Saturday, December 22, 2012

The Case of Prematurely Marriage in Madura

Discussing prematurely marriage, admitted or not, the society of Madura is often shown as a good example. This is based on the reality in Madura’s society dealing with marriage; many parents have been seemingly nice to marry their children prematurely.

It is said premature because the child’s old is not enough for making family. Usually, the two couples are still under 17 years old (a phase of innocence and childhood). It is also said premature because many families were failed in that. Violences and cutting human rights often exist around the marriage.

The prematurely marriage is not something glad to do, but it has to be avoided and hit so that it will not hold our young generation. The prematurely marriage often makes future gone, and because of it, a young can not do anything. Furthermore, according to expert’s opinion, the prematurely marriage can cause undeveloping society in anyfield, such as education, economics, politics, and in sustaining country’s development. The point is that we have to avoid the prematurely marriage as well as we can.

In Madura, the prematurely marriage was operated long time ago. It is not found in Madura’s today. I think, the case of prematurely marriage, had not only been emerging in Madura’s society, but also in other areas throughout Indonesia. It can be said finished since early 20th century. It means after this country getting its independence at 17th of August 1945.

Arriving here, we may ask a question: how can it be? There are many causes to say. But before I explore them, I would like to tell you how the prematurely marriage walks in our society (the process of becoming, not causes), in this case, the society of Madura.

Ordering Child in Law

It is not only food can  be ordered, but also child. What does it mean? Here I will explain the extremest process of prematurely marriage cases in Madura. I am glad to say it as “ordering child/son in law”.

It is a story about two mothers in a day. The first and the second mother still do not have a child. But, with some determined reasons, they make a deal. It is to bond their child later (if they have) in a marriage. We can easily say like this: later if the first mother has son, and the second has daughter, the mothers will marry the son and daughter based on the deal made before. It will so and contrary. The conclusion is that the two mother make a deal about their child’s marriage too sooner; without knowing when they will have child (although there is no sign of pregnancy) and the child’s decision about his marriage.

After the bond, when the child comes (born), he just wait and see his marriage held by his parent. There is nothing to do. Although his old is still premature, but the bond demands him to be what his parent want.

This may be funny or crazy. But whatever you say, it is the reality in society of Madura long time ago. Now, what is the causes of the prematurely marriage so that the child can not determine his choice as his right?

The first, less-educationed people. Actually, the young generation is a great asset to develop a society even country. The society’s future is based on young generation movements. When this is forgotten, the future is surely gone. The Madura’s society do not know about this so that they consider their young generation become what they want, like in marriage case. This condition is known that the society of Madura are less in education, then economic development and other fields.

The second, economic demands. As far as I know, in Madura, when a family is holding a marriage party, it seem a requirement of the family to invite other families around. Then, the family invited seemingly has also responsibility to bring something like rice or money to the invitation. Practically, the host of the party can get many profits. They can use the money and sell the rice. On the first glance, it is very nice to be rich, although it has to be pay back later in the same occasion (marriage party of other families which have “lent” the rice and money). Whatever, it is good to overcome economic demands temporally.

So, we can get the point: the marriage can be one of strategies of society to overcome economic demands. When economic demands break, and accidentally a family have a son or daughter,  marriage party may be way to overcome. No consideration about son’s or daughter aspiration.

The third, fiqh legality. It means the concept of “virginity” (Indonesian: perawan; Arabic: bikr) and “parent can force” (Arabic: wali mujbir). This case is only for a daughter. It is said that parent can force his daughter to marry, if the daughter have got phase of marriage and she deny to marry). But, the parent’s error often happens here. Parents frequently do not care about their daughter’s old, so that they do wrong force. This concept, without clear explanation, can encourage violence. This concept surely does not mean making legality in prematurely marriage. The core meaning of this concept is to help daughter to find her couple. Because, it has been all-known that the daughter can not show her want and need to her parent, she may be shy. So it takes parent’s care to force. Besides, in marriage case, the doughter can never say “yes” in spite of her heart says “yes”.

Our Agendas

Although the prematurely marriage has been narrowly shrinking in Madura, but in the reality, it require other effort to maximize the rule of young. It is frequently still found that many young generations can not catch their right in anyfield of life, such as education and others, mainly young girl. This is our agenda after prematurely marriage. Then, the problem of Madura’s today is also about equality of rights between man and woman. The reality shows that man has more occation than woman almost in anyfield. These are our agendas to do seriously.***

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