International Marriage Broker Act passes! Plus, Bush admin refuses to release rules to help battered immigrant women.
| December 27th, 2005In 1997, Indle King Jr.’s wife divorced him. King had beaten her head against a wall, and she sought and got a protective order to keep King away from her. King felt victimized by the divorce settlement (still does, probably).
King’s first wife had been what people call a mail-order bride. So King went back to the internet and found a new wife, Anastasia Soloviev from Kyrgyzstan. Two years into their marriage, 20-year-old Anastasia King had realized that she married an abusive monster, and was seeking a divorce. Not wanting to pay a second divorce settlement, King recruited his friend Dan Larson to help him murder Anastasia. King, a big man, sat on Anastasia’s chest to hold her down while Larson strangled her.
They dumped Anastasia’s body. Then the newly-single King went back to the internet to find his third mail-order bride.
Fortunately, Anastasia’s body was found before King could close that transaction. King wound up getting a 27-year sentence (newspaper accounts say King’s testimony on his own behalf cleared up any doubt the jury was feeling). The trial was big news in Washington state, where Anastasia had lived, and the issue came to the attention of Washington Senator Maria Cantwell and Representative Rick Larsen. As a result, Congress this month passed The International Marriage Broker Act, which requires potential mail-order brides to be informed if their suitors have criminal histories or have had domestic violence complaints taken out against them.
Actually, there’s a lot more to the legislation; Bean, posting on her blog for the first time in months, describes the legislation in detail. There’s too much for me to sum up, so go over there and read her post. From Bean’s post:
Bean also discusses the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000. The most disturbing bit? In 2000, Congress created a class of visas - the “U visa” - for witnesses to and victims of “rape, torture, trafficking, incest, domestic violence, sexual assault, abusive sexual contact, prostitution, sexual exploitation, female genital mutilation” and a variety of other crimes. U visas are needed; they can give crime victims a way to avoid the impossible choice between staying with an abusive criminal or being deported.
Five years after Congress passed the U visa law, however, the law might as well have never been passed. Why? Because the Bush administration has refused to release rules for U visas, meaning that no one can get a U visa. (Women who would qualify for a U visa have been getting by with halfway measures and year-to-year visas in the meanwhile - if they’re lucky.) Sheer incompetence, or cold-hearted indifference? Who can even tell anymore?
UPDATE: See Ginmar’s post on this subject, as well.
December 27th, 2005 at 2:22 pm
Twenty seven years? That’s it, I’m back to Berkeley and we are really ceceeding this time, this country is too evil to live in.
This comment was written by ErikaGillian.Report this comment to the moderators
December 27th, 2005 at 9:49 pm
Personally, I wouldn’t mind seeing the whole “mail-order bride” industry closed down.
This comment was written by Glaivester.Report this comment to the moderators
December 28th, 2005 at 12:10 am
Personally, I wouldn’t mind seeing the whole “mail-order bride” industry closed down.
Difficult. What are you going to do, make it illegal for people to (say they’ve) fallen in love and want to be together? Immigration law is already a snake’s nest of contradiction and byzantine process. It’s hard to see how any new rules would ever be enforceable.
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
December 28th, 2005 at 4:37 am
A short while back, I asked Amp for an article on this subject. Here’s the reason for my interest:
My best friend, Ron, is married to a Filipino woman. She’s not a MOB; she was here (Scotland) as a student when they met, but his relationship with her put him into the filipino community in my home city, and through him, brought me into contact with it. This comunity appears to consist overwhelmingly of MOBs and their husbands. (I don’t know how many of them are, but there are very few adult Filipino men.)
A short while ago I asked him to explain how this worked. He seemed a little embarrassed at the question, but he answered honestly in my opinion. Of course this is just his opinion, and filtered through me.
According to him, British men (presumably it’s the same elsewhere in the West) who are unattractive to western women (he also suggested that maybe I should get one. Cheers Ron), often approaching middle age, and not particularly wealthy by western standards can get a woman who is young, very pretty, great in bed, relatively passive, and willing to fullfill the traditional role of a wife. He said that many of the women are virgins on their wedding nights. (How that makes them good in bed, I’m not sure.)
In return, money flows back to the Filipino family who are very often in dire poverty. So it’s an economic deal. I didn’t ask how much money, typically, would go to the family, or how that side of the deal is enforced. (I can’t imagine that there’s a written contract.) But it’s very important that the money does get sent back. He said that the women know that in many cases they will be basically sacrificing themselves for their family. On a couple of occasions at community events I’ve been rather obviously sized-up by unattached female family members presumably on tourist visas. I’ve no doubt that they know the score, and still regard it as a deal worth taking.
Even before I had read anything about it here, or done any other research, I thought this arrangement was a recipe for domestic abuse. He agreed that this did happen, but thought that maybe 60% of the marriages were successful, (which compares favourably with intracultural marriage in Britain.)
Solely my opinion now: It’s clear that ‘the community’ acts as a support network for many of these women. In another conversation with one rather obnoxious husband, he lamented that “you don’t just marry your wife, you marry the whole community”. He also complained about the expense. (He was clearly wealthy even by western standards, and was hosting a party for the comunity at the time, so I’d say that he was probably honouring his side of the deal, even though he was whinging about it.) What is not clear to me, is how many women aren’t supported, how many are isolated, either though choice (not many, I’d imagine) or by their husbands, and what (if anything) the community can do about it.
On the surface, the community looks like a picture of intercultural harmony. This is probably not the complete picture; I’ve no reason to believe that they would show their dirty laundry to me, nor do I have a sense of how big a pile there might be. But neither is complete the picture painted by women’s rights activists, of women coming across dreaming of western opportunity only to awaken to a nightmare of isolation and abuse.
This comment was written by Daran.Report this comment to the moderators
December 28th, 2005 at 7:44 am
The problem with the issue of mail-order brides and abuse is that while I don’t want abusive husbands to be able to hold deportation over their wives’ heads, I also don’t want to have people who want a “quickie path” to U.S. residence to be told that “just marry someone, and if you want out, you can claim he abused you.” Or alternately, a woman who wants to get into this country but who doesn’t want to be married for a long period of time could delierately marry an abuser so that she could leave as soon as he got violent.
The major reason I would think that the government is reluctant for MOBs to make it easy to get asylum for domestic abuse is to avoid people exploiting loopholes to get “quickie residency.” [At least, that's why I would be cautious about making asylum easy].
Of course, considering how little the Bush admin cares about reducing illegal immigration from Mexico, it is more difficult to see them motivated by such concerns, so perhaps misogyny is the explanation here.
[Of course, for someone who wants open borders or at least fewer immigration restrictions than we have now, this may not be seen as a problem].
In any case, severely restricting the purchase of mail-order brides would, in my opinion, reduce this dilemma greatly.
Which brings up the fact that I find I curious that the mail-order brides should be informed of a potential husbands’ domestic violence record, but domestic violence does not disqualify one from ordering a mail-order bride. It seems to me that someone who wants to get into the U.S. badly enough might marry someone even if she knew he was abusive, so I’m not certain that “informing” the brides provides anywhere near enough protection.
This comment was written by Glaivester.Report this comment to the moderators
December 28th, 2005 at 8:14 am
Wow, Daran. What you describe sounds like a description of prostitution. I hadn’t thought of it that way before. Thanks.
Glaivester, what do you think are the chances of this happening?
… a woman who wants to get into this country but who doesn’t want to be married for a long period of time could delierately marry an abuser so that she could leave as soon as he got violent.
It’s pretty much the same thing as playing Russian Roulette, only with a better chance of getting hurt or killed.
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
December 28th, 2005 at 9:12 am
There are problems the law cannot solve, and this sounds like one of them.
How should the law “prohibit” MOB’s and still allow people who have legitimately “fallen in love” (or who wish to marry for some other reason) to marry? How to deal with women who want to get to the US or the West at any price for whatever reason, who then claim domestic abuse? How to keep ugly, geeky (but reasonably well-to-do) men from in effect “buying” a bride? Can we? Should we, between consenting adults?
Human beings being what we are, I have no doubt whatever that what Daran says is true: some of these marriages work out magnificently for all concerned, by any measure. There is nothing, after all, to keep the lovely young foreign woman from actually discovering loveable qualities in the ugly geeky man and genuinely coming to love him, and vice versa. I’m sure this doesn’t always happen (!) but I’m equally sure it happens sometimes. Love, as we have all observed, does not follow anyone’s rules.
The legal situation as described in the original post sounds pretty complicated to me, so that any woman who wanted to take advantage of any of this should have a specialist lawyer. Now, at a certain level I think more work for lawyers is a very fine thing, but I’m wondering if it’s a social good.
This comment was written by Susan.Report this comment to the moderators
December 28th, 2005 at 10:52 am
It’s pretty much the same thing as playing Russian Roulette, only with a better chance of getting hurt or killed.
Yes. But people play Russian Roulette, the real kind, all the time. Because something is obviously stupid and self-destructive doesn’t seem to eliminate it.
This comment was written by Susan.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 6:52 am
bean:
I think the people who were arguing against outlawing MOBs were actually arguing not against the new law, but against me, as I suggested that the practive of MOBs be outlawed or severely regulated. (#3 and #6)
Jake Squid:
It’s pretty much the same thing as playing Russian Roulette, only with a better chance of getting hurt or killed.
Actually, I think the chances of getting killed are not that great, and I think that there are a lot of people who would be willing to ge beaten up once or twice, even severely, in order to be able to live in the U.S.
My essential concern is that it should be a lot harder for someone to marry an American and then get a green card. I don’t think it should be automatic.
This comment was written by Glaivester.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 7:12 am
Jake Squid
I don’t think so. Prostitution is the exchange of sex in return for money, or some economic benefit. In the case of MOB, the deal is the exchange of the role-of-wife-and-homemaker for the role-of-husband-and-breadwinner. “Breadwinner” is extended to include supporting the woman’s family, but a lot of traditional western marriages involve looking after the inlaws too. Neither is it clear that love is absent from these marriages any more often than it is absent from traditional western marriages.
I’d say it was a lot closer to marriage than to prostitution.
I should also warn that this is a description of one community of one nationality in one city. It may play out differently elsewhere, or even for MOB with a different nationality here.
This comment was written by Daran.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 7:22 am
They may do, but I took my friends words as meaning that in the majority of them, the couple stay together, and aren’t beating each other up, or making life a misery for each other. I would describe that as “successful”, but not “working out magnificently”
I expect that some do work out magnificently. That description would apply to my friend’s marriage, assuming that they’re not concealing problems from me, which is always possible I suppose. However his is not a mail-order marriage.
This comment was written by Daran.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 7:28 am
Prostitution is the exchange of sex in return for money, or some economic benefit.
As has been pointed out for at least a century, if not more, where sex is required from the wife in return from economic support from the husband, marriage is a form of prostitution. Other labour may also be required from the wife - the job you sum up as “homemaker” - but intrinsically, traditional marriage is a narrowly-defined form of prostitution.
In Scotland it is illegal for a husband to rape his wife. However, I have to wonder if these women are aware that they have the legal right to refuse to have sex with their husbands, and, if they exercise that legal right, what happens to the economic support that their husbands have agreed to provide to them and to their families.
This comment was written by Jesurgislac.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 8:27 am
Amp, are you listening?
This is precisely the kind of remark I was referring to on the other thread, as the kind of “radical feminist” doctrine that doesn’t fly with me.
So shoot me, all you radfems, I just don’t take orthodoxies well, especially when they say things like this.
Jesurgislac is entirely entitled, of course, to hold this opinion. I won’t enlarge further on my opinion of this opinion.
This comment was written by Susan.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 8:46 am
Let me guess, Daran. You’re either not married at all, or have been married less than ten years.
Your idea that “working out magnificently” and having “problems” are mutually exclusive reveals that either you aren’t in the game at all, or haven’t been in it long enough to figure out where the goalposts are.
I’m not saying that all that is required is that the parties stay together and don’t beat each other up. (Well, sometimes that is all that is required, but not usually.) But marriage is as complicated as people are, and that is complicated indeed. What is “magnificent” in any given situation depends very much on the players involved.
This comment was written by Susan.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 8:53 am
I begin to believe that Susan has some sort of disorder when it comes to understanding written concepts. Here, let me point out the salient words for her:
…where sex is required from the wife in return from economic support from the husband, marriage is a form of prostitution.
See that? That is not saying that marriage is always a form of prostitution. It is saying that when a woman is required to engage in sex with her husband in order to gain his economic support, and only in that case, would it be considered a form of prostitution.
Sheesh!
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 9:38 am
Susan: This is precisely the kind of remark I was referring to on the other thread, as the kind of “radical feminist” doctrine that doesn’t fly with me.
What do you call it when a woman is required to provide sex in exchange for money?
So shoot me, all you radfems, I just don’t take orthodoxies well, especially when they say things like this.
And I don’t take well to being called a “radfem”, but there you go.
It’s hardly an “orthodoxy” - it’s just honest. In a marriage where the wife is not required to provide sex to the husband, it’s clearly not prostitution.
Daran can dress it up how he likes, but “Mail Order Brides” are a rather blatant form of marriage-as-prostitution: the difference (and it doubtless looks like a large difference enough to the women involved) is that the woman is only required to have one client, must live with that client and do other work for him, and gains certain legal rights. But the key point - the exchange of sex for money - is still there.
This comment was written by Jesurgislac.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 10:12 am
In a marriage where the wife is not required to provide sex to the husband, it’s clearly not prostitution.
See, I have a problem with the notion that sex is something the woman “provides” to the husband, rather than something both parties participate in and is expected/intended to be mutually fulfilling.
This comment was written by Lis Riba.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 10:13 am
Whoops, missed the “not” there.
BTW, according to traditional Jewish law, it’s the husband’s duty to sexually satisfy his wife — not the other way around.
The Talmud even contains a table of men’s minimum performance requirements based on his occupation:
And that’s not an onus upon the wife; just a statement of what she has a right to demand.
Furthermore, if a man has an opportunity to switch jobs which would reduce his sexual requirements, his wife gets to choose whether she wants the increased money from a better job, or whether she prefers more frequent sex.
This comment was written by Lis Riba.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 10:22 am
Les Riba, in case you missed it, it’s almost 2006. Any man who demands that his wife perform sexually for him in exchange for financial support is prostituting his wife. Forcing her to perform sexually against her will, whether that be through physical or financial coercion is rape.
This comment was written by Q Grrl.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 10:50 am
Susan, why is it that when combining experience and doctrine to arrive at your viewpoints, you are speaking your mind– Yet when a radical feminist combines experience and doctrine to arrive at her viewpoints, it’s “orthodoxy ?”
You are, in fact, pushing an orthodoxy yourself, Susan. It’s just not one espoused by radical feminists.
This comment was written by alsis39.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 11:12 am
Jesurgislac:
If you take that view, then my point was that MOB marriage - at least as it plays out in the Filipino community in one large Scottish city - is functionally closer to that form of prostitution commonly known as ‘marriage’ than that form commonly known as ‘prostitution’.
However, I don’t agree with your analysis; it appears to commit a fallacy of definition. Words are defined by usage, not by dictionaries. Dictionaries merely attempt to describe how words are used. If two things are functionally different, and a word is used to describe the first and not the second, then it is a defect of the definition of the word if it can be applied to the second thing.
The same applies to ad hoc definitions like my one quoted top.
Prostitution is functionally different from marriage. Marriage is a long-term, open-ended contract between three parties: the husband, the wife, and the State, which typically involve exchanges of value other than sex on the one side and economic benefit on the other. Prostitution typically involves two contracts: An open-ended contract between prostitute and pimp[1], and a short-term, closed-ended contract between the partnership[2] and the client, which involves only the exchange of sex on the one side, and economic benefit (usually money) on the other.
There are two significant variations on this theme: There may be no pimp, but all that means is that the prostitute undertakes that role for herself. Also the prostitute may be enslaved by the pimp, in which case there is only one contract - between pimp and client.
[1]or any other person or body which undertakes the role, including a procuress or a brothel.
[2]I do not intend to imply that prostitute and pimp have equal power. I can’t however, think of a better word to describe the typically unequal relationship between a pimp and a not-totally-enslaved prostitute.
Both the usage and the emotive load of the two words depends upon these functional differences. They are different words for different things. Calling marriage a “form of prostitution” appears to be no more than an attempt to recruit the emotive load of the latter word to disparage the institution of marriage. Marriage is certainly open to criticism, and it does provide a counterexample to the idea that society disapproves of all trades of sex for economic benefit, but it is inappropriate to call marriage prostitution.
Scotland has some very strange rape law, which I could discuss at length, but that would be rather off-topic.
My view is that adults should be allowed to negotiate their own relationship contracts, short- or long-term, and regardless of whether they are formalised as a marriage[3]. These contracts[4] typically include an agreement to have sex sometimes, and could (but usually do not) include an undertaking by one partner to be available for sex at any time.
[3]or Civil Partnership.
[4]Typically, of course, they are not explicitely negotiated, nevertheless they could be. If not, then the terms in the case of a marriage are explicit in the vows, or otherwise implied.
Some MRAs argue that rape in marriage is impossible. In their opinion, marriage is a binding agreement to have sex, thus meets the definition of consent: “to express willingness”. I do not agree, for two reasons. Firstly a general agreement to have sex does not imply agreement to have in any particular way or at any particular time. Such agreements are possible, as I noted above, but not typical. Secondly, while I agree that an agreement implies consent, it is not the same thing as consent. Consent - “expressed willingness” is an act of communication about the person’s state of mind at the time. If that state changes, and she communicates it, then de facto consent has been withdrawn, even though the agreement may (and probably is) still in place. The antifeminist argument confuses the contract with the performance of the contract. She may have (and probably has) consented (at the time of the contract) to sex at some time, and possibly (but probably not) to sex at a particular time or even at any time. She may also have (and probably has) agreed not to withdraw that consent. But she is still capable of withdrawing consent, and if she does, and he goes ahead and has sex with her anyway then, this is rape.
The antifeminist reply to this, is that it’s not rape (or if it is, then it’s justified), because he’s just taking what he is entitled to under the contract. My reply is that it is rape, and it’s not justified. The appropriate remedy for a breach of contract is by negotiation, or failing that, in the courts, not by committing criminal acts.
This comment was written by Daran.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 11:15 am
Historically, women’s role in marriage has been much more similar to slavery than prostitution. Married women have been (and still are in many places) denied political rights, property rights, parental rights, bodily autonomy rights. Prostitutes had at least some of those rights; slaves none.
This comment was written by AndiF.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 11:24 am
Any time a man purchases a “wife”, he is prostituting a woman. Why would one argue differently? Who benefits from classing a bought wife separately from buying a prostitute?
