Circus and Bond Street.
How wonderful it must be for the people of Saudi Arabia, a place populated entirely by members of the upper middle class.
So that’s the only opportunity those women get? Shopping excursions? There are no women there that would like to excel in education, teach the new generation, become a doctor, lawyer, scientist, or even just maybe work at Macy’s because they get a really awesome employee discount?
I would love to be rich. I’d probably still work, or volunteer, at least a couple of times a week. Shopping is not personal fulfillment. I’m sure some women enjoy it. I’m sure just as many women would like some meaning to their lives, something more than just shopping.
What did he say when you told him you had a kid?
As an old-school feminist, I think we are better served by looking for commonalities with other oppressed women, instead of sneering, stereotyping, and describing them in terms that allow us to dismiss them as objectionable people.
Of course, only a lunatic would argue that being rich and oppressed is not a thousand times better than being poor and oppressed. And I have no doubt that there are wealthy women in Saudi who are appallingly shallow.
But if we resort to the formulation that all are Saudis bad, because they are either cruelly oppressive men or lazy shopping-obsessed women, there’s no hope, ever, for any kind of true rapprochement across cultures.
Full disclosure - I am no fan of many aspects of Saudi culture and saw some of its excesses when I lived in Egypt (a prime tourist destination for Saudis on honeymoon, gambling, or on the prowl). It doesn’t surprise me in the least that the OP’s potential paramour is shaping up as someone she won’t want to date. But its important that she comes to this conclusion by talking to him as a person, not by jumping to conclusions based on his nationality. Who in this thread would be comfortable being judged solely on their nationality (or religion), with no effort to get to know you as a person? Not me, that’s for sure.