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This commentary addresses what many Pakistani-American families may encounter or perhaps have already encountered - that is the marriage of their desi child to a non-Muslim, non-Pakistani man or woman.

Many parents may be wondering why such marriages occur with a growing frequency with each passing year? And for those who think that this would never happen to your own child, please wake up and read on. The answer is simple: the rules imposed upon us as children are now backfiring. A gender barrier was erected in front of us as children and now, the repercussions are being felt. The typical responses may be along the lines of: “We raised our children correctly”; “We should not have let our child go away to college”; “It is the Western culture to blame.”

Unfortunately, by the time your child began college the damage was already done. The problem began when we were children. Growing up in the US, attending desi functions with our parents up to and through college, Pakistani parents always encouraged a separation of the sexes. This separation was more obstinately followed at the Islamic Center. No commingling is the rule! Separating the desi boys from the desi girls began innocently enough in elementary school, continued through junior high and high school and persists even through the college years. At desi functions, I watched older siblings deal with this dilemma to no avail and watched repeatedly, our parents split up at the door and each one settling at the men’s or women’s side of the party. During the last 30 years, this illogical separation has become an inherent aspect of Pakistani-American culture.

Yet during all this time, Pakistani children were quickly growing into teenagers and then young American adults. In their alternate lives, Pakistani-American kids have been exposed to young people of all different races, cultures, colors, and yes, both sexes. The only group that a young desi boy did not have much contact with was the enigmatic and unapproachable desi girl. Not only a lack of contact, but a complete prohibition. As commonly occurs, the young desi need not bother with the difficult situation of dating another desi and the community gossip that ensues, when so many other people are readily available with no such barriers.

Attempts to defend with such statements as “we did not let him go out with any girls” do not have any merit. Parents need to realize what growing up in the US is truly like. Your children deal with the opposite sex everyday of their lives. Relationships are formed during lunch at the school cafeteria, in the library, during extra-curricular activities, on the street corner, at work, or at any another infinite sources. And yes, on the weekends when your child was going out with friends, he or she was invariably going someplace where the opposite sex was well represented.

A psychological barrier, manifesting itself in young adult desis, is created due to the separation of the sexes. Over the years, for a desi, dealing with a desi of the opposite sex became taboo. As we got older, we became more cognizant of what attracts somebody to someone else. The result being, it is much easier to deal with and feel more comfortable with a non-desi of the opposite sex. Unsurprisingly, the manner in which we were raised leaves an indelible mark upon us as adults. This, as I have pointed out, will result in an increase of mixed marriages to the horror of many parents and to the disappointment of the Pakistan community. But as parents, you have no one to blame but yourselves.

Now, as your child is finishing undergraduate or graduate school, and becoming, by most cultural standards, of marrying age, parents are now encouraging their kids to meet a desi man or woman. Parents drag their children to Pakistani and Islamic conventions, to dinner parties, and traipse them around at weddings proudly displaying their “tall, fair skinned” son or daughter for all to see (like cattle to the mundi in Pakistan).

On a side note, the “fair skinned” complexion issue further exacerbates this dilemma. Parents are foolish to encourage their daughters to look as “fair” or “European” as possible. This results in a child being confused and ashamed of their culture and more profoundly, of their self-image. Furthermore, such obsession about inherent physical characteristics endorses xenophilia, and the antiquated notions of misogyny and racism.

Unfortunately, the parents are not marrying the eligible bachelor. Parents have never encouraged their children to have relationships with their Pakistani friend’s children of the opposite gender. Such relationships ultimately would result in life long friendships, potentially marriage. Thus, combining the factors - psychological barrier, lack of encouragement, indifference to parent’s desires, and parental pressure - it is much easier and (parents remember this) just as satisfying for the young desi to have a relationship with a non-desi.

The evidence is overwhelming. This dilemma manifests itself in the desi community curiously, in that it is very rare for two desi’s from the same city to marry. Look at any other community and the amount of marriages that are encouraged and fostered between the children of friends within the same town is very high. The reason is obvious: these young couples grew up together, they went to the same places of worship, they spent time together as children, and there was parental encouragement. But now, as adults, they marry who they are most comfortable with, those who share their norms and mores, and by choice, and to the community’s delight, they marry each other. Why look elsewhere, when everything one wants is right in front of one’s eyes? Desi parents stumbled with this idea.

Now Pakistani parents are stressed out conducting national and at times, international searches for a suitable partner for their kid. It is a difficult, pressure-oriented, and time consuming job - calling, traveling, networking, politicking at a fever pitch for potentially years on end and perhaps to no avail. The parents, with all the good intentions in the world, have created this problem for themselves and if blame is to be placed, it should not be on the child or the US, but on the community which fosters this inane system, that being the Pakistani-American community.

The older Pakistani folks with whom I have spoken regarding this issue, all seem to agree, but perhaps they are more enlightened than most and hindsight is always 20/20. Additionally, when they were growing up in the newly formed Pakistan, segregation based upon sex never occurred. It was with the arrival of the desi in America, and most probably in England as well, that this began. A feeble and poorly calculated attempt not to lose some type of desi value system which did not have this prohibition as one of its tenants. It was a reaction to culture shock that is understandable. At the time, it may have seemed innocent enough and as children ourselves, we did not really care either. But as teenagers and then as young adults, we did care, but the gender gap was now part of our psyche and so your kid married a white girl.

Inter-marrying is an inevitable part of cultural assimilation, it has happened to every ethnicity that immigrated to the US. To make a young desi want to marry another desi, the younger generation of parents with young children must attack the problem of retaining one’s culture in a different way. As we are seeing, the current system is not fostering community or the continuation of that community for the following generations. Freedom to know each other as children will result in choosing to marry a desi for oneself and not for one’s parents nor the community he or she happens to reside.