This comment was written by Q Grrl.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 11:32 am
Here are the things that Daran wrote that make an incredibly strong parallel to prostitution:
In return, money flows back to the Filipino family who are very often in dire poverty. So it’s an economic deal.
An economic deal. A contract in which Filipina woman provides sex and other services in return for monetary compensation. Seems like prostitution to me.
He said that the women know that in many cases they will be basically sacrificing themselves for their family.
She is selling her body to provide for her family. How is this not prostitution? Daran even used the word “sacrificing.” Marriage, in Western culture is not currently viewed as a sacrifice by the woman in return for monetary support to her family.
Daran made it crystal clear to me that this is a form of prostitution.
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 11:43 am
I see this as an example of women in desperate situations choosing the lesser of two evils to have a better life. US immigration law is a mess of red tape and impossible requirements, and these women see becoming a MOB as a means of escaping from extreme poverty, violence, and oppression beyond that experience by most American women.
I do not believe that it is right, and I can see that one possible remedy for the situation is to loosen immigration restrictions into the United States and other countries where MOB buisnesses flourish.
Discussing marriage as prostitution or MOB as prostitution (though I think I might be persuaded to this view myself) is only part of the problem. If the women signing up for these services had other legal alternative means of leaving their countries of origin then I think some of the MOB trade might just dry up.
Even better would be to attack the problem from both sides. Restricting how these services operate (regulations, reporting, and other rules) and opening or loosening immigration law. That deals with both sides of the equation: the demand (MOB services and the men that use them) and the supply (opening immigration law so that women may more easily immigrate). I’m not sure if that is a realistic way of looking at things or if I am only being naive.
Thanks for letting me post my rather disjointed thoughts about this subject.
This comment was written by Mendy.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 1:25 pm
I feel a strong urge to make a joke about “ass-drivers” and sex once a week.
Mendy:
The problem with loosening immigration restrictions is whether or not we want, or are able, to take in every person who wants to come to the U.S.
This comment was written by Glaivester.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 1:48 pm
Bobby Hill: Why is there such a big fence, Dad?
This comment was written by Robert.Hank: Well, millions of people come to America in search of a better life, and we’ve decided we don’t need that many.
Bobby Hill: Did the Soupinusanphones come through the fence?
Hank: No, Bobby, Kahn applied the legal way. Sometimes the system fails us.
Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 3:51 pm
I realize that it is most likely an unworkable and unrealistic proposition, but it does provide a jumping-off point for discussion that is solution oriented.
I have a hard time in balancing my need to ensure that there is a safe, tolerable society for us to live in and keeping government small enough to avoid becoming “Big Brother”. In this instance, I am for stringent regulations on how these women are chosen, how the men are chosen, and how much time they must spend together to qualify.
I’m open to other ideas and opinions on the solution to this problem as it affects women and society as a whole.
This comment was written by Mendy.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 4:36 pm
Mendy:
A third possibility is to improve conditions in their home countries so that there no longer is the incentive to become MOBs.
This comment was written by Daran.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 5:12 pm
Jake Squid:
(I’ve never given any thought to the gendered suffix to the word “Filipino”. Thanks for the correction.)
You write “sex and other services” as though it were primarily sex, and the ‘other services’ were ancillary to sex. That is not what I said, and not my understanding of the arrangement. Nor is the economic benefit the sole benefit that accrues to the woman.
There appear to me to be just two functional differences between the arrangement I have described, and traditional western marriages - the way the marriage is arranged (i.e. normally through a broker), and the flow of money to the family. In contrast, there are many functional differences between this arrangement and prostitution which I described in post 23.
Yes. Lots of people sacrifice themselves for their families.
The focus upon sex to the exclusion of everthing else is entirely yours. That tells us a lot more about Jake Squid than it does about mail-order marriage.
Sometimes it is. Sometimes prostitution isn’t so viewed by the prostitute. But marriage in western culture is often, perhaps usually viewed by one party as an agreement by the other to support them economically, while the other expects to be granted sexual relations. (Lis’s point about sex being a shared act is well taken, nevertheless, the fact that both expect to be granted sexual relations implies rather than contradicts the claim that each one expect this, and that therefore “the other” expects this.) If you view this as prostitution, then chances are most people on this blog either are or have been prostitutes or clients of prostitutes.
This is not what the word means, and not a useful analysis, in my opinion.
This comment was written by Daran.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 5:28 pm
Q Grrl:
He doesn’t purchase a “wife”. He pays the broker for the introduction. The prospective couple then choose to enter into the arrangement, or choose not to.
This comment was written by Daran.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 5:44 pm
Jesurgislac:
I’m not dressing anything up. I described how the arrangement works, as fairly as I could and as best I understand it. The focus upon the sex side of it is entirely that of the commentors here.
She lives with the man (the word “must” is yours; having a place to live is a benefit.) She works for them, just as he works for them. Often they have children together.
These men don’t want prostitutes. If they wanted prostitutes they could have prostitutes; the city’s big enough to have a red-light district. The point of going to a prostitute is that there are no ties for the client, once the deed is done and paid for. These men want those ties. They want wives.
This comment was written by Daran.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 7:48 pm
The focus upon sex to the exclusion of everthing else is entirely yours. That tells us a lot more about Jake Squid than it does about mail-order marriage.
Geeze, dude. Fuck you, too. I’m trying to have a serious discussion about this. Just remember who flung the first insult.
Aside from that, it may surprise you to know that I, too, have known older, well-to-do, white men w/ Filipina wives or girlfriends or mistresses or kept women. It’s odd that, without exception, every one of these women is young, thin and beautiful by current US popular standards. What a coincidence, huh? Why do these men feel the need to find a wife from a country where women are even more obviously oppressed than in western culture? Do you doubt, for even one second, that if a putative Filipina wife decided she was no longer going to have sex with her wealthy western husband that the money would cease to flow from him to her family in the Phillipines? If you do, you are sadly mistaken.
If you can’t see the parallel to prostitution in your own comments, you are being willfully blind.
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 9:59 pm
Daran,
Treating reciprocity in a relationship as a trivial case of dual non-reciprocity is extremely sloppy (judged kindly) and does not lead to good analysis. In fact, it leads to a fundamental blocking of good analysis, nearly on par with a failure to understand the concept of consensuality. In this passage, you seem to claim that any relationship in which both partners have a mutual expectation of sex and a mutual financial dependence is equivalent to a relationship in which sex is traded for financial support. This is such a contorted position that I have a very hard time believing that you actually hold it, and have a very hard time believing you aren’t simply putting forward a nonsensical argument because you dislike the association of your friend’s friends’ marriages with prostitution.
It is true that the mere coexistence of a one-sided expectation of sex and other services and an opposite directed one-sided expectation of financial support is not inherently equivalent to prostitution (that a one-sided expectation of sex and particularly a view that sex is something provided by the female partner to the male partner is fucked up, sexist, misogynistic and harmful is true even if it isn’t equivalent to prostitution, and this view of het sexuality is certainly strongly tied to the existence of prostitution). However, where both of these expectations exist, the slide into viewing these two one-sided expectations as an exchange will certainly frequently occur.
While you point out a variety of features of a group of forms of prostitution that are lacking in marriage, these features are also not found in all forms of prostitution. What is found in all forms of prostitution is treating sex as a good possessed by one person, which is traded to the other person in exchange for money or other goods or favors. Where a marriage also functions along these lines, it is worthwhile to point out that it shares this feature with prostitution, and that indeed such a marriage can be viewed as a form of prostitution. This may seem to you like an expansion of the definition of prostitution beyond what you are comfortable with, but it is an expansion of the definition that is based in an analysis of the two institutions and of particular instances, it is not simply an attempt to stick a pejorative label on an unrelated phenomenon. It is also not a new or shocking expansion of the definition to most feminists (whether or not they would fully agree with it or find it useful).
So, um, does your argument against the basic concept that non-reciprocality is fundamentally different than reciprocality, or your argument that no marriage could be akin to prostitution in any meaningful sense rise to the level that you are making anti-feminist arguments in an anti-feminist intolerant thread? Only Amp can say for sure, but self-moderation by people of good-will is the center point of effective discussion of the sort Amp favors. Your pointless dig at feminists in your first post makes me question your good intentions throughout this thread. I don’t think that you are trolling exactly, but you are certainly ensuring that feminist-feminist (or even feminist-non-feminist) discussion of MOBs doesn’t take place in this thread.
This comment was written by Charles.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 10:08 pm
I agree that changing the country of origin would be a wonderful thing, but how would you go about doing that? It’s taken about 100 years for women here in the States to get to where we are. I’d be open to suggestions of how to make women in the Middle East and other countries more liberated.
This comment was written by Mendy.Report this comment to the moderators
December 29th, 2005 at 10:32 pm
Daran,
As an example of other forms of prostitution that fail your criteria, but that I think you would agree are prostitution:
Geishas, whose johns were (are) long term relationships including extensive companionship and entertainment services as well as sex.
Mistresses who are financially supported by their partner, and whose long-term relationships include extensive companionship services as well.
While there is (I suspect) a grey area beyond which financially supported mistresses would no longer be prostituted in your view, I think you will agree that there is also the other end where financially-supported mistresses blend into escort services (which can also involve long-term open-ended relationships) or personal ads seeking “generous” partners.
So your criteria of pimps (or mental pimps, which seems to me to be a dodge on your part, how do you evaluate whether someone is serving as their own pimp?) and closed-term one-off relationships as the defining features of prostitution seems to me to be clearly an inadequate analysis of the range of obvious forms of prostitution. Trading sex and other social relationships for money or other favors seems to be a better defining feature, particularly if done under conditions of social or economic inequality.
If you find the term prostitution too upsetting of a term to see used for something nice guys and their decent, upstanding wives do, perhaps you would prefer “transactional sex?” But then I guess part of your point was that more than just sex is being traded?
This comment was written by Charles.Report this comment to the moderators
December 31st, 2005 at 7:56 am
These men don’t want prostitutes. If they wanted prostitutes they could have prostitutes; the city’s big enough to have a red-light district. The point of going to a prostitute is that there are no ties for the client, once the deed is done and paid for. These men want those ties. They want wives.
Your understanding of prostitution is extremely limited and naive.
This comment was written by colleen.Perhaps the problem is the considerable elasticity of the job description of the role of ‘wife’. I used to work in the merchant marine, a job which, after periods of 80-100 work weeks, included some long vacations. Many of the men I worked with sneered at ‘Western women’ and would vacation in countries like Thailand where they were able to purchase a young and beautiful woman on a monthly basis. She would clean the house, shop, provide sex, remain agreeable and perform all the functions of a wife
for a remarkably small fee. Sometimes these guys would end up marrying these women and bringing them back to the US or, and more often, commuting from Thailand a couple of times a year . So, the question is, were these women wives or prostitutes or both?
Does a marriage ceremony immediately confer some sort of dignity on a relationship which is (to my mind) intrinsically denigrating? And, if so, what does that say about marriage as an institution?
The men I worked with didn’t want ‘ties’, they wanted someone willing to perform a number of functions as cheaply as possible without objections; they wanted a good deal.
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December 31st, 2005 at 1:15 pm
Why did the writers of this law explicitly provide a provision in the law that exempts Match.com, FriendFinder, AsianFriendFinder, FilipinoFriendFinder, MSN Personals, and other large sites? Why was this provision necessary? They could have just LET IT BE and thousands of foreign women would fall under the law’s protection. The law states that matchmakers that do not match foreigners and Americans as the main part or their business and who charge equal fees to men and women are exempt. But these large mainstream sites allow folks to join for free! The paying member can make the contact. Therefore, thousands of foreign women (Match.com alone has more foreign women members than all international marriage brokers combined) join and wait for American men to contact them.
Can anyone explain this?
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
December 31st, 2005 at 2:46 pm
Here is something for the MRA’s to sink their teeth into
http://www.emediawire.com/releases/2004/7/emw138739.htm
Promoters of the INTERNATIONAL MARRIAGE BROKER REGULATION ACT strategically link international matchmaking organizations with human trafficking rings in effort to gain bipartisan support.
Strategic linking of marriage brokers with human trafficking rings aids in gaining bipartisan support for law intent on eliminating international matchmaking companies and websites.
(PRWEB) July 4, 2004 — To gain bipartisan support for the International Marriage Broker Regulation Act, we endorse the strategies of (1) using “womens’ protection” as the main theme of the law; and (2) claiming that American-based marriage brokers are part of global human trafficking rings, however unfounded.
We also support provisions of the Act that will require brokers to conduct large quantities of consent verifications and background checks before American men can write love letters or make any contact with foreign women. These provisions will make it very difficult for American-based marriage brokers to organize those disgusting overseas introduction “parties” where women outnumber men 100 to 1. These provisions will also drive up costs to the point of putting most brokers out of business. In addition, this law effectively places “warning labels” on American men thus decreasing demand for them among foreign women over time.
Although this law is long overdue (and hopefully not too late), we welcome the Marriage Broker Regulation Act of 2003 as a means to regulating the often arrogant and brazen international marriage broker industry. This industry has gone from the fringe to the mainstream. The American male population is now overly exposed to the message that it is acceptable to desire and actually marry women “unspoiled” by American materialism and most troubling, “uninfected” by American feminism. This message may impede the progress of feminism here at home and give American men the idea that it is acceptable to not respect feminist principles that took so long to instill upon them.
The marriage broker websites promulgate the “message” that American men are highly desirable outside the U.S. and can have access to women not intent on upholding over 30 years of hard won womens’ rights. These sites also offensively elaborate on the reasons for rejecting American women as part of a campaign to promote the desirablity of foreign women. We find this to be most appalling.
Certainly, the existence of this industry is indicative of the sad state of romantic relationships between men and women in North America; however, it by no means should be allowed to continue unregulated. Sites such as http://www.americanwomensuck.com and http://www.nomarriage.com are problematic enough.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
December 31st, 2005 at 3:20 pm
Aaargh! I just accidently deleted a very short post by “Christy” (at least, I think that was the name) - my bad, I was intending to delete a spam post that was just below it, and I hit the “delete” button above instead of the “delete” button below.
Sorry!
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
December 31st, 2005 at 3:31 pm
Amp, no issues. I think this was the link and she wanted to show how the MRA’s are freaked over IMBRA.
This comment was written by Hilda.Report this comment to the moderators
December 31st, 2005 at 3:38 pm
Alice, the press release you quote seems to me to have been written by fans of the mail-order bride industry as either a hoax or a satire, and not written by actual supporters of the IMBA.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
December 31st, 2005 at 3:40 pm
Thanks, Hilda! That’s it!
(But how did you know? Very mysterious!)
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
December 31st, 2005 at 4:00 pm
Amp
Yeah, maybe it was a hoax. But why would supporters go out their way to compose all that?
Also, regarding the issue of exemption under the law, why are so many foreign women being left out - that is, those who use Match and MSN? It seems like such a vast loophool was left intentionally open.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
January 7th, 2006 at 10:22 pm
To call on generally all international matchmaking agencies like a kind of prostitution is not correct. The fee is not for ‘to buy a woman’, but it a fee to pay a broker to look for possible men and women to arrange meetings. The woman, but also the man can refuse proposals for a meeting anytime.
About the personal ads of MSN, Yahoo and others it must be noticed, that these are containing 10000s of ads from women living in the USA and Western Europe.
About the IMB bill:
1-
There is, of course, no law existing, which prohibits a male US citizen to search for and marry a foreign woman and to bring her back to the USA.
2-
Immigration rules and such IMB laws might delay the arrival of the foreign woman for some months, but cannot change the final result.
3-
International introduction services are very useful, as US citizens have only short vacation and to travel abroad is a very long trip and time-consuming. Introduction services make it possible to meet some women you can never meet by yourself, at a certain time at a certain place.
4-
In Asia, where I am living, unlike in the USA, introduction services for marriage are very common among the locals - nothing wrong with it.
It is not only for poor local women looking for rich foreign men.
It has nothing to do with the living standard of the man or the woman. Introduction services are existing legally in Thailand, Malaysia, China but also in Singapore, Hongkong and Japan.
It is difficult or almost impossible to control and to restrict male US citizens, who are looking for a foreign wife outside of USA.
Male US citizens might get on the internet and contact overseas introduction services, which have their offices and registration not in the USA.
I see much discussion, but basically nothing will change.
This comment was written by Johann.Report this comment to the moderators
January 8th, 2006 at 6:52 am
Johann Writes: To call on generally all international matchmaking agencies like a kind of prostitution is not correct.
That may be so, but not for the reason you give:
The fee is not for ‘to buy a woman’, but it a fee to pay a broker to look for possible men and women to arrange meetings. The woman, but also the man can refuse proposals for a meeting anytime.
That’s the way escort agencies work. A man who pays an escort agency is legally only paying for a meeting with a woman (or a man). Legally, if the man wants to have sex with the “escort” the agency provides, he has to arrange that separately with the “escort” at the meeting, and pay a further fee. Even so, a man may pay an international matchmaking agency a fee only to “find a woman”: that would not prevent these agencies effectively providing a form of prostitution, if their intended market is rich-by-comparison men who are looking for the kind of marriage that is sex/labor for cash.
In Asia, where I am living, unlike in the USA, introduction services for marriage are very common among the locals - nothing wrong with it.
It is not only for poor local women looking for rich foreign men.
And dating agencies are extremely common in the US and in other parts of the Western world, which are (or can be) introduction services for marriage. When two people who are equals are looking for a partner, this is a different situation from a well-off man looking to buy a woman who will provide him with services in return for economic support.
This comment was written by Jesurgislac.Report this comment to the moderators
January 8th, 2006 at 7:25 am
So many details. So much discussion. Yet, I have never seen an explanation or justification for the following:
IMBRA’s requirement that the men and agencies provide all sorts of paperwork for women to review for each man and the women must give permission to release her contact information BEFORE any man can write her an email to say hello. Why BEFORE? That is, how is saying hello just to find out if she is remotely interested in him harmful to the woman?
Aside from the remote possibility that he may get her mailing address and actually fly half way around the world to stalk her, what was the intent of the lawmakers regarding this provision?
This comment was written by Lee (another Lee, that is).Report this comment to the moderators
January 8th, 2006 at 8:17 am
Lee: Aside from the remote possibility that he may get her mailing address and actually fly half way around the world to stalk her, what was the intent of the lawmakers regarding this provision?
Because no man should object to it, except those who want to keep their identity a secret from the women they are pursuing. I can think of all sorts of reasons why a man would want to do that - not least, a man who is actually stalking a woman who lives in the same city as him, and contacts these agencies pretending to be in another country.
This comment was written by Jesurgislac.Report this comment to the moderators
January 8th, 2006 at 8:49 am
“Because no man should object to it, except those who want to keep their identity a secret from the women they are pursuing. ”
That could be said about any man meeting any woman anywhere by any medium. That is, I absolutely agree: he should not object to having his background looked over but:
1) why is this check required BEFORE a man can say HELLO? That is, it is not about him objecting, its about the TIMING, and
2) why is the woman not given a choice whether she wants this information before he can contact her? The law requires her to receive it before contact can be made.
This comment was written by Lee (another Lee, that is).Report this comment to the moderators
January 8th, 2006 at 9:42 am
Let me reverse the question, Lee. Why shouldn’t a woman know that a possible suitor has a record of criminal violence against girlfriends before she decides whether to correspond with him?
But she does have a choice. The law requires her to receive it, but it can’t force her to read it if she doesn’t want to.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
January 8th, 2006 at 10:06 am
1) why is this check required BEFORE a man can say HELLO?
“Let me reverse the question, Lee. Why shouldn’t a woman know that a possible suitor has a record of criminal violence against girlfriends before she decides whether to correspond with him?”
Yes, you are right, why shouldn’t she. Assuming that the lawmakers thought this way as well, why was SPECIFIC and DELIBERATE language included in the law that enables men who use Match.com and others large powerful matchmaking firms to avoid this disclosure requirement when pursuing foreign women living in third world countries? AND I do understand the words “marriage” and “broker” were created as propaganda labels and therefore not relevant to my question.
This comment was written by Lee (another Lee, that is).Report this comment to the moderators
January 8th, 2006 at 12:24 pm
why is the woman not given a choice whether she wants this information before he can contact her?
To avoid allowing the agencies to treat asking for that information as a sign of a troublesome client. To avoid allowing the agency to stall or refrain from giving that information, with the hopes that maybe she’ll forget about it, or won’t get it until there’s an established relationship.
If it’s required, the question is very simple: did the agency comply with the law, or not? There’s no she-said-they-said about whether she asked or didn’t or whether they oopsed on the request.
This comment was written by mythago.Report this comment to the moderators
January 9th, 2006 at 8:22 am
Umm, the Lee posting here is the other Lee, not me. Amp, I thought you said you’d fix this?
This comment was written by Lee.Report this comment to the moderators
January 9th, 2006 at 11:45 am
Thanks, Amp!
This comment was written by Lee.Report this comment to the moderators
January 9th, 2006 at 11:57 am
Sorry, Lee. I can edit names after-the-fact (as I’ve now done here), but the software doesn’t allow me to prevent a new user from using a name that an old user is already using.
Lee (the other Lee), next time you post, please choose some other name, or some variation on “Lee” to distinguish yourself from the already-here Lee. Thanks!
* * *
Lee (another Lee, that is) wrote:
Because the goal of the legislation was to regulate mail-order-bride services, not to regulate dating services, obviously.
Just because you want to pretend that there’s no difference between match.com and chanceforlove.com (”The Russian woman’s attitude about herself is feminine. She expects to be treated as a lady, she is the weaker gender and knows it. The Russian woman has not been exposed to the world of rampant feminism that asserts its rights in America. [...] If you follow our simple rules you will end up with an excellent chance of winning a beautiful and loving companion for life.”), doesn’t mean that there is no difference.
In fact, if there were no difference - if the phrase “marriage broker” was nothing but hype - it would have been logically impossible for the legislation to distinguish between the two industries with just a couple of simple rules.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
January 9th, 2006 at 12:09 pm
Alternatively, if the other Lee doesn’t make any changes (for whatever reason), then I could change mine, but I think that would make the old threads very confusing.
This comment was written by Lee.Report this comment to the moderators
January 9th, 2006 at 7:23 pm
“In fact, if there were no difference - if the phrase “marriage broker” was nothing but hype - it would have been logically impossible for the legislation to distinguish between the two industries with just a couple of simple rules. ”
You are right.. the lawmakers made an effort to distinguish the marriage broker business model (and based on the quote from that website, a specific marketing model) from sites like Match.com. In addition, numerous organizations, substantial funds, hours of research, and massive lobbying, were probably thrown at this, as difficult as any law is to get passed these days. That is, there was a lot of thought and effort, not to mention three years of waiting for it to happen. The international matchmakers were now seen as a marriage broker “industry” unrelated to any other business model where men meet women.
With the industry finally isolated and singled-out, why didn’t the lawmakers outlaw it? All that effort, and its still allowed to exist? And with regulation that has to be monitored and enforced and adjusted from time to time. WHY? Aside from the brokers themselves, who would have put up a fight? And who would, and for what reason, come to the defense of a bunch of women-trafficking pimps?
This comment was written by eel.Report this comment to the moderators
January 9th, 2006 at 10:18 pm
Ampersand Writes:
January 8th, 2006 at 9:42 am
1) why is this check required BEFORE a man can say HELLO?
Let me reverse the question, Lee. Why shouldn’t a woman know that a possible suitor has a record of criminal violence against girlfriends before she decides whether to correspond with him?
———-
Ampersand,
I do not think, that this really is a problem for a man, why not. If I have no criminal record, then there is nothing to hide.
However I do not understand, why the man has no right to ask for the same information in return about the woman.
It is not always the American man, who is the bad guy. There is a lot of fraud, scum, cheat going on among foreign women to find a possibility to enter the USA. There are not even so few cases known, where the woman did not exist, where documents were a fake, where women were still legally married…
The law now regarding obligatory information is an one-way…from the man to the woman.
It should be both ways, by my opinion, and I am sure, most complaints about the bill would never come up.
My question: Why shouldn’t the man know in advance, if a certain foreign woman, who is interested into marriage and immigration into the US has a criminal record?
This comment was written by Johann.Report this comment to the moderators
January 9th, 2006 at 10:36 pm
From posting 49, Jesurgislac Writes:
January 8th, 2006 at 6:52 am
And dating agencies are extremely common in the US and in other parts of the Western world, which are (or can be) introduction services for marriage. When two people who are equals are looking for a partner, this is a different situation from a well-off man looking to buy a woman who will provide him with services in return for economic support.
———————————–
I wonder, how you do define ‘equals’?
And how do you want to control or regulate this?
I do not think, that all marriages in the US and other Western world are between ‘equals’ regarding their economic situation.
There is NO law, which can prevent a rich man to marry a poor woman (or vice verse).
This comment was written by Johann.If this is an American woman or a foreign woman - I still do not see any difference.
Again, there is NO law, which can prevent an American citizen to marry a foreigner.
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January 9th, 2006 at 10:55 pm
The situation isn’t as parallel as you’re implying.
He’s contacting her, not vice versa. So he’s able to decide “do I want this woman to have access to my records, or not?” If he decides not, he can choose not to contact her. He can decide to let her have his private info, or not to.
In contrast, the only way to allow him to have access to her records before he contacts her, is to have her records be open and accessible to any suitor who’s interested, rather than her deciding to make them available. She’d have no ability to decide who gets, or doesn’t get, her private info.
Keep in mind, however, that part of the process of getting a visa is having a complete background check, including criminal records. So although he doesn’t get to see her criminal background check before he says “hello,” he will at least get to see it before he says “I do.”
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
January 9th, 2006 at 10:57 pm
Mayeb they thought it was better to have the service legal and regulated than illegal and unregulated.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
January 9th, 2006 at 11:42 pm
Ampersand Writes:
January 9th, 2006 at 10:55 pm
The situation isn’t as parallel as you’re implying.
He’s contacting her, not vice versa. So he’s able to decide “do I want this woman to have access to my records, or not?” If he decides not, he can choose not to contact her. He can decide to let her have his private info, or not to.
——————–
I have a question - I am really astonished to read that. Is it really so, that it is ALWAYS the American man, who is contacting the foreign woman first?
Matchmakers usually collect profils of men and women, and sometimes the man might contact the woman, or the woman might contact the man…
However, if you are using something like MSN or Yahoo, you never know, if the profil is correct or a fake. - It is said, that 80 percent are a fake or somehow untrue of both, men and women.
You can never trust any matchmaker. After you find your contacts, get on a plane and check it out yourself, before inviting an unknown woman to join you in Western countries. Just my opinion.
This comment was written by Johann.Report this comment to the moderators
January 10th, 2006 at 5:29 am
“Maybe they thought it was better to have the service legal and regulated than illegal and unregulated. ”
If it is made illegal, its is essentially banned from existence. There will always be a small underground version, whether brokers are kept legal or made illegal (banned). So why not just ban it since nearly all operate as websites and violaters (those remaining in business) would be very easy to track by monitoring the web (just like the banning of American-based sex tour operators which has already been accomplished in numerous states). By banning it, close to 100% of the volume of women being imported via American-based brokers would be eliminated.
This comment was written by eel.Report this comment to the moderators
January 12th, 2006 at 7:19 am
The MOB industry is IMO creepy and very disturbing and should be banned. But, as that appears to be unrealistic right now, at least this legislation is a step in the right direction.
This comment was written by Kriss.Report this comment to the moderators
January 12th, 2006 at 7:59 pm
“The MOB industry is IMO creepy and very disturbing and should be banned. But, as that appears to be unrealistic right now, at least this legislation is a step in the right direction. ”
Why does it appear “unrealistic” to ban it? Just who would come to the defense of these women-trafficking pimp brokers anway? The ACLU??
This comment was written by eel.Report this comment to the moderators
January 12th, 2006 at 9:51 pm
I’m not sure how this law is going to do any good. There seems to be a big loophole:
“This legislation, as presently constituted, would exempt large companies like MSN Personals, Yahoo Personals, Match.com and others whose ‘primary’ business is not International Matchmaking. Although International Matchmaking is not the “primary” focus of these large companies, they advertise thousands of profiles of foreign nationals on their site and receive a substantial stream of revenue based on the promotion of international profiles”
So if Mr Bad Boy wants to avoid the paperwork, he joins Yahoo Personals which will be exempted from providing the required paperwork to the ladies.
Lets face it, the law is about putting a feather in someone’s political hat and has very little to do about protecting the foreign bride. Otherwise, the big boys who have the vast amount of traffic in the arena would also have to comply no matter what their main business source is. Congress must of been afraid of the Yahoo lawyers :).
Cheers.
This comment was written by steve.Report this comment to the moderators
January 14th, 2006 at 8:04 am
“Lets face it, the law is about putting a feather in someone’s political hat and has very little to do about protecting the foreign bride. Otherwise, the big boys who have the vast amount of traffic in the arena would also have to comply no matter what their main business source is. Congress must of been afraid of the Yahoo lawyers.”
That is a fact…and not one person who supports every provision of IMBRA has ever made (or cared to make) a clear argument that the above is false. Although protecting the foreign bride was part of their agenda, there is another agenda that the original supporters of the law will never admit to: They absolutely HATE and are INFURIATED and AFFRONTED by the foreign matchmaking websites. That is, these websites have implications beyond the notion that they attract men who seek “to abuse” women.
This comment was written by eel.Report this comment to the moderators
January 14th, 2006 at 1:03 pm
That is, these websites have implications beyond the notion that they attract men who seek “to abuse” women.
Absolutely true. These websites have strong implications of prostitution. Many of us object to that. See the string of comments from #5 through #40 in this thread for a discussion of this issue.
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
January 14th, 2006 at 4:32 pm
“Absolutely true. These websites have strong implications of prostitution. ”
Certainly, the writers of IMBRA must have recognized that fact. After all, they are smart people.
Prostitution is not legal and therefore banned in almost 100% of counties in the United States.
So, then why didn’t the smart people who wrote the law simply ban the marriage broker business (which they spent countless hours defining and protesting against) along with the related websites that have strong implications of prostitution?
This comment was written by eel.Report this comment to the moderators
January 17th, 2006 at 9:52 am
i got an idea… why don’t all men get chips implanted in their heads with there complete history, crimninal, marital, how many children he has… if he wants to contact a “foreign national” lady through a for-profit website you can scan his head and print the information and mail it to the lady. Of course we should not offer more protections to a foreign national outside the country than we do to the “illegal” foreign nationals in the country ( i am speaking of the estimated 1 million illegal single Mexican ladies in the USA). She would also get to scan my chip… oh i forgot, the American ladies do not get the same protection under H.R 3402 Subtitle D, so if i want to contact a single american lady she cannot scan my chip.. but i am sure in a few years that will also change… just like the scanners at the department stores that check prices you can have a chip scanners everywhere and run guys head througH it before they can say hi or get your phone number.. gee makes dating so attractive
The visa process now protects American men and foreign ladies through an extensive backround check before they can spend their lives together.. that is where the process belongs.. not in the getting to know you stage..
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
January 17th, 2006 at 11:05 am
Before this legislation, the “extensive background check” was only done of the one immigrating to a new country - that is, to the woman. Nor do I see any logical reason why it’s wrong to have a background check at the earlier stage.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
January 17th, 2006 at 10:20 pm
“Nor do I see any logical reason why it’s wrong to have a background check at the earlier stage. ”
I hope this will not be too difficult to answer - but a logical response would sure help me to understand, so if you dont mind..
1) Why do you think the lawmakers wanted women to have this information before, say, an email could be sent? Nevermind why its wrong or right, or justified or not - but just why? Go ahead, speculate. I sure can’t figure it out.
2) Related to 1, why couldn’t the woman just be made aware that a background check was available if she wanted it at any time, even before she made or allowed contact? Certainly, the lawmakers and everyone here are not a patronizing bunch and know these women can think for themselves. Is there a reason why this approach is not plausible?
This comment was written by eel.Report this comment to the moderators
January 17th, 2006 at 11:41 pm
Before this legislation, the “extensive background check” was only done of the one immigrating to a new country - that is, to the woman. Nor do I see any logical reason why it’s wrong to have a background check at the earlier stage
Goodness, this statement shocks me. Lets review. You join a dating service. You read a lady’s bio, it seems nice, it interest you so you want to contact her. At this stage, that is all you know of the lady–her bio. You have no idea if this lady is legit or not. In other words, she could be prowling the internet collecting personal information that could violate your privacy.
However, take the same scenario but this time it is 6 months later. You get to know the lady, fall in love and ask the lady to marry you….in other words, you are asking her to leave her country. You have to file for petition for marriage and that paperwork has to go to the U.S. embassy in her country. This is the appropriate time to officially disclose your personal background. It is only fair sense you are asking her to leave her country. Since the lady has full access to all the paperwork during the immigration process in her country, if she decides not to accept your petition for marriage she can turn it down….and she is still safe and sound in her country.
Do you see the difference??? Even in the traditional dating scene, most men date several woman before they find the one they consider Mrs Right. It is no different in the internet world. Men will engage in an introduction period with several woman until they find Mrs Right.
So the laws intent can still be executed, just don’t ask a man during the introduction stages to give his personal background to every lady he wants to meet. Disclose it at the appropriate time when he petitions the lady for marriage … she will have amble time to see the disclosure and decide if she wants to leave or not.
Why not take this privacy issue and bring it to the traditional dating world. You are in a club looking around. You see a lady you want to meet, walk up to her and ask her for her phone number…..she smiles and says, show me your paperwork first. Most of us wouldn’t tolerate this type of invasion of our privacy at initial contact with another person. Even more ironic, in a traditional dating scenario, a man could meet a lady, get her phone number, call her and ask her out for a date. At that date, the man is physically in the lady’s presence. Now tell me who is more at a danger during the introduction stage…the lady on a traditional date or a lady who is a thousand miles away.
The law is just bad………besides, it isn’t going to accomplish what it is intended to do. It does not regulate the big boys in the industry like Yahoo Personals, MSN, etc. This law should be an insult to any woman lib group if they take the protection of women’s safety seriously. The law has loopholes that let the bigger traffic sites of international dating to continue as is and promotes the off shore websites who ethics may be questionable.
So the law crushes the little guy whose numbers are minor in the international arena. While the possible threat of danger to a foreign lady has not changed one bit by this law. If the small sites are crushed it just means those who are seeking a bride will go to the bigger sites or off shore sites where they are not regulated.
As usual, the law’s hidden intent is about money and corporate America.
Oh well, that is my two cents.
This comment was written by steve.Report this comment to the moderators
January 18th, 2006 at 6:27 am
And I still want to know, if anyone who supports this law wants to step up, the following -
WHY the lawmakers wanted women to have this information before, say, an email could be sent? Nevermind why its wrong or right, or justified or not - but just why? Go ahead, speculate. I sure can’t figure it out.
and if anyone here who supports the law is really brave, they can answer this as well -
Why is it “unrealistic” to ban marriage brokers? Just who would come to the defense of these women-trafficking pimps along with their websites that strongly imply prostitution? The ACLU??
This comment was written by eel.Report this comment to the moderators
January 18th, 2006 at 9:53 am
Ignorance must be bliss….most are not women-trafficking pimps…..unfounded words sensationlized by the media and narrowed minded people like yourself.
Show me the evidence….you can’t!
This comment was written by steve.Report this comment to the moderators
January 18th, 2006 at 10:23 am
i read this stream and one thing keeps digging at me… forget about whether you think website owners that post foreign nationals are “women-trafficing pimps” …. but my god that is a horrible statement and one that is unfounded, but understandable in todays “sensational” society. Hell, politicians have become experts in those sensational sound bites so why not join in..
If this country requires men to submit a backround and personal history check to a webmaster and a lady he doesn’t know, just to write or email her, this country has lost it’s way..
maybe it is that everyone is so busy working and trying to to make ends meet that they no longer care about their right to privacy… or maybe it is that your hatred of men that want to marry foreign nationals is so strong you do not care about their first amendment rights… i am not sure …
The bottom line is this … i cannot believe that anyone posting here thinks that another person has the right to your complete criminal backround and personal history just to speak with you… if you tell me you agree then i guess you are not concerned about your own right to live and breath in a free society..
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
January 18th, 2006 at 10:34 pm
It seems that you guys are still at it - trying to poke holes in this law. OK. Lets put this to bed. Especially the notion of when the foreign woman receives the man’s background information. There is a clear reason why the lawmakers wanted it this way and if you would have thought through it, you may have figured it out for yourselves. Here, let me help.
The law states that the background information must be supplied to the woman and she must provide permission for the broker to release her contact information for purposes of the man writing her a letter AND meeting her in person. Lets focus on the latter part while reading this from the Atlanta Journal Constitution, dated 12/7/04:
Jeanne Smoot, who is with the Tahirih Justice Center (they had a major role in the drafting of the law) says the romance tours sponsored by some international matchmakers … where typically 20 men travel overseas to mingle in socials with hundreds of foreign women … are “akin to a cattle call.”
Now, don’t you think Tahirih and numerous others who have a problem with these imbalanced social events that are more likely akin to a harem wanted this practice to continue? If there are 20 men, there may be as many as 300 women and I bet you that most of the women never had prior contact, by email or otherwise, with the men. Sounds fun? Too bad, because now the party is over. Think about it. The new law will require that each woman receive the background information for each of the 20 men - that is the broker would have to manage 6,000 release forms…just to have a party.
So, now that you know the reason, stop asking and leave the folks here to move onto other more pressing concerns.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
January 19th, 2006 at 5:19 pm
Being that I work in this industry I can tell you that nobody gets into this country without being interviewed extensively. One does not simply “order” a bride, those days are long gone. Today you must prove that you have carried on an extensive relationship, met several times, and corresponded at least a year. The man must then go through a background check and interview seperately.
The main problem I have with this Act is that it doesn’t work both ways. Does anyone here have any idea how many Russian women extort money from men through these services? Just google any scam site and you’ll find thousands of examples where women have either stolen money or completely duped idiotic, lonely men into sending away their inheritance. Why doesn’t the woman have to get a background check? Because the law always assumes that women are either not smart enough to be cunning or that the women are more innocent because they don’t have the same capacity for violence as a man. So if you think this is a feminist piece of legistlation you’re sadly mistaken. In government, women are not capable of the same things as men. You’re not equal.
Also, the law is so broadly defined that essentially any dating service in the US is now liable to provide background information on every male member, a prospect that will drive most companies out of business. I know at my agency we don’t tolerate any type of unsavory conduct or activity. We primarily give bandwidth for men and Russian women to talk and get to know each other. Nobody gets shipped anywhere. We merely organize dates that are quite expensive and supervised until the woman feels safe with the man. Only when she has informed her agency that she’s comfortable will they be alone together.
In the end I think that this law will only be one of many unenforceable laws because of it’s broad wording. If anyone thinks that this only pertains to the selling of contact information, you haven’t been paying attention in the last 50 years. Laws like this are a gateway that allow the judges or the various investigating agencies to pry further into a company or individual’s practices. Sure it may say that they’re only going after the selling of information, but after they’ve confiscated all of your PC’s for 12 months and found nothing you’re still out of business.
Nobody wants a woman or anyone else to be abused but creating massive sprawling laws without precedent aren’t going to stop that from happening.
Oh, and a question for the current Administration- what ever happened to finding that Osama fellow?
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
January 19th, 2006 at 8:40 pm
Well Alice thanks for your insight, and for dismissing us as idiots. The problem with your little example is it that you are talking about one example, and one example that does not address what most of these websites are about. There are hundreds of websites that only deal with providing contact information of people, and do not treat women like “cattle” .. Legitimate and caring people that have mom an pop websites sharing contact information of people that want to “talk” .. they are caught in the dragnet of this marriage broker law.. i am sorry this is not a pressing concern for you.. but that does not mean the argument has no merit..
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
January 19th, 2006 at 8:58 pm
here is what the law really says
A) In general.–The term “international marriage broker” means a corporation, partnership, business, individual, or other legal entity, whether or not organized under any law of the United States, that
charges fees for providing dating, matrimonial,
matchmaking services, or social referrals between United States clients and foreign national clients by providing personal contact information or otherwise facilitating communication between individuals from
these respective groups.
if you provide contact information you are a marriage broker.. whether the two will ever meet in person makes no difference..
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
January 19th, 2006 at 9:35 pm
Yossarian writes:
As the Act itself says (describing the situation before the Act is passed):
So, in fact, although it’s not identical both ways, it does work both ways.
Yossarian writes:
That’s simply not true.
Here’s how the act defines marriage brokers - and unlike Mike, I’m quoting the complete definition from the Act.
Clearly, the exceptions make it possible for dating services to exist without being affected by this law.
And Mike, Alice was quite correct that the law applies to contact by either letter or an in-person meeting. Here’s the relevant text from the Act:
I have to say, I’m not impressed with how accurate either of you have been, Mike and Yossarian.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
January 19th, 2006 at 10:35 pm
Alice, you cite one incident the law effect. Individual rights and privacy are pressing concerns. Sorry you don’t think so.
This comment was written by steve.Report this comment to the moderators
January 20th, 2006 at 5:42 am
Ampersand, you are correct in cititng the law. But how do you think they’ll tell if someone is in compliance, wait for a disgruntled woman to drop a dime? No, we have already researched and found out that the State department has allocated millions to investigate each marriage agency. Having a little background in law enforcement myself, I can tell you that this means one thing- raids.
Again, you can quote me the specifics of the law all you want, it’s all the same when your door is kicked in by the Feds.
They will essentially raid the top five businesses and confiscate all computers on the premesis. Normally any kind of effective data mining will take no less than 8 months. Be assured that the Feds will take 12. By then, guilty or not, the compliant agencies will be out of business.
Because most of the top 10 dating services that specialize in international dating have thousands of customers, it would require roughly $10k to ensure that each paying member is checked. March 5th is not when the law takes effect, it’s the launch point for the raids. We know that they’ve been watching us since the end of December but we’ve done nothing wrong. Incidentally they did the same thing with Medical Marijuana laws when they repealed them. The repeal date doesn’t mean you have to stop doing it then, that just when they’re going to come after you.
And Ampersand, I realize that the woman gets a background check for the K1. I was referring to the fact that if she wants a man’s personal information she doesn’t get a background check. That’s when scams usually take place. She sends a letter asking for money and it follows from there. Incidentally, have you ever seen the Ukranian version of a background check? Probably not.
Oh, and socials? I’ve witnesses several in my time and it’s nothing like a harem. The local agencies post fliers around town like a nightclub, normally attracting either party girls or professionals. The men are usually from England, American, Germany, and a few other industrialized nations. It’s then an awkward staring contest while the pros work the room and try to pick up on one of the guys. In the end there’s usually about 75 men looking sad and the rest of the women looking bored. They’re really quite pathetic and not as popular as they were in the 1980’s. Kind of like Pete Burns’ band Dead or Alive.
So in the end, whatever- we’ll adapt and continue to do what we do. Nobody’s ever been hurt through our service, lost any money, or gone away pissed off. We simply get people together and make sure that they want to be together. Moscow is not the 3rd world. It’s more expensive to visit there than Paris and the people there are absolutely wonderful and generous. The women using our service come of their own free will and leave when they want, just like any online dating service in the States.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
January 21st, 2006 at 11:34 am
“Oh, and socials? I’ve witnesses several in my time and it’s nothing like a harem. The local agencies post fliers around town like a nightclub, normally attracting either party girls or professionals. ”
Well, well. Isn’t that revealing. Of course, the writers of IMBRA were very aware of that since they had scouts sent into the field. Its actually called sex tourism and illegal in many states for American men to travel for purposes of engaging in this activity. In this case, however, it would have taken years to gather enough evidence so the smart lawmakers solved the problem by requiring background checks before ANY form of contact can be made - to throw a wrench in the business practice. Now, each girl at the entry to the club would have to sign off on each man’s background information - before they can even show themselves, or wave to, or make eye contact with, or…whatever. I can’t even begin to describe the shear glee all the womens’ groups, that helped write IMBRA, are having knowing that they found a way to put the brakes on these parties.
On the issue of why the larger dating sites were made exempt:
In the IMBRA law, there is an exception to the definition of “International Marriage Broker (IMB)” for the following:
“(ii) an entity that provides dating services if its principal business is not to provide international dating services between United States citizens or United State residents and foreign nationals and it charges comparable rates and offers comparable services to all individuals it serves regardless of the individual’s gender or country of citizenship.”
Section 833 (e)(4)(B)(ii).
Match.com, Yahoo.com, MSNBC.com, and other similar mega-dating sites fit into this exception. Their high-paid lobbyists helped to get this exception carved out for them by this law’s drafters.
Good. Now we all understand that one.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
January 21st, 2006 at 8:19 pm
bean Writes:
“As I clearly wrote in my post about this (and I think it should have been pretty clear in what Amp wrote), this law does not outlaw International Marriage Brokers, mail-order brides, or international marriage of any kind.”
Agreed, as per the letter and on the surface of the law. However, most of us on this blog will be happy to know that the law will regulate most US based brokers out of business, and its good that the lawmakers found a way to do just that.
The lawmakers first choice, as it would have been anyone’s who despises the marriage broker industry, was to outlaw it. That is, a law that shut down US based marriage brokers and (if bold enough) made it illegal for American men to utilize brokers operating in foreign countries. Eliminating the brokers is a MUCH more effective way of ending the negative stereotyping found on marriage broker websites and the ability of American men to contact foreign women who seek marriage as an escape from povery.
Its a well know fact, and the writers of IMBRA knew, that it took numerous years to shut down just one sex tour operator, Big Apple Tours, that was based on Queens, New York. Why? Because it is a legitimate business that was merely organizing vacation tours for men and once in the foreign country, it was very difficult to prove that Big Apple was pimping the local women.
The IMBRA folks crafted the law in such a way that would minimize resistance and thus speed the law along (although it did take three years) while accomplishing the desired effect of putting the brokers out of business. After all, who, aside from the brokers themselves, would protest all the background checks and consent verifications? The brokers protested not because they were against background checks; they protested because they would lose male clients due to privacy concerns (including the majority who have clean records) and the logistics of following the law would be so difficult that they would not be able to operate profitably. They are right.
Here is some early evidence of whining protest -
http://www.tlcworldwide.com/newlaw/home.php
By the end of this year, there will be a substantial decline in the number of US based marriage brokers. Congratulations to the lawmakers.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
January 25th, 2006 at 11:23 am
Your ignorance keeps shining through. Just like there are a few bad men, so are there a few bad sites. The hypocrisy in your argument are the exemptions in the law. It allows sites like Yahoo, MSN, match.com to continue as is. Before you argue that these sites primary focus are not international dating, you need to take a look at the numbers. A site like yahoo whose primary focus may be domestic dating, yet even if their international dating was 10% of their business, that 10% is a huge membership base compared to smaller international dating sites. Yahoo, match.com, MSN, etc has more male members meeting ladies overseas then all the smaller online dating sites combined.
All your law is doing is putting the smaller business site out of buiness and driving male clients to sites like yahoo. I guess under your law, ladies from other countries will have the privilege of being abused from memers of the larger sites. Stupid!
Nope, your goal was not to protect immigrant women, your goal and the goals of the lobbyists for larger sites was to put the smaller sites out of business. Otherwise, the requirement of the law would of applied to the larger sites who may have versified business backgrounds but are the biggest traffic of international dating.
And you are constantly quoting a few cases. Why not look at domestic violance whose numbers are much larger. Next you will have men having to provide background information if he walks up to a lady to ask her for her phone number.
Worse you don’t want to listen to reason. I, as most men are, are against violance towards women no matter where they are from. It is the law’s execution of having to provide personal back ground information to every lady that may catch his eye on the net we object to. Are you not as concern about a male U.S. citizen’s privacy? I would glady disclose all my background inforamtion to a lady I got to know and I was asking her to leave her country to marry me. But to ask every man to do so during the introduction stage is an invastion of privacy. But I don’t expect you to understand this because your agena to protect immigrant women is a forest to your real agenda to invade male privacy and put the small business owner out of business. Your true intentions are obvious.
So stop with your lies and hypocrisy.
This comment was written by steve.Report this comment to the moderators
January 25th, 2006 at 12:42 pm
sorry i have been away to miss more fun. Alice, you are really funny. Do you even know what the full definition of a marriage broker is according this law? A “marriage broker” is a site that gives out an address, telephone number, email or in anyway facilitates communication between American men and foreign nationals. They are lumped together with agencies that take men to foreign countries and get half naked women to parade in front of them. You don’t see the difference? Of course you see the difference you are just to stubborn to admit it.
So “Nick’s Asian Penpals” is a marriage broker because he runs a for-profit website that charges for the contact information on foreign nationals. Of course any of your big dating sites that do the same thing get an exemption because they can claim the foreign market is not their specialty.
So are you willing to write to your Senator and tell him or her that yahoo and MSN need to stop posting foreign nationals, or should we just stop American men from viewing them? Which is it?
My God we wouldn’t want a man from the USA to fall in love with a poor woman just so she can “escape from poverty”. Not everyone falls in love with someone from his or her same economic class, and it doesn’t always mean that the person has bad intentions.
Your one size fits all approach just doesn’t hold water when it comes to this issue, any your goal of stopping foreign women from coming to this country and getting married is a pipe dream. The numbers will keep increasing because ignorant laws have a way of being ignored, and prosecutors have better things to do than prosecute websites that post penpals..
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
January 28th, 2006 at 2:44 pm
Oh me oh my. Resistance!
Look what these guys are cooking up. Forget it, its futile. Between NOW and their backers at Match.com, MSN Personals and Yahoo Personals, you don’t stand a chance.
http://www.filipinalady.org/international-marriage-broker-regulation/index.php?sid=4776f31b9ca9b5be6596443de869d1a8
WOW N.O.W. update!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! PLEASE READ!!!!! As of Jan 28, 2006. This law is only the beginning. We need to fight it now to stop the cancer from spreading. Now that this law is on the books, it won’t stop here. N.O.W. has both the Federal and State politicians behind them. With the IMBRA law in effect, N.O.W. has their foot in the door to try to get more laws passed to levy against an IMB website and their clients. Including special taxes by the state and federal governments. A phone conversation with a N.O.W. representative indicated next they will ask states to levy a special tax. In other words, like cigarettes, a special tax that will make us raise our membership prices and doing business impossible (next it will be required to get some kind of insurance). If you don’t believe it, wait a year from now. Even though this law is in effect, fighting it now may stop the spread of cancer this law will impose. The more requirements implemented because of this law, the harder it will be to fight. We need more then 2, 3, 4, 10, 12, IMBs fighting this, we need HUNDREDS. N.O.W. has thousands. We need all IMBs and their members who believe in freedom of choice to stop the spread of an unfair and unconstitutional law. N.O.W.’s cancer is upon us and spreading — Sign the petition, get others to sign the petition, IMBs get your members to sign the petition, write your congressman, DO something OR next our Love will be TAXED. Our WORDS alone won’t stop this cancer — our only chance is to ACT or GIVE IN to N.O.Ws power to convince politicians that their way is the BEST way.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
January 28th, 2006 at 4:43 pm
“Forget it, its futile” .. sure thing Alice.. that would be the easiest thing to do.. but all it takes is one judge to look at the law and declare it is unconstitutional.. if the backers of this law REALLY cared about protecting immigrant women from a life of abuse they would have written the law so it applied to all sites, big and small… N.O.W. sold out to the yahoo’s and the match.com because they knew they would fight back.. how many lawyers do you think work for yahoo? give you a hint… too many
So the dragnet is nothing more than a broken fish net, and N.O.W. is no better than a crooked politician trying to secure another term in office.. at least we have learned something today
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
January 28th, 2006 at 5:58 pm
It goes on and on and on
http://internationalmarriagebrokers.com/index.html
Large matchmaking companies may have made political contributions and used lobbyists to make themselves excempt from the Marriage Broker Act. In an attempt to gain market share in the growing Latin and Asian singles market.
Behind the scenes negotiations went on between the largest US Dating Companies and Feminists to make large US based dating companies exempt before the Marriage Broker Act was passed. This alone is evidence that unfair business practices have taken place to pass this new law. The largest US dating companies with deepest pockets helped craft a law in their favor to get rid of the smaller international dating companies that are in the way of the larger American dating companies market share. Effectively, the small international dating companies are clogging up the seach engines. The new law makes the a few select large American companies exempt from this new Marriage Broker Act because their core business in US dating. The fastest growing dating market in the United States is Latin and Asian singles. 90% of the Latin and Asian singles market is controlled by small mom and pop type dating websites. The new law is aimed directly at them in a backroom political move to take market share.
Now these smaller companies are being persecuted in an organized and illigal effort to take their market share of the 700 million dollar dating market. Feminist groups have sponsored a law to help put small international dating companies out of business. The original purpose of the law was to help protect foreign women which is clearly not the goal in its unconstitutional state. By making lake US dating companies excempt, it defeats the purpose of the Marriage Brokers Act. The law was passed Christmas eve as members of congress were eager to go home to their families. Small Latin dating companies are now deemed “Enemies of the State” by US law. Its all about money. The next question would be how many people involved in passing this law have stock in the larger American dating companies and will benefit from the Marriage Broker Act.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
January 30th, 2006 at 12:29 pm
One can almost hear the Looney Tunes theme playing in the background.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
February 1st, 2006 at 8:12 pm
I wanted to comment on one side effect of the law that nobody ever mentioned.
After two months of marriage to a Russian woman my friend Bill called me and asked to help him and his wife with translation of an important issue. Both came to see me the next day. Both said that they were happy, but Luba, Bill’s wife was unhappy that the petition for the change of her status from fiancée to a permanent resident was not approved yet. She suspected that Bill never filed that petition. Bill was adamant that he did file and has no control over the rest of the process. Luba asked me in Russian if she could file the petition by herself, without Bill’s involvement. I answered her that it was not possible unless she was abused. “Did he abuse you?” I asked her in Russian. She answered: “No”. I said, then you have to be patient and wait until you receive the answer from the immigration services. The only reason why you are able to get your legal status in the US is because you married a US citizen. You can not self petition.”
They left and seemed to be satisfied. I was happy that I could help. Little did I know.
The very next morning I received a call from Bill. He told me that the police issued a restraining order for him, because Luba filed a claim that she was abused one day before our conversation took place. Luba moved to a free shelter using the services of free criminal, immigration and divorce attorneys. I came to the criminal court hearing to testify as a witness. I had no doubt in my mind that Luba’s scam was so obvious that it would never work. Again, little did I know.
Several months later Luba triumphantly received all her legal paperwork. As I write this she is visiting Russia for two or three months. I suspect, that her next step will be to bring her Russian boy friend here, to the USA. Also, she is sharing her hands-on experience of getting US citizenship with her numerous friends in Russia and USA. She is very thankful to American feminists for providing her this great opportunity to live in the best country in the world without inconvenience of being married, albeit for only two months in her case. At the same time, I suspect, that Bill’s record is not something he is anxious to share with those foreign women that he will attempt to say Hi in the future. The law does not leave him a chance to explain the truth before producing the records. Not to mention, that now the law left him only two more attempts to file for a fiancée visa. “Three strikes and you are out!”
Has anybody ever attempted to research a number of fraudulent abuse claims? I know that Luba mentioned that she met and made friends with a couple other girls from the shelter. They also chose this easy way of getting their legal status. Also, a mother of a Ukrainian bride told my friend in Kiev that while visiting her daughter in New York she saw an instructional film in Russian that explains what medications to use in order to induce bruises, what numbers to call and what phrases to memorize in English when choosing claiming an abuse as a way to receive American citizenship.
And this is only the beginning. With this law that invites women to file abuse claims by legitimizing an image of American men as predators and abusers it is only the matter of time until all shelters will be flooded with “abused” women. Real abuse cases — especially abuse of American women who do not have much to gain from filing false claims — will be falling through the cracks and not dealt with properly. Government budget to maintain free shelters will be growing. The industry of lawyers pushing through the immigration paperwork of the “abused” women will grow and it will become the most lucrative profession. After all, they can not loose cases under the current law. Luba’s case is a perfect example. Keep on supporting the law.
By the way, Luba was so surprised when she saw me in the court testifying in Bill’s defense. She called me the same evening and said, that she expected me to be on women’s side. After all, American women are supposed to hate American men. Bravo the Law! It proved Luba right in the eyes of many Russians who are convinced that American men want to marry Russian women because American women hate them. The law explains why. Ladies, beware of American men. Check their records. It can be comparable with the road sign: “Buckle up! It is the law to wear a sit belt on American made cars only” Feel free not to wear your sit belt if you drive a foreign car.
This comment was written by moscownights.Report this comment to the moderators
February 2nd, 2006 at 8:11 am
moscownights, I’m pretty sure the bulk of posters on this thread don’t care about an American man’s rights. That’ll teach him for trying to get married to anyone outside of the country.
The ultimate irony here is that the totally illegal marriage services in Russia and other parts of the world will flourish without the legitimate American businesses to compete with. Mission Accomplished N.O.W. You’re helping human trafficing like nobody else.
P.S- Our company is still thriving under this law, as we’ve already made the transition for compliance. You lose again suckers.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
February 2nd, 2006 at 2:31 pm
Yeah, I was about to call shinannegans too. The law is heafty but it’s not 100% air-tight, despite what Alice would like to believe. Some of the top defense lawyers in the country have already pointed out numerous faults that will eventually be overturned.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
February 2nd, 2006 at 4:43 pm
Since you are doubting the story I would refer you to Leesburg, VA District Court. I have the case number and the full names of both Bill and Luba. I am sorry that the story sounds fantastic to you and you are dwelling on the time-line to prove that it never happened. If I were not involved in it myself, I would have never believed it either. I was not the only person, who testified on Bill’s behalf. One other couple who knew Bill and Luba came to Court to testify. Please e-mail me directly and I will give you all the details and even Bill’s phone number for you to get the exact dates from him personally. I stand behind every word in this story.
I know one Russian man who lives in Maryland. He used a web site to meet and marry a Russian woman from Russia. After a few months his new wife filed false abuse charges and the man was taken out of his own house on a restraining order. He had a heart attack and became paralyzed. He is currently under the care of his elderly parents. In the meantime his wife has possession of his house and uses time to get her legal status in this country as an abused woman.
By the way, this status is considered to be very honorable among Russian ex-wives. It opens the doors to free lawyers, citizenship, job placement and what not. One Russian woman received a proposal to remarry from a very desirable American young man. She said “no” to him in order not to loose the status of an abused woman. It is hard to get it back again once you remarry here and are no longer a “vulnerable mail-order-bride”.
This morning I received a call from one other Russian man whose Russian Internet wife filed false abuse charges and his case in currently in Virginia court. He asked me if we can start a support group of American men - victims of false abuse charges.
If you need to know the time-line of this call, it was between 11 and 12 noon today, February 2, 2006. I do not know the time-line of a paralyzed man story, but I know for sure that typically real predators and abusers do not get paralyzed after an act of real abuse.
I am sorry that you do not see the seriousness of the situation. It reminds the meaning of the expression “Silence of the Lambs”
This comment was written by moscownights.Report this comment to the moderators
February 2nd, 2006 at 8:53 pm
Moscownights, your claim to have a case citation would carry more weight if you gave the case number. And your claim to be willing to provide the number to anyone who emails you would carry more weight if you provided an e-mail address.
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 4:39 am
Yes, abusers never suffer heart attacks.
It is one of the great advantages of being an abuser. Sadly, it doesn’t protect against cancer.
To be protected against cancer, it is necessary to murder cats.
This comment was written by Charles.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 4:54 am
Not cats, Charles - kittens. Baby kittens, no more than 4 weeks old.
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 5:01 am
No, no, kittens cure cancer (as do half cylon babies, apparently), but cats are sufficient to prevent it.
Or so I’m told.
This comment was written by Charles.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 6:33 am
Yesterday I called my friends to find out how the paralyzed man was doing and if he would be willing to participate in this discussion. I found out that he died. He was 40 with two small children from the previous marriage. His ex- “abused mail-order-bride” is still trying to get something from his estate, I was told. His friends did not want to discuss this any further. His mother is in very bad shape and would not be able to speak out.
Then again, from reading what this story was reduced to — cats, dogs, kittens, what else? — I am thinking that may be the feminists are not that wrong. After all, every people deserves its own government, as they say.
My e-mail is moscownightsindc@hotmail.com
I would be happy to provide you with any information I have and I have lot of it. Just please do not ask me how to use cats, dogs and pigs for curing physical illnesses. I am more concerned about social diseases.
This comment was written by moscownights.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 6:38 am
moscownights, upon further consideration your story doesn’t sound all that crazy. It’s just that at this point in the game, I’ve heard it all. My favorite cliche about the whole industry is the Russian Mob, who are about as active in the real world as Dracula and the Mummy.
P.S.- Kittens and Broccoli cure cancer. But they have to be together at the same time to have full effect. (has anyone else noticed that we hijacked this thread?)
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 11:02 am
The case number isn’t meaningful unless the judge’s full-text ruling is published on lexis or available online, or unless you know of some other free method by which people who don’t live in Virginia can access official court documents. If there is documentation of Bill and Luba’s case available online, from an official, objective source, let me know and I’ll certainly read it, and eat crow if you’re telling the truth.
Lacking any evidence, however, your story sounds nuts.
It doesn’t even make sense on its own terms - if Luba had already filed an abuse claim the day before she talked to you, then she must already have researched immigration law and decided to falsely claim she was being abused. IF she already knew that, why did Luba need to get that info from you the day after she filed her claim? And if she had already lied to authoriteis about being abused, then why undermine her own case the very next day by telling you she hadn’t been abused?As it is, your story is that on day one, Luba filed for a restraining order. On day two, she decided to insist that she and Bill come over to your house, so she could ask you leading questions about immigration law and assure you that she’s never been abused, hence making sure you’d be in a perfect position to testify against her.That doesn’t sound like a plausible way for a woman pulling off a slick legal scam to behave.Let’s assume, though, that you are telling the truth. How do you know that Luba wasn’t being abused? If you ask a real-life abused woman, in front of her abuser, if she’s being abused, she might well lie. Maybe she doesn’t feel comfortable discussing her abuse with you. Maybe she doesn’t feel comfortable discussing this (even in Russian) in the same room as her abuser.
Similarly, how do you know that the two Russian men you’ve mentioned weren’t lying when they told you they hadn’t committed abuse? Maybe they were telling the truth, but maybe not.
That’s nothing. My friend’s aunt has a friend whose cousin works in the Pentagon, and she told me that all the Jewish employees took the day off on September 11th!
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 11:03 am
Dude, if you don’t think her story sounds crazy, then you’re probably crazy yourself. Did you not read the bit about the instructional film?
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 12:01 pm
You’ve misread. Luba filed an abuse claim the day following the alleged meeting. In this claim, she alleged that she had been abused the day before meeting with our storyteller.
More importantly, do the police issue restraining orders in VA? I know that in OR that a court does that.
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 12:41 pm
My friend’s aunt has a friend whose cousin works in the Pentagon, and she told me that all the Jewish employees took the day off on September 11th!
I knew it!
Man, you Jews are wily!
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
February 3rd, 2006 at 1:31 pm
Whoops. Okay, I’ve corrected my earlier post (moderator’s privilege) by crossing out the bad bits.
In Virginia, the police can issue a 72-hour emergency restraining order. After that, you need a judge to sign off on it, and in the long run a hearing (at which both sides get to speak, if they choose to) is unavoidable.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
February 5th, 2006 at 1:13 pm
This is just a small sample. It is very sad that IMBRA excluded protection to these innocents -
http://th.match.com/match/mt.cfm?pg=results
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
February 8th, 2006 at 7:51 pm
The initial intensions of this law have merit. Unfortunately, the law makers did not have real intentions to protect anyone. You need to ask the question “Who benefits from this law?” The answer: “BIG” Dating and a few senators who get to brag publicly about how they are saving the world from the evil U.S. citizen man. This law is not to protect women. Its to curb legal immigration. If the real intent was to protect women from dangerous men, how can yahoo, match, and others let any sex offender, or psychopath join.
If I had to publicly post any private information about myself in a restaurant and everyone inside had to read it and sign-off on it before I was allowed entry into that restaurant. I wouldn’t waste my time going to that restaurant.
This law further erodes anyone’s choice to pursue life, liberty and happiness. It is not illegal to write someone a letter in another country. It is not illegal to call someone from another country on the telephone. At least not for now.
Well of course the government will listen in and read everything you do since they spy on its citizens anyhow. But let’s put that aside for now. It is not illegal to marry someone from another country whether it be Britain, Canada, Greece, you name it.
The section of the law requiring U.S. citizens to undergo a criminal background check and answer very personal questions should scare the pants off of anyone who values what’s left of their personal privacy and freedoms.
You see, this law opens the doors for more and more regulations. Pretty soon you’ll need to get a psychological examination, a personality profile test, an interviews with every friend, you’ve had since kindergarten, your family members and employers. Maybe you’ll be required to have a microchip implanted on you to track your every move because this law says you are a “criminal” until you prove otherwise. You know those fancy criminal ankle bracelets.
Now this is not the America I remember when I was growing up as a child. I don’t have a criminal record and I work hard. And I don’t have time to meet people in bars and I enjoy chatting with people and meeting new people online. I know I’ll never meet 99% of them in person but you have to meet many people in order to find that special person who is right for you.
I have passion and pride for the USA. We have people dying in Iraq to serve and protect this country and to preserve the freedoms and liberties we enjoy (or what’s left of them)
I should be able to put my profile on a dating website and have a choice to meet anyone in the world that I want without having to give up my liberties. I don’t want the government to tell me who I can fall in love with and who I can’t.
So now webmasters who do not comply with near impossible regulations are criminals. Good God! You people should be angry. Your government spies on you and takes all of your freedoms away everyday little-by-little. Now your house can be taken away from you if a business can generate tax dollars from your land for the betterment of government. You see every year more rules, more regulations and you people let them do it. You live in the United States Prison. A prison without bars…that’s why it works and people like you let them take and take and control you.
The IMBRA 2005 does not do squat other than to deprive people of a means to meet other people. To say “hello”. Well I guess saying “hello” is soon to be a crime. Since only U.S. citizens are affected by this and only small “mom and pop” websites, this law doesn’t accomplish anything except further degrade your freedom to fall in love with whom you choose. Shame on all of you! If you really want to protect everyone’s rights whether they be a man or a woman, do background checks when a couple is ready to get married at the immigration stage of a relationship. This way everyone gets “last looks” before a commitment is made and everyone is treated the same no matter the persons nationality, gender, religion, race.
This comment was written by Jeremy.Report this comment to the moderators
February 14th, 2006 at 8:53 pm
Yikes
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2006/2/inktomi345729.php
International Marriage Broker Regulation Act of 2005 — Welcomed by Big Internet Dating Companies Seeking to Corner the Foreign-Women Dating Market
Regulation of international marriage brokers creates competitive advantage for big Internet dating companies.
(PRWEB) February 14, 2006 — The Big Internet Dating Organization (BID) supports the efforts of Internet dating sites in their opposition to criminal background check regulations (see http://www.onlinedatingmagazine.com/news2005/online-dating-regulation.html). However, despite BID’s opposition to background checks, BID supports the International Marriage Broker Regulation Act of 2005 (IMBRA) as it will enable BID’s Member Websites to capture more of the cross-cultural dating market.
Cross-cultural dating is the fastest growing segment of the Internet dating industry. It seems that there is a large and growing segment of American men who desire strong family relationships and believe women from other cultures also have this goal in mind. BID’s Member companies facilitate communication between foreign women and American men, although it is not their primary business. Typically, the women do not pay for membership since many come from impovershed circumstances, and the men join as paying members in order to receive their contact information.
Feminist organizations have been seeking to regulate the cross-cultural segment for years. The first law was from Washington State in January, 2002, (House Bill 2667). The feminist groups that helped write the law were mainly focused on International Matchmaking Organizations (IMO’s) that, in their opinion, advertise women as commodities and perpetuate sexist and racist stereotypes of foreign women. However, the law was too inclusive and would have negatively impacted our Member Websites’ cross-cultural segments. Therefore, BID worked with these groups to develop a more narrowly tailored definition that would only affect the IMO’s.
To further separate the IMO’s from the cross-cultural dating business, they were labeled International Marriage Brokers and the law was taken national as the International Marriage Broker Regulation Act. The hallmark of the law is the requirement that mandatory criminal and marital background checks be performed on each American man and each foreign woman must receive and approve of this information before her email address can be released. This last provision will certainly drive more traffic to BID Member Websites since most men, CRIMINAL OR NOT, will not want to be bothered with all the paperwork and compromise their privacy just to say “hi” to a woman. BID also anticipates that, in addition to the declining customer base, the cost of compliance will drive most marriage brokers out of business.
IMBRA goes into effect on March, 6 2006. Already, the cross-cultural segments of BID’s Member Websites are showing increased traffic. BID thanks the writers of IMBRA for their support and appreciate their concern for women worldwide.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
February 17th, 2006 at 1:39 pm
As many as 64 million Americans have arrest records, many of which never resulted in conviction. That means that about 27% of the nation’s adult population have a criminal record. (Source: LAC.org).
In 2004, nearly 7 million Americans (3% of adult population) were under some form of correctional supervision: 2.2 million incarcerated in state and federal prisons and local jails; 4.1 million on probation; and 700,000 on parole. (Source: US Department of Justice)
If you want to make some money, invest in some private prisons that trade on Wall Street like Corrections Corporation or Wackenhut. Soon everyone can be a prisoner!
This comment was written by Jeremy.Report this comment to the moderators
February 22nd, 2006 at 2:57 pm
’twas a joke. I’ve heard some whoppers in my time but that one goes on the shelf for display. I wonder who produces such instructional films? ;-)
In other news, we are now in full compliance with the new legislation and all is well in the jungle. Our customers (both men and women) are more than willing to comply with the new rules and business is thriving once more, much to Alice’s chagrin I’m sure (that was some nice trolling on http://internationalmarriagebrokers.com/index.html by the way).
As others have noted, the law has intentions that are valid but unfortunately it falls short of the mark. I believe that in one of the primary cases they use as an example, the man had no previous convictions of any kind. So in truth, that poor woman’s fate would have been no different with this law in effect. Unfortunately though, most of the less ethical agencies who specialize in canned letters and fake profiles are now thriving overseas because their legitimate American competition is running for the hills. Many of them were almost on the brink of bankruptcy until now.
I guess the bulk of my frustration comes from the fact that we never specialized in any type of “mail order bride” service but have still been forced to divert lots of time and effort to comply with the IMBRA. Oh well, such is life in the big city.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
March 3rd, 2006 at 7:53 pm
IMBRA Photos?
A recent search on the subject came up with this
http://www.online-dating-rights.com/index.php?ind=gallery&op=section_view&idev=6
Why are these photos on that site?
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
March 4th, 2006 at 11:54 am
Yikes!
From http://www.pacificislandtours.com/imbra.html
The United States must be the first country in history to ever pass a law to protect foreign citizens from it’s OWN CITIZENS! This is an example of our legislators hard at work protecting our constitutional rights!!!
The United States is the only country in the world that is now putting these restrictions on its men! Foreign women do not have to go through any of these requirements to contact American men. The two Senators and the feminist militant activists state that there is a trend of raising violence to foreign born brides of American men, nonsense! They presented no evidence of this, because there is none, no surveys, no reports, NOTHING! They dwell on three horrible incidents of violence in the last 10 years where those women who were foreign born brides were murdered by their husbands. It is interesting to note that the feminists do not mention the American husband who had his penis cut off as he slept by his foreign born bride or the Florida man who’s foreign born wife tried to slowly poison him to death and now in prison! As a matter of fact, the evidence out there states that marriages to foreign born women are more stable and successful than marriages to American born women. The divorce rate in one survey made some years ago after ten years of marriage found a divorce rate under 10% with American men married to foreign born women. The divorce rate of men married to American born women is over 50%. So than, why are these women pushing through this legislation? Is it to protect foreign women from the horrible, violent and criminal American men? No, they could care less. The real reason is that it just infuriates them that American men are more and more disgusted with the attitudes of many American women. Many American men seek traditional women who have some old fashion and traditional values of what a family and a wife is suppose to be. Women that act like women, not wannabe men! These traditional values are poison to the feminist as this threatens their sickening and destructive agenda. This does not mean that most of these men are looking for women to be submissive or to be treated as an object or a sexual slave. This is just the nonsense that these people are telling us. What infuriates them is that many men are finding successful relationships with foreign women, more so than American women on average. Right along side this fact is that many of these foreign born brides are much younger and more beautiful than what is available in the U.S. Many foreign women especially from Asia are very unconcerned about large age differences of the men they marry.
This law {IMBRA} is now telling the world that American men are by nature so violent, horrible, abusive and criminal that the U.S. government has to protect all foreign women by the mandating of it’s male citizens to provide police checks before allowing the men to correspond with a foreign women to say a simple, hello! So there you have it……………………… How does it make you feel?
Sites like Yahoo personals, MSN, match.com, etc are also exempt as dating is not their primary business and other exemptions they may qualify for. They exempted these large sites because they knew this law could be tied up in the courts for years if challenged by them with their large wallets. The common belief is that these companies contributed largely to the lobbying of this law to push it through and give them most of the online dating market.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
March 5th, 2006 at 9:04 am
TODAY is the last day for marriage brokers!!! Do I hear taps playing?
They are starting to shut down. Here is the first of multitudes to be put out of business.
“Love of Asia Vietnam”
No more Viets for you buster
http://www.online-dating-rights.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=93&sid=67bf2ce502e71d503497035ddc918786
IMBRA is working. Thanks to Tahirih, Legal Momentum (N.O.W.) and Maria Cantwell.
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
March 7th, 2006 at 12:14 pm
Looks like a judge in Atlanta has issued a temporary restraining order on this ridiculous law.
It’s only good for about 10 to 20 days but at least that gives more time for more people to see how poor put together and just plain wrong this piece of legislation is.
Hopefully we’ll soon see this legislative jalopy relegated to the junkpile where it belongs
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 8th, 2006 at 9:36 am
Hello all.. .. i called the United States District Court (Northern District of Georgia Atlanata Division) today and was told the following
Temporary Restraining Order Entry today IN CASE 1:06-CV-00426-CC , granting European Connections request for a TRO…. Prelim Injunction Hearing Scheduled for March 20, 2005.
Federal judges do not issue TRO’s just for the hell of it.. the fact that a TRO was granted should tell you something about this garbage law which tries to regulate free speech between law abiding folks….
In the end what i think will happen (this is just my opinion based on experience in court) is that the law will be stripped and end up another uselss piece of legislation that failed to consider the constitution… you know that document i am talking about?
Passing laws to regulate people (because you do not like their life style) is never a good idea, especially when you have no facts to back up your claims of immigrant women abuse… but again, I understand that the supporters of this law were able to gain traction with sensational sound bites which connect penpal websites with human trafficking… you better find something better
This comment was written by Dave.Report this comment to the moderators
March 8th, 2006 at 12:16 pm
Unfortunatley, this may bring unwanted public scrutiny and brand the law as a scornful subversive feminist plot. How those boneheads were actually able to pull this off is a wonder.
http://www.online-dating-rights.com/pdf/ConBrief.pdf
This comment was written by Alice.Report this comment to the moderators
March 8th, 2006 at 12:52 pm
Alice,
If it looks like chicken, smells like chicken, and tastes like chicken….chances are its CHICKEN!
So hopefully this subversive feminist plot will be exposed for what it really is and IMBRA will be thrown in the trash.
This comment was written by Jeremy.Report this comment to the moderators
March 8th, 2006 at 1:04 pm
Alice, you could gain a lot more respect and support for your causes if did not refer to everyone else as “boneheads” and “idiots”… many of the people you refer to with these comments actually are decent people with wives and children… they are not all looking for slaves.
Maybe take some time to understand why men from the west marry ladies from the far east. Not every man does a search for “submissive asian bitch” on the internet looking for a wife. Many of the guys I talk to have just stumbled across sites from other dating sites.. i hear things like “I didn’t even know what a Filipina was before I met my wife” … or guys are searching for penpals and find a “foreign bride” website… believe it or not, many of the guys that meet foreign nationals are not even looking for them.. like a lot of things in life there is no rhyme or reason for it
While it may be easier to label everyone with the same label, if you do this you are not being honest with yourself or anyone else for that matter…
This comment was written by Dave.Report this comment to the moderators
March 8th, 2006 at 2:00 pm
Actually, I’m pretty sure that Alice is a marriage broker supporter just pretending to be a feminist.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 8th, 2006 at 4:29 pm
As a matter of fact, all the links she posted point to such websites.
This comment was written by Jimmy Ho.Report this comment to the moderators
March 8th, 2006 at 9:21 pm
Amp,
I think maybe you are right about Alice…but nonetheless, there must be a better way to protect women AND men such as requiring the background checks when a couple is applying for the fiance visa. This method is most fair to everyone and would apply to all foreign fiances.
This comment was written by Jeremy.Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 12:10 am
Ya think, Amp?
“The real reason is that it just infuriates them that American men are more and more disgusted with the attitudes of many American women. Many American men seek traditional women who have some old fashion and traditional values of what a family and a wife is suppose to be. Women that act like women, not wannabe men! These traditional values are poison to the feminist as this threatens their sickening and destructive agenda. ” - Alice
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 7:08 am
There is a better link to the actual judge’s comments at http://www.imbra.org
The brief you linked to was what the plaintiff’s lawyer said (quite interesting in that he mentioned Alito and Scalia as having ruled in similar cases to the benefit of the victims of the anti-constitutional law).
The actual judge did his homework and came up with even more precedents to throw this law out. Now he is going to do even more homework and make this the kind of decision that the feminists won’t even bother taking to the Supreme Court.
IMBRA is stillborn.
But the feminists will push at their real agenda: stopping foreign women from getting great American husbands which might involve the American men divorcing feminist American women and moving in with someone half her age. The Internet and cheap airfares is making this more and more a danger to the mouthy feminist types approaching menopause.
To this end, fiance visas will soon take a year to be granted. The hatred continues…men must be stopped from pursuing happiness at all costs.
I recommend the book ‘Ethan Fromme’.
This comment was written by Aaron.Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 9:51 am
Or a schizophrenic forum troll, either way it’s a bit aggavating. Don’t people have better things to do with their time? The fact that he/she posted on the Marriage Broker forums doesn’t make much sense to me, as one would think it would get boring after a while.
Alice wrote:
It’s called due process, look it up.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 12:25 pm
Geeze, Aaron. Could you possibly use more misogynist cliches in your writing? To be fair, you did avoid the terms “feminazi,” “bitch” & “hag.” But I can’t really credit you for that.
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 1:24 pm
Yeah, I thought that was a bit heavy. Cliches running amok.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 2:55 pm
I recommend the book ‘Ethan Fromme’.
… and I recommend a good therapist.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 3:14 pm
Well, if someone were trying to take away your basic rights I’m sure you would be using a few choice words also
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 6:47 pm
Yes. Yes, I would use a few choice words. Motherfuckers, oppressive assholes, intolerant bigots are all terms that come to mind. However, “…mouthy feminist types approaching menopause,” is simply a misogynist cliche.
Rather than attack your opposition for their position, this uses the old cliche of your opponents simply being bitter because they are old, ugly & unable to enjoy sex rather than having an opposing opinion due to their interpretation of the facts that have been displayed (even in this comment thread). In short, Mahku, you’re apoligising for an insulting misogynistic bigot (or so his words strongly suggest).
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 10:55 pm
Well, given the obvious man-hating nature of this law, and the anti-male cliches which appear on this very thread (e.g. guys who look for women overseas are losers, can’t get women back home, are all over the hill) you an see that there’s plenty of cliche going around on both sides of this issue.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 9th, 2006 at 11:40 pm
The law is intended to prevent future deaths like the death of Anastasia King. The law may be badly written, or futile; but please explain, using simple language, why trying to prevent another case like Anastasia King’s is “man-hating” in nature.
It’s VERY telling that not one pro-marriage-broker person here has expressed more than a pro forma sentence of concern about what happened to Anastasia King, even though the original post spends quite a bit of time discussing her case. Most marriage broker supporters can’t even be bothered to even express the pro forma concern; the fact that Mr. King beat one marriage-broker bride and murdered another isn’t even a matter of concern for you folks, judging from what you’ve written here.
And you wonder why we feminists think you folks don’t give a crap about what happens to women?
If you’re against this law, then suggest an alternative that might protect women like Anastasia King in the future. If you can’t even be bothered to do that, then please don’t imagine that you’ll have any credibility in this forum.
Aside from yourself and Alice (who is a conservative pretending to be a feminist, not an actual feminist), no one has used those cliches in this thread.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 1:20 am
Well, you’ll have to work that out with ‘Alice’ since it’s your blog. Those may be the only instances the cliches appear on this thread. But if I had a dime for every time I’ve heard them when this issue came up I’d be typing this from my penthouse overlooking Central Park.
Other than the intro to this thread and possibly the first response nobody on your side has expressed much concern either, pro forma or otherwise. For what it’s worth I hate those crimes and I can’t imagine a man laying an angry hand on the the woman he’s supposed to love. I agree with the responder that implied that 27 years is too short a term. I’ll spare you the details but I have definite ideas for the punishment that should be given to such scum. Also, concern and condolences for Anastasia and the other woman who was murdered by her American husband have been expressed on other forums discussing this issue such as online dating rights.
And while your showing all of this concern might you spare a little for the men who’ve been attacked, poisoned and killed by their foreign-born wives?
And you wonder why we marriage broker supporters think you folks don’t give a crap about what happens to men.
These terrible tragedies are 2 (TWO!) out of the tens of thousands of American man-foreign born wife marriages. Can you, Ampersand, give me clear evidence that there’s more of a problem with these marriages than with American man-American woman marriages? That’s what proponents of this law are claiming, and giving zero evidence to back it up.
You wonder why I say that this law is ‘man-hating?’ Well, clearly it targets men and paints them as criminals until proven otherwise. It also targets only men looking overseas, like there isn’t a domestic violence problem and a 50% divorce rate in this country?
How about this? African-American man married Caucasian woman. He kills his wife. Out of the tens of thousands of such marriages maybe one other instance like this is found. An outraged nation enacts a law saying that all black men must produce documents proving they’ve never committed such crimes before they can say ‘Hi’ to a white woman. Fair law Ampersand?
What to do to prevent these crimes? Background checks for both the American man and the foreign woman at the time of the application for the spouse/fiance visa. Unlike your side I want to protect everyone involved, not just target one group that I find ‘creepy.’
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 1:59 am
Mahku, while I see the logic in both having a background check, isn’t that what immigration is for, with regards to the foriegner? Don’t immigration hearings cover that background as is?
Second, your stance seems to come from a perspective that would imply that men and women are equally as likely to commit these violent acts. Statistics don’t tend to back that up.
And finally, the more vulnerable of the two parties is the one that is being ‘purchased’. I for one find the practice abhorrent. I think that most would agree that the vast majority of these women would not be selling themselves into an unknown marriage if they weren’t desperate in some way or another (to immigrate or for money). The notion of a person being purchased can (and does from what I’ve read of things written by men who have used such services) a sense of entitlement that is flat out frightening. Cultivate that megalomania enough, and it isn’t hard to imagine acts of imagined subordination or independence being responded to with violence.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 2:05 am
Oh, also, is this law specific to men buying brides, or does it apply to if a woman were to buy a groom?
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 3:17 am
As I understand it the immigration process mainly checks into the background of the foreign spouse-to-be. I’m proposing that this is the best time to check into the American applicant (man or woman), not at the point where they’re saying ‘Hi, nice to meet you.’ I would support full background checks for both sides at this time as a way to protect both sides.
Yes, men commit these crimes more often. That doesn’t mean that men who are victims of these crimes from women don’t deserve equal protection. All victims of crime deserve the same protection and all criminals deserve punishment. Let’s make laws that address the issue equally, scrutinizing foreign and domestic relationships, investigating the men and the women.
As for your last paragraph, it’s full of the condescension one often finds from those who are trying to ‘protect’ foreign women. It also shows that you knows these marriages about as well as I know about the mating habits of the platypus. I’m sorry that you find it ‘abhorrent’ that so many of them men are going out and finding wives, having happy, long marriages with children. It’s too bad that you see a woman of color and assume that she’s a vulnerable shrinking thing that needs your protection.
I’ve been living in Asia, Africa and the Middle East for the last 18 years. I’ve seen hundreds of such marriages. I can assure you that the abuse and other problems in these marriages are nothing compared to the carnage that is the American marriage scene.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 4:09 am
You know, it was easily predictable that you’d say something like that at some point. I know you. We know you (make that a plural ‘you’ as well, if you like).
Like we care what someone who sides with the oppressor “assures” us. As long are you are not one of those women, instead of a pimpstress or a bride purchaser, nobody cares about your “experience”. Oh, and don’t assume that we all spent our entire lives in Western countries and don’t know anything about “exotic” cultures and languages. ‘Cause that would be “condescending”, y’know.
This comment was written by Jimmy Ho.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 5:25 am
What I do know about these marriages is that the age difference is generally quite large, and involves older American men with younger foriegn women. That in and of itself is a concern for me, because it sets up an immediate power dynamic that needs to be overcome to ensure equality. Do I wish to protect these foriegn women from potential servitude? Well yes, as much as I can by speaking out and asking the tough questions that seem to make you so uncomfortable.
Wow, so some of them finding happiness makes a system that is set up in such a way that could easily create abuse and human servitude of a very questionable sort is enough to free it from scrutiny?
Whoa, hold-up there Sparky, where did I at any point say ‘women of color’? Hell, through this whole conversation, I’ve actually had those silly Russian bride websites going through my brain. While I know that the marriage market is not exclusive to Russia, my own critical thoughts have got zero to do with color. My concern is for women in vulnerable situations, regardless of their ethnicity.
And pray tell, how many of these marriages occur between young men to older women, or older men to older women, or younger men to younger women? Can you deny that the vast majority are middle aged to older men marrying barely post pubescent women?
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 5:33 am
Re The IMBRA
However noble the motivations might have been in wanting
to prevent crimes against foreign brides like those two that
occurred in Washington State, it is not fair or appropriate to
inject innuendo and slander on all men dating or wanting to
meet and marry a woman outside the US. Last I heard, Scott
Peterson was an American married to an American. Why
not slander all American men?
Additionally, the term ‘marriage broker’ is an intentional
added slur that does not at all describe introduction
agencies that foster people meeting rather than
engaging in anything like being a marriage broker. I have
written to Russian women for the past two years and
have never even encountered a so-called marriage broker.
These ad hominen attacks through intentional mislabeling
just confirm the lack of intellectual integrity in the IMBRA.
Furthermore, the focus of congressman Larson should
properly be on protecting American men from the
illegitimate agencies that use phony photos, or foreign
women seeking only money, entertainment, or a green card. We are,
after all, the taxpayers paying for his services and protection.
Embassies may advise engaged women as to their legal rights and responsibilities as part of the visa application process”“which seems reasonable. Knowledge of these same rights protects U.S. citizens at home. Futhermore, exercising these rights by the women truly victimized in Washington State would have given them the means to escape their inexcusable and fully reprehensible abuse. Rights should protect both men and women equally and fairly and be legislated with that objective in mind. Creating innuendo and bad mouthing and victimizing American men who are dating foreign women is not reasonable. Nor is continuing to sermonize the fiction that men are more often scoundrels and women are more often saints.
Some introduction agencies”“not marriage brokers”“have actually sold their databases and gone out of business. This has not only destroyed the dreams of some American men and foreign women, but also the financial dreams of the respective entrepreneurs and their employees.
The assumptions that American men seeking to meet foreign
women are a ‘risk group’ to be treated differently is not only
insulting and a calculated innuendo, but also patently false.
The corollary assumption that American women are the
last bastions of moral virtue and any man looking elsewhere
must be morally deficient is also patently false and ludicrous.
I didn’t realize the state of marriage is so advanced and harmonious
in the USA that we can lecture the world.
In the comments below are addressed other issues that
relate to the IMBRA. I particularly object to the use of
innuendo to prevent or discourage international marriages.
This is the new McCarthyism of our age egged on by
the radical feminists and ‘political correctness.’ Or perhaps
the Salem witch trials come to mind? Just who is it that is really
in league with the devil? The radical feminists
should look in the mirror since they propose to take away
‘the pursuit of happiness’ from some American men and
foreign women as guaranteed by the US constitution.
The Salem witch trials were apparently sparked by a
homegrown cause of the wholesale eating of a type
of grain that caused delirium and delusions, which
was not understood at that time. Similarly, American
women should look at themselves to answer and address the
question as to why so many and ever growing numbers
of American men find foreign women to be better and more
pleasing spouses, rather than to try to prevent American men
from seeking international romance.
Email to Fox News:
I commend you for criticizing this outrageous act. I am attaching
below my response to the stop the IMBRA web site.
I would also like to add that I was up in Montreal for six months and
discovered all of the college students there are cohabitating happily,
while Americans are too puritanical and dysfunctional to do so.
There is also remarkably less obesity and violence, and medical care
for all, but that’s another subject.
I have not submitted a spousal Visa, but would like to one day. I
have found the Russian women to be a lot more polite and even
handed in correspondence as compared to narcissistic American
women who always act like they are doing you a great favor for
five minutes of their precious time.
Contrary to belief and some others, I don’t want a woman to be subservient
or a baby machine. Actually, I would like her to have a career.
What I do want is a woman who will meet me 50% of the way and not
demand 100% or throw a tantrum or/and run to a divorce lawyer.
This has not happened to me, but I fear it greatly. It happened to
my Dad and other men I know. I guess some American women label any woman who doesn’t expect to get her way 100% of the time as “subservient.”
Women over much of the rest of the world actually
hold American men in high esteem as compared to their men. (Russian
men drink to excess while Latin men are too macho.)
Are these women all really just misinformed? Why is it that no foreign or domestic company has had a singles tour for wealthy foreigners: Europeans, Arabs, Koreans, or any background to come here to meet poor
American women for prospective brides? Why are so many
American women divorced and overweight? Many have
ended up with 18 years of child support”“which come to
think about it”“is a lot more expensive than a green card!
I think the reputation of American women has preceded them. They
only get excited for movie stars, rock stars, or pro athletes who will let their entire life revolve around her and do and agree with everything
she demands.
Comment to Anti-IMBRA site:
I was thinking of doing a similar web site. Thanks to you I don’t have to.
I did complain to several congressmen’s offices about this outrageous law. You are exactly right about the type of innuendo that it purposely associates with American men looking for love abroad.
May I say that you have not touched on related topics which are, I admit, beyond the immediate scope of fighting the IMBRA.
What I am referring to is that the strategy of ‘attack by innuendo’ is not new. Some American women use this strategy in the workplace to attack male coworkers. Let me be clear, I have never harassed
any woman or been accused of such. I am going by what I have seen in the work place at large companies. Some women have ‘relations’ with upper level or mid level bosses to gain favor and then ‘bad mouth’ or spread innuendo about lower level men who compete with them for advancement. Others may suffice to use a form of innuendo alone”“much as the IMBRA does. This ‘innuendo’ does not have to be about sex. It might be about misconstrued comments about the company or a manager, or any other subject, which can then be turned into gossip to be used against a coworker. No doubt the woman engaging in this innuendo will demand ‘equal pay’ for her efforts. I personally have witnessed this type of behavior at several companies in different industries. It has made me so disgusted that I refuse to work for any business but my own.
Women are hardwired to compete this way, much as men are inborn to use their fists. What really burns me is that the media is saturated by the evil men do….and I admit that there are some very evil and cruel men, but that the media almost never covers the wrong, unethical, cruel, dishonest, unprofessional, and abusive things that some women do. Woman are propagated to be faultless paragons of virtue, or yes, the ultimate virgins of moral purity while men are dirty scoundrels, and only to be tolerated if they do everything that the enlightened ones”“the women”“want. Ugh. Enough!
So-called political correctness is used to intimidate anyone who has the balls”“no pun intended”“to speak out against this contrived and outrageous sex prejudice. Of course, American women don’t want to compete with foreign women because they know how insufferable
some of them have become by the ‘bitch factor’ and by demanding their way 100% of the time for putting out, while a Russian woman would be very, very, happy to get her way 50% of the time in a relationship. Another good thing to mention would be the right to say no. Any woman has the right to say no, but does she have the right to be a rude bitch while saying no. American women don’t feel any obligation to show or even
reciprocate politeness to American men since they are constantly bombarded by the media of the latest crime committed by a very small minority of men. Also, the constant harping by the media on how
women have all been ‘victimized’ by all men economically, politically, socially, and sexually, gives them the right to treat all men as the ‘evil disreputable ones’ not deserving of courtesy or fair play.
I don’t know of a website that actually discusses these issues in a ‘fair and balanced’ way. Women extremists would like to institute a new McCarthyism with them deciding, of course, who in the
male community is in league with the devil. The IMBRA is just the tip of the iceberg.
Are not American women in need of any improvement? Could this have anything to do with why many American men are seeking foreign wives?
This comment was written by Hal Watkins.by Hal Watkins
Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 7:00 am
You make the assumption: Age difference, bad…same age, good. I don’t see you justify it other than with your own preference. If you want somebody near your own age, go out and find them. A lot of these women WANT older guys and they go out and find them. In fact a lot of cultures in the world encourage age difference in marriage. And even in western countries large age differences weren’t unusual until recent times. Are you saying that other cultures are wrong and only modern, western culture is right?
Yes, power in the relationship is an important thing to be negotiated BY THE TWO PEOPLE IN THE RELATIONSHIP. Not by a nanny state looking over their shoulder before the relationship even starts. You can have equality in a relationship even if the age difference and economic difference is large. The two people in a couple can have different roles in a relationship without one feeling that they’re a groveling slave.
And on what basis do you conclude that equal age, equal everything is the recipe for success? It seems like plenty of couples like that end up on the rocks, with beating, intimidation, etc. Why don’t you get exercised about that? Could it be because the smaller percentage of trouble with foreign born wives gets sensationalized and propagandized beyond all reality?
You said some, I said many. Anyway, if even half of the marriages are happy and work then they’ve already beaten US domestic marriages. And it’s definitely more than half. Is there abuse and unhappiness? Sure there is? But my problem with you and others is that you demand a standard of scrutiny and perfection from this subset that you don’t ask of others. And on top of this you have NO EVIDENCE that a problem even exists.
Yes, I’ll grant you that I overreached my conclusion that we were talking about women of color. My experience is with East Asian, East African and Latin women marrying western guys. I don’t know very many East European/Western marriages so I can’t comment on those very much.
All of the above except I DO DENY THAT THE VAST MAJORITY ARE MIDDLE AGED TO OLDER MEN MARRYING BARELY POST PUBESCENT WOMEN. Where do you get that? That’s propaganda that you’ve swallowed hook, line and sinker. For example look at the website for A Foreign Affair and see the photos from their tours. Some of the guys are older. The majority are 30s and 40s and the women are 20s and 30s with some older ones. Both sides are free to choose or not choose.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 10:19 am
I am 39 and my wife is 35, so we must not fit the “typical” age difference you indicate.. I think the age difference is decreasing based on my limited experience in meeting other Asian/American couples..
One reason more sympathy is not expressed over the few terrible cases that have been mentioned (or even discussion about common sense approaches to protect immigrant women) is because many people see IMBRA as a sell out, or a law with another agenda..
The one essential thing I cannot get passed is this. Since the law requires all of this background checking to occur during the visa processing, then what is the purpose of it at the hello stage? It just makes no sense.
The only conclusion I can come to is that it is meant to hinder or prevent men from seeking a foreign bride, because most men wouldn’t want a foreign national he has never met to see all of this information.
If the intention of the law was truly to protect immigrant women, then what harm can come from delaying the background checks until the visa stage? Can anyone answer this question for me?
This comment was written by Dave.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 2:40 pm
Aight, I’d better refrain from commenting on this particular thread: no time nor patience, and I’d have to break all of them “civility” rules.
Of course not. She has the right to shyly whisper “nnooo, I’m not sure…” while batting her eyelashes, and that’d be already too much, wouldn’t it? What fuhmocking rape fantasy is that? Hey, y’all want some “petite geishas” and “me-so-literate guniangs”? You’re in for a treat, mm-hmm. Everyone’s only doing their business, after all.
This comment was written by Jimmy Ho.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 4:26 pm
Jimmy Ho, You miss the intent of the comment. The right to say no was NOT meant to be a request for sex. I was unfortunately, unintentionally vague on that point. I meant rather a request to dance, a request to have a conversation at a bar, or a request for a minute of her time, or even a request for information on the telephone for information that has nothing to do with social interaction–like tech support.
I agree that a direct request for sex–out of context– should not be expected to have a polite response expecially when talking to a stranger. This is not what I meant to say. The point is that when asked almost anything, including even, for example, tech suppport on the telephone from a Tech Support Dept., or an offer to dance proffered in the most polite and respectful manner, or a request for information at a pharmacy….American women are often amazingly rude. Even when nothing is said or asked, like holding a door open for a stranger, most American women will not even utter a thank you.
Regarding the Geishas ha-ha. Not what I am looking for. I have written several Russian women in a respectful manner and never received a complaint for rudeness of what I have written. I have learned that some American men inject sexual questions in an inappropriate mannner and that understandably turns these Russian women off. I know these women deserve equal respect that they are extending to you.
However, try to write to an American woman in a similar respectful manner and you soon find that she will not reciprocate the courtesy that you have extended to her. Russian women I have written at two major introduction–not marriage brokers–agencies have all without exception been polite, even if a few were not being honest. Also, they are interested in learning more about you. They are willing to meet you 50% of the way and treat you with respect. I can tell you that this is remarkably different than writing American women on Match.
American women first go overboard in telling you every boring detail about their mundane preferences: all muscians, films, books they like..ad nauseum, and then will demand what specific characteristics you must have to continue to correspond to them. One demanded that you must read a certain relationship book before even writing her. Another demanded that you have a certain number of pictures of certain views on your profile before she would consider responding.
Additionally, an American woman will almost never thank you for writing her. Russian women always thank you for writing them. Just basic courtesy. An American woman always tries to make you feel grateful for having ‘gotten’ five minutes of her time for free. A Russian woman understands that your time is as valuable as hers.
Some of this may be attributable to the fact that American women are bombarded with Emails at major sites while Russian women don’t get as many letters in comparison. However, it is more attributable that in their culture it is customary to be polite to a man as long as he is polite and respectful to you. American women have the freedom to be rude in every situation and every interaction for no reason at all–after all: ‘there worth it!’ It’s simply cool and in vogue to behave this way. Foreign women in any country have better manners. Even in Canada–just across the border–women are markedly more polite. Also, Canadian coeds are all cohabitating while American women are too puritancal and dysfunctional to do so. Miss manners and civility have left the entire American culture..as has been much talked about, but American women have embraced this trend and made it their own.
This comment was written by Hal1490.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 6:00 pm
Amp,
I’m not sure if anyone has mentioned this or not. I don’t feel like reading this entire thread again. But, in the two cases in Washington State, including the Anatasia King case, none of the husbands had criminal backgrounds and the IMBRA would not have protected them at all. That’s what I don’t understand. The government representatives in Washington state created a law based on (3) cases where the law would not have protected anyone. Even if background checks were done at the visa stage, it still would not have protected anyone. Scott Peterson never had a criminal history either. He murdered his wife Lacie. Many times terrible murders take place and really nothing could have been done to prevent it. Statistics show that you have twice the chance of being murdered by your spouse if you are an American woman married to an American man than if you are a foreign woman married to an American man. The IMBRA law protects no one and further erodes fundamental freedoms and liberties we once had in this country. Not only that, but it opens the door for men to be falsely accused of spousal abuse so a foreign woman can get a “free ride” to permanent residency in the United States.
This comment was written by Jeremy.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 7:05 pm
Jeremy wrote:
Actually, as my post at the top of this thread said, “Congress this month passed The International Marriage Broker Act, which requires potential mail-order brides to be informed if their suitors have criminal histories or have had domestic violence complaints taken out against them.”
So I think you’re mistaken about the facts. Since Indle King’s first wife had taken out a domestic violence complaint against him, IMBRA would have warned Anatasia Soloviev about his history before she began a relationship with King. You can’t dismiss the possibility that this would have saved her life.
What is the primary source for this finding, please?
How does it do that?
Furthermore, what alternative do you propose to protect immigrant women who are abused by their American spouses?
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 9:17 pm
This quote and others like it keep me at a point of near constant boggled amusement and amazement when I’m reading this thread. On one hand, we have a group of men that are demanding to be seen as victimized, humble gentlemen, being painted with an errant brush by a society that wants only to keep them from achieving happiness. On the other, we see them making commentary that can only be considered completely arrogant and sexist. Somehow, these men have gotten it in their heads that the reason people (specifically women) object to these protections is out of selfish petulance.
Fella’s, hate to burst your bubble of self-aggrandizing studliness, but that’s not why people (including women) object. Here we have completely unaware comments of consistent sexism laced with misogynistic beliefs about American women and feminists, and confusion still runs rampant about why it is people worry about the vulnerability of the foriegners coming to meet them. While I know I’m not going to change anyones mind here, you have to admit that such arguments and accompanying beliefs seem very telling, and only bolster the case for such laws.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 10th, 2006 at 11:50 pm
Ampersand, I think Alice has found a new handle in Jimmy Ho.
It would be nice if your side would hold yourself to this standard. You have yet to provide any convincing proof that there’s a problem here that justifies singling out these population groups. I could go out and find 2 murders in just about any combination of ethnic marriages but why do you zero in on American men meeting foreign women?
Assuming we concede your assertion that there is indeed a problem which justifies singling out these subsets of people and making laws about it, several of us have proposed having the background checks as part of the immigration process. One can assume that such a check would have saved Anastasia from her terrible fate. By the way, I have yet to see anyone from your side besides you, Ampersand, express this concern for the victim that you beat us over the head with. It would certainly work better than this preposterous IMBRA which leaves 90% of the people involved out of the dragnet anyway.
Another thing, does such a check exist to stop an American woman from marrying a monster like Indle? If not, why aren’t you trying to move heaven and earth to make a law about that, like you are about this one?
It seems that there’s this persistent idea that foreign women don’t have the knowledge or ability to protect themselves and therefore they need their wise and all-knowing American sisters to save them from these slavering male monsters. Well the truth is that out of the over 100 wives of western men that I’ve met from Japan, Korea, Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia, Ethiopia, Colombia, etc. the majority of them are college degree holders with some skill to support themselves. Furthermore, they have a vast network of relatives and friends who are already married to westerners, passing back information about their experiences. They know full well that there are cases of abuse. They also know that this network tells them that the odds and statistics point to a pretty fair chance of a happy, long-lasting marriage with a western man. Or so I’ve been told by women in many countries. Also, when I tell them that American feminists are looking out for them by making restrictive laws it’s met by hoots of derision and outrage that someone is trying to take away their right to meet people.
As for you Basement Kim:
You talk of hate (misogyny). I’ll tell you what hate is. It’s singling out and pursueing a small group of people, spending years trying to dig up dirt, not finding very much (2 or 3 cases), couldn’t pass a normal law, so a poorly crafted one was sneakily attached to another law to ride with little notice through the voting and presidential signing. All of this spending years and the untold money spent all targeting this group of people that you hate. Very little evidence is produced justifying the need for all of this, only these few cases which could be duplicated in any number of other population groups. In fact the main reason for the hostility seems to be things like the age difference, the economic disparity, etc. Going to such lengths over years just to stick it to a group you don’t like seems to me like a fine, shining example of hate. So consenting adults are choosing to enter these relationships that run counter to your narrow definition of the ideal. And you and others move heaven and earth to make laws to express your hatred of these people. Very sad indeed.
Also, it’s not hatred (misogyny) or sexism to reject unsatisfactory mating options and look elsewhere. This is like the innuendo and slurring thing that Hal was talking about. Also, if you find us American men so repugnant you yourself are free to look overseas. There are still parts of the world where the guys still like American women. But you’d better hurry. The word is spreading fast. And we just might get together and make a law protecting those poor, vulnerable guys.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 11th, 2006 at 4:41 am
You know what I find extremely irritating about this statement? It is in absolute denial of the fact that women are at risk due to patriarchal systems and beliefs like this regardless of foreign marriage arranging. This system of buying or ‘investing’ in young women as brides with the expectation that people will trust that despite what it looks like the motives are completely altruistic and without any intent of creating a relationship that is much like indentured servitude is not realistic or even deserved. If men were being trafficed in the same manner, I’d have the exact same feeling about it. It is a situation that is ripe for setting up potentially abusive relationships. While it may not occur in all or even half of the relationships, the excuse that marriages are filled with women are in abusive relationships in the United States is absolutely not a justification for neglecting to set up whatever systems are possible that would at the very least make the women getting into these relationships aware of any potential problems with their prospective spouse. The fact that you are so eager to have these relationships kept away from any scrutiny despite their unusual nature that warrants it makes me leery.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 11th, 2006 at 6:20 am
This blog’s writers and regular readers were not born just yesterday and this is not the first time we’re having this discussion with people who defend the “right” to purchase a live woman chosen for her economic dependance. It’s too bad a large part of the previous thread has been lost, because we could just copy ans paste it here.
You are the one advertizing for this industry. “Alice” is on your side. Stop insulting our intelligence, will’ya?
This comment was written by Jimmy Ho.Report this comment to the moderators
March 11th, 2006 at 8:21 am
Whoa! I got linked to here from some press release through a “dating rights?” site. Actually read through most of the above and had to say something.
Its seems that there is a lot of common beliefs - maybe more than differences. Everyone seems to acknowldge that background checks are being done under the current system (that is without IMBRA) but there is maybe disagreement over the need for them. One sticky point that comes up is the timing of the when background information is provided - that seems to be what IMBRA is adding to the current system (among other less contentious things anyway).
I think that everyone (excluding crazy folks) wants people to be safe. So how can all this be solved where everyone is happy?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 11th, 2006 at 4:44 pm
My knowledge of immigration for marriage is limited. However, it seems logical that at some point she decides to marry someone and at another point, she applies to leave her country. While preparing these documents and while she is still in her country, she could receive whatever information used to be given to her after she came to the US. Moreover, I think that the background information given at that point would be more reliable since it would be prepared by (or for) a credible government agency and not inexperienced matchmakers.
Does this seem plausible?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 11th, 2006 at 5:20 pm
IMBRA seems to have addressed a number of points. Is it plausible to have the US government background check that is required under IMBRA be given to the woman at the point she has decided to leave her country?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 11th, 2006 at 6:02 pm
Hi everyone!
There is a crisis! You see, Chinese people eat cats. And Americans who like to eat Chinese food could be putting a cat’s life in great danger.
We must protect these poor cats from evil Chinese people here in the United States who may be importing cats and serving them as food in a Chinese restaurant.
We need to pass a law to protect these cats from sadistic American customers!
The law needs to say that if you own a Chinese restaurant whether or not it is organized under any law in the United States or if serving Chinese food is your principal business, then you may be endangering the lives of cats. We don’t have any statistics to prove it but hey, we all know Chinese people eat cats!
If you own a Chinese Restaurant, know you are now on watch. And all of your customers must prove they don’t eat cats before they can read the menu in your restaurant or eat there.
So you must do this:
If you own a Chinese restaurant or primarily serve Chinsese food as your principal business (YES, take out included), you must fingerprint your customers and perform a criminal background check on them to see if they have ever eaten a cat or even joked about eating a cat before they can come inside and look at your menu.
You must also check with the Chinese government to see if they have ever travelled to China and eaten a cat there. Check with all humane societies throughout the country and see if your customer has ever inquired about getting a cat. Doesn’t matter if they wanted a pet, they may have a different motive.
Failure to investigate your customers will send you to jail and you will have to pay $25,000 per incident. You better do those background checks!
We will have secret customers visit your restaurant to make sure you comply with the new law so don’t cheat!
Now of course, if you serve Chinese food but its not your principal business, you are exempt from these regulations (you may buy Chinese food at a grocery store or a restaurant who does not exclusively serve Chinese food). You are also exempt if you give your food away for free or if you eat cats for religious purposes.
American customers secretly love to eat cats so we must stop this terrible cat trade and slaughter of cats in the United States. Chinese people are terrible….SAVE THE CATS!
This comment was written by Jeremy.Report this comment to the moderators
March 11th, 2006 at 6:50 pm
IMBRA seems to have addressed a number of points. Is it plausible to have the US government background check and other items required under IMBRA be given to the woman only at the point she has decided to leave her country?
Given the history of this type of question being ignored, I really was not expecting a response. But maybe, just maybe, someone will be brave enough to step up and prove me wrong. Bean?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 11th, 2006 at 8:56 pm
…patriarchal systems… foreign marriage arranging… buying or ‘investing’ in young women…. completely altruistic…..indentured servitude…. fuhmocking rape… petite geishas…me-so-literate guniangs….
Jimmy Ho.. you are really funny… do you really believe all of the things that you type? you should be on stage
I corrresponded with my wife for 2 freaking years after meeting on a penpal website, and i didn’t purchase anything.. my children come out of a happy 8 year marriage. That is why I can laugh at all of this dribble… the sensationalism is about to run out of steam, so maybe now would be the time to go get some facts
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
March 11th, 2006 at 11:08 pm
I don’t know where you’ve been Kim, but people have been going through this business with a fine-tooth comb for years. They’ve been turning over every stone, desperately hoping to find things they can use. The attempts to make laws like IMBRA have been going on for years now. And the best they can do is come up with these two cases. So no, I’m not worried about scrutiny because it’s already scrutinized through and through.
As Mike said, give us facts, not your pet social engineering theories. I could hear the groans and see the eyes glaze over in front of screens everywhere when I read words like ‘patriarchal systems, buying and selling, indentured servitude.’ Repeating them over and over again may help you believe them. But if you want to make laws to go after people the burden of proof is on you to show there’s a problem. The truth is even after years you have nothing but rhetoric to fall back on.
Yes, there’s a serious problem in the world with women trafficking. But guess what? Almost none of the people you are targetting have anything to do with it. Could it be that you’re really afraid to go after the big, mean boys that are the true criminals? I have to say I’m not too impressed with the bravery of your movement after you shy away from taking on Yahoo, Match.com, et al.
And oh, Jimmy, since you’ve had so many chances in the past to hone your debating skills with oppressors like Mike and I why can’t you do any better than fall back on your tired mantras. However, your post with the link was entertaining, if not juvenile and unconstructive. That’s why I thought you were Alice.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 1:57 am
See, this is what I find flat out wrong with your mindset. You are viewing this law as some sort of huge inconvenience or threat to you or other men. We’ve all agreed that if there isn’t a system for background checking the women, that one should be set, but that doesn’t make background checking the men any less important. You aren’t being ‘targeted’ for anything other than the same damn thing people get targeted for to work at a daycare center, and yet you object. Why on earth would you not wish to have a system in place that allows these women to feel confident and secure in their choices - wouldn’t it ultimately benefit you, or other men that use these services through the assurance that you are on the level and not a violent criminal, domestic or otherwise? The only people this law could possibly hurt as I’ve come to understand it (and feel free to correct me if this is not the case) is people who have records - and even then, it only affects them in so much as it is making it a ‘buyer beware’ sort of market for these women.
And finally, I’m not part of any movement, I simply support laws that protect people - women and men, from systems that are potentially dangerous. You should too.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 7:12 am
Kim, let me make sure i understand you. If you saw a guy that you liked, and wanted to get to know him by email or over the telephone, you have no problem with providing the following information to him so he can decide whether to communicate with you.
1) You criminal background check, 2) how many times you have been married and the dates of any divorces 3) every state you have lived in since age 18 years old 4) how many children you have and their ages 5) the results of your name being run through a sexual registry of sex offenders and if your name happens to be Jane Smith you will have a lot of matches..
So Kim, you think this is reasonable? Or should it only be required of men wanting to communicate with a foreign national because he is more likely a spousal abuser?
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 7:35 am
Actually I think a good reason for requiring it of men wanting to communicate with a foreign national is because, as a foreign national, and most likely as a relatively impoverished foreign national, it would be nearly impossible for that foreign national to do her own research on the background of the man she is communicating with.
We have lots of ways of vetting the people we date. Usually it’s knowing other people who know them, knowing their reputation, how they treat others (how they treat waiters, etc). If you grew up in the same town you might know that person’s family.
All of these safeguards are much harder to find in a correspondence situation (although coincidences abound!), and some people do advise people to get a background check and do some investigating of anyone they meet online when they’re on the point of getting serious - to make sure they are who they say they are.
But that’s *even* harder (if not impossible) if the corresponders have different home nations and different first languages. I think that it’s totally reasonable to provide some basic verified background information.
This comment was written by Tara.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 7:45 am
Tara
The writers and supporters of IMBRA probably would agree with you. Please explain why, in your opinion, they purposely excluded protection to foreign nationals advertising themselves to American men on Match.com, Yahoo Personals, FriendFinder, et al. From my read of all the above, no person who supports IMBRA has provided a logical explanation.
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 8:10 am
Bean Writes:
Thank you Bean. I do believe that a change like this would relieve a lot of the tension. The matchmaking company would perform the background check on ONE man for ONE woman and the requirement of numerous consent verifications from women would be eliminated. Also, men would be able to say “hello” to women without having to provide very sensitive background information.
Bean, do you think the lawmakers would consider this? If so, how do can it be communicated to them? Do you think the Tahirih Justice Center, Legal Momentum (NOW) and others would be willing to consider this change?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 8:29 am
Tara Writes:
The writers and supporters of IMBRA probably would agree with you. Please explain why, in your opinion, they purposely excluded protection to foreign nationals advertising themselves to American men on Match.com, Yahoo Personals, FriendFinder, et al. From my read of all the above, no person who supports IMBRA has provided a logical explanation.
Given the history of this type of question being ignored, I am really not expecting a response. But maybe, just maybe, someone will be brave enough to step up and prove me wrong. Tara?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 10:01 am
Tara writes:
First question Tara. Are you saying it is a good idea to require all of the information i mentioned to be able to send an email to someone during the hello stage? Or do you think it is appropriate during the visa processing stage?
Second question Tara. If you think it is appropriate to require this background check at the hello stage because she is a “impoverished foreign national”, then it would only be appropriate that the guy be given the same exstensive background information, right? I mean heaven knows it would not be out of the realm of possibility that the “impoverished foreign national” may be a scam artist.
There is only one appropriate place for the background checks of both parties, that is the visa processing stage. If you think it is appropriate just to communicate with someone then you should consider living in North Korea.
Kim writes:
if i am a daycare worker and have childrens lives in my hands the it is appropriate….. if i am marrying a lady from abroad i expect this for both me and her when the petition process begins.. It is all about timing.
Don’t force me to reveal personal information about myself to strangers so I can talk with them. That shows an intent to punish me for wanting to know a lady from abroad… That indicates you have prejudged me as a criminal.. That is why this law pisses me off.. Any reasonable person can understand this.
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 10:51 am
Mike wrote: Jimmy Ho.. you are really funny… do you really believe all of the things that you type? you should be on stage…
Mahku wrote: And oh, Jimmy, since you’ve had so many chances in the past to hone your debating skills with oppressors like Mike and I why can’t you do any better than fall back on your tired mantras. However, your post with the link was entertaining, if not juvenile and unconstructive.
Folks, you’re guests here on my blog. Please read the moderation policies. If you’re not willing to abide by them, then you won’t be allowed to post here anymore.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 11:01 am
There has got to be way to mediate this soon-to-escalate issue. As it is, typing Marriage Broker Act into any search engine produces a lot of fuming intensity. All sorts of blogs, articles, press releases, and now a full blown restraining order. Major dating sites like Match.com (for ease of reference and lack of a better term - DMB’s - Domestic Marriage Brokers) are probably watching all this in amazement, if not sheer fear as to how it may play out in what has become a very competitive industry.
Look, it really comes down to the issues of when background check information is revealed and to a lesser extent, the exemption of DMB’s from the law. Bean is on board with the changing of the background timing, so just work with that.
With all the perceived social gender tension that now exists in this country (marriage strike, divorce and sexual harassment industry, rise of the MRA movement, to name a few) the last thing anyone wants is a full blown battle taken to the federal level.
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 11:42 am
I will not bore the moderator with a dozen insulting block quotes from Jimmy Ho. I was simply pointing out his sensationalism and insutling comments.. Since that is not appropriate i will move on
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 12:17 pm
Kim wrote:
I’m not just saying that it’s an inconvenience. I’m saying that it’s an inconvenience which doesn’t help hardly anybody. An inconvenience for nothing.
Fine, at the visa processing stage.
Apples and oranges. Interesting that you seem to compare these women to helpless children though.
I will indeed feel free to correct you. First of all some introduction agencies (I will no longer go along with your inaccurate naming) have already closed down in anticipation of this law. Now I’m sure that you consider this some sort of great victory. But the ones that have been hit are small operations mainly run by interracial couples where the lady is trying to find good matches for women back in her home country. They’re run more as a labor of love than for profit. Real menaces to society there.
Second and much more, has anyone thought of the identity theft implications of giving this sensitive information to companies all over the internet? If the background checks are done at the visa stage at least they’re in the hands of the government. So anyway there’s plenty of hurt and possible hurt to be had by this law. And again it’s all for very little help to the protectees.
Tara wrote:
The patronizing of women from other countries just never stops. I was chatting today with a lady from a remote part of Mindanao in the Philippines. This ‘impoverished, vulnerable’ woman was doing medical research online to finish up her nursing degree. She makes about 4 bucks a day in her part-time job. I’ve been online with good, speedy connections in small villages from Ethiopia to Indonesia. The point I’m trying to make is these women are quite capable and have the resources to take care of themselves. They don’t need or want big sister.
Not at all common in today’s mobile, urban society. Would you propose making the same kind of stringent law where this level of connectivity doesn’t apply?
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 12:26 pm
Ampersand wrote:
I did read your policies before and I knew this was coming. Because I saw where you openly admit that you’re going to treat us with a double standard. Like you said it’s your blog. But if you’re interested in having credibility I would think you would want to be more even-handed. Remarks by the person in question like ‘oppressor’ and ‘rape fantasy’ are at least the equal of anything Mike and I said. Not to mention the link. I have a sense of humor and can laugh at it but there’s no denying that it’s insulting and demeaning to lots of people.
So if that’s the way you want it then fire away. We’ll leave you to bat softball posts at each other.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 12:38 pm
The visa processing stage is too late. The hello stage might be too early but unless there’s some better middle stage, better early than late.
If any particular foreign national (and my perception is that if there were male foreign grooms, this would apply to them also) feels that they don’t want the information from the background check, they’re free not to look at the results. Perhaps you should do the honour of not presuming that the medical researcher you are corresponding with would want to take away informative measures from others who might not have the same access to information she does?
Even in today’s mobile society, I still know a lot of couples whose parents know each other. Let alone the number of people who know each other’s classmates, colleagues, campmates, churchmates, and friends of friends. And if not before they meet, than certainly before the make life long visa-status effecting commitments.
(Also, I don’t know if it’s still true, but didn’t the state use to require blood tests before issuing a marriage license?)
The small companies whom you claim are doing it as a labour of love? If they’re not taking steps to protect the people they’re marrying out, that doesn’t look very loving to me.
This comment was written by Tara.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 2:36 pm
How so? Please elaborate on why this is too late.
That’s a bit rich given the forest of presumptions that your side makes.
Perhaps you could do her the honor of not presuming that she and others don’t have their own means of taking care of themselves.
Even if I were to concede your rather idealistic take on the stateside dating situation there would still be a rather large percentage that fall outside of this secure land of know him and know her. Why aren’t you exercised enough to make laws about them and their protection? Nobody on this entire thread has addressed this question.
And even back in the safe and sound area of dating acquaintances of friends can you really be so sure? Shouldn’t these people get the same rights as our poor, vulnerable foreign lasses? There are plenty of instances where guys conned and charmed whole communities and families only to turn out to be cunning killers. Don’t you agree we’d better set about making laws here also.
See? You can’t justify the selective concern you show for one group while ignoring others.
So you’re saying this is a good time for people to be checked out? If so you’re contradicting your earlier statement.
Don’t forget we’re dealing with different cultures here. There are very few places in the world that have this American notion of hand-wringing over every possible bad thing that may happen and legislating everything to death. In most places they accept that life is about risk and reward, personal choice and responsibility. There are however, places where they make women wear burkas and lock them in the house. I’m sure you’ll these women are very safe.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 3:13 pm
This will be my last post. I am sorry, but the above as stated in your policies is just not happening. The allowed flaming coming from the feminist point of view is overwhelming. I only challenged what were some of the most outrageous comments from Jimmy Ho that i have ever seen posted here. The ultimate in flaming.
Tara said:
Well, that comment suggests at the beginning but you never really did answer the question. So is the purpose to protect a woman in advance from having a broken heart?
I mean if the check is done on both parties during the visa processing then how is this too late? Lets say the lady is really married to someone else, or the guy has a record of abuse, or the lady spent 3 years in jail, or the guy had 5 kids he failed to mention, all of this will be discovered and the visa will be denied. You will have one or more parties devistated but that is life. Men and women sometimes find out the person they fell in love with was not really who they thought.. life is nothing but chances.
Tara Writes:
I actually do care about people. Telling people they have to submit everything about themselves to communicate with another person isn’t a labor of love. I am not the police. There is a reason dating sites in the USA do not require background checks for people to communicate. The reason is because the general public thinks this is a tad much. So why is there a double standard here for foreign personals?
Take care.
This comment was written by mike.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 3:44 pm
Mahku wrote:
The post you are responding to here (post #176 by Tara) is perfectly polite. Nothing in it in any way insults you or any other person personally. And you responded by implying that she’d approve of how women in Saudi Arabia and other countries with Sharia law are treated.
This is the second time I’ve given you a warning. The previous time you responded with a juvenile “they insulted me first!” excuse; but that you’re treating Tara’s respectful post with such contempt shows that you treat even people who disagree respectfully with you, with contempt.
Responding respectfully - especially to posts like Tara’s, which were perfectly respectful of you - should not be too much to ask of you. If you can’t manage that, then stop posting here.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 3:58 pm
Mike, Jimmy’s more extreme comments were virtually all a direct response to Hal’s post about how no woman has a right to be a “rude bitch” while turning him down. Here’s another lovely quote from the post Jimmy was responding to:
Hal’s post was woman-hating in the extreme, and thoroughly deserved Jimmy’s response. To take those comments of Jimmy’s as if they were personally directed at you or generally directed at everyone here on your side - when they were clearly directed at one particular posters’ over-the-top misogynist post - is not fair of you.
As for the link, I thought it was funny. And although I’ll take your word that not all men who use international marriage broker sites have the racist beliefs that site satirizes, some do have such beliefs. If you can’t see that such attitudes exist, and deserve satirizing, then you’ve pulled the wool over your eyes.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 4:27 pm
Makhu,
There is no good data on domestic violence in relationships begun via marriage brokers; nor, currently, is there any means of collecting the data. I wish the people who had written this bill had included a mandate for federal record-keeping combined with funding for a future study, but they either chose not to do that, or didn’t think of it.
I’m not sure how accurate records could be kept, unfortunately. As even many pro-international-marriage-broker (IMB) sites admit, there is a social stigma against relationships begun via IMB. So even if a question about how people met was added to immigration forms (which would be a necessary first step in being able to track and keep statistics), there’s the problem that people might lie to avoid the stigma.
So there are no quantitative facts to deal with - and it’s probably impossible to gather such facts for many years. (Unlike Jeremy (#148), I have never falsely claimed such facts exist.)
But I think there are still good reasons to be concerned. Women like the woman who was shot to death by her husband (met through a IMB) in a Seattle courthouse aren’t just myths made up by American feminists, and saying “we can’t do anything until data is gathered, which may be never” isn’t a solution. And the power inequalities when one member of a marriage is dependent on the other for citizenship and the right to work, and has moved far away from everyone she knows and any independent support system she has, is a legitimate reason for concern. I don’t see anything wrong with trying to provide such women (or men) with tools for protecting themselves.
(Are there women who get into such situations outside of IMB sites? Of course. But it seems self-evident that the proportion of such women in IMB-initiated relationships is going to be significantly higher. Furthermore, like all feminists, I support many sorts of legislation to protect all people from domestic violence - the idea that feminists are only concerned about DV when dealing with IMBs is nonsense.)
You complain that providing women with tools to help themselves is paternalistic: “Perhaps you could do her the honor of not presuming that she and others don’t have their own means of taking care of themselves.” That’s a common argument made by right-wingers against government aid: We can’t have food stamps, welfare, minimum wage laws, etc etc, because such laws allegedly presume that people don’t have the means to take care of themselves.
But your argument is wrong. Such laws don’t assume that 100% of the people offered help by the law can’t take care of themselves; rather, they assume - based on good reason - that some of the people offered the help can use the help, and that those who don’t want the help are free to ignore what the government offers. Unless you’re going to claim that there is absolutely no person using a IMB service who might be wooed by an abuser, and who would find it useful to know the person is an abuser from the outset, your “how dare you presume to help people who don’t need your help!” argument is nothing but hot air.
Several people here have suggested that the information should be offered only at the point of immigration, when the prospective bride has already made plans, begun arrangements to sell her stuff and give up her residence, etc.. I’m leery of that. I think most people are far more able to view a suitor objectively before they’ve committed to marrying him and begun preparations to entirely uproot their life and begin again.
And any American man who can afford the price of a IMB can also afford to have a background check performed on his prospective wife, if he feels the need to do so in fact, some IMBs offer that service to their male clients. In contrast, I’d bet a significant proportion of foreign women who use IMBs don’t have the resources to pay for a background check on their prospective husband.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 4:32 pm
You really weren’t kidding about this double standard were you?
and you respond with a juvenile ‘Hal started it!’
Yes, Tara’s post was perfectly respectful and I had no problem with it in that way. And I meant no insult by the point about the burka. I’m just trying to point out that the burka thing and this IMBRA law grow out of similar mentalities, that one group decides that women need protecting and sheltering from ‘evil men’ and then compose onerous and inappropriate strictures. Now you may well disagree with that point but I think we can discuss that without getting huffy and can be assured that respect for Tara and your blog is intact.
And by the way burkas are worn in Afghanistan, not much in Saudi Arabia.
That’s it for me for a while. It’s 3:30 am here in the Emirates and I’m only up to see the NCAA pairings anyway.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 12th, 2006 at 5:46 pm
Well this thread fell apart rather fast. Regardless, I think we can all agree that international dating/marriage has many pitfalls, some of which can be devistating if not handled correctly. Hopefully one good thing that will come out of this situation is a mutual understanding of the complexities of the process.
I personally remind each male and female client of the seriousness of this situation, that it’s not a game and that they should keep themselves informed at all times of who they are dating and what they should expect. While I don’t agree with this particular piece of legislation, it has actually helped us weed out some potential clients (on both sides) who may not have been serious about this at all.
Believe it or not, I work with a wonderful bunch of women from the FSU who have all found their soulmates in the United States. They have educated me on so many things that as an American man I was previously unaware (cultural stereotypes and the like) and have really opened my eyes to how wrong our perception is of their country and customs.
Look, I’m a 28 year old Liberal with a Creative Writing degree who ended up in this business almost by accident. I would NEVER align myself with an industry or company that thrived on taking advantage of anyone- man, woman, dog, cat, etc. Most of the men I deal with on a day to day basis are widowers who are simply trying something new or guys who just never had much luck in the normal dating scene. In every instance where we thought we had someone who was slightly unbalanced or dangerous, we immediately cut them off and reported them to the proper authorities. The moment we heard about this law we immediately created the proper background check paperwork and informed all of the Russian agencies of the new policies. Their reaction? Laughter. They find it hilarious that in the United States we have more rules than they do in the Former Soviet Union. And no, this isn’t some fat sweaty male Agency owner either, these are the women themselves telling me this. The ladies I talk to every day (roughly two hundred in a week) are smart, educated, and as socially aware as any woman on this thread or anywhere else. In short, their not ignorant of their situation at all.
I rarely see any massive gaps in dating ages like the kind that have been mentioned here in this thread. Sure there are guys looking to date younger ladies but you can find that on every college campus or social setting in the U.S. Almost all of the marriages that occured through our service were between couples of the same age group and of the same mindset.
In the end I hope that everyone can put aside the Red vs. Blue, Feminist vs. Misogynist mentality and look at the bigger picture. Sure we need some rules but let’s use our heads when deciding them. The murders and abuses that spurred this law into being are beyond horrendous but we can’t let that get in the way of logic. Maybe I’m being idealistic here but I think if everyone just sat down and worked together on this we could all come to a mutual agreement on what would work and what wouldn’t.
Again, my two cents on this. Take it as you will.
This comment was written by Yossarian.(please excuse any typos, as I’m battling my allergy medicine and trying to focus as best I can)
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March 13th, 2006 at 2:10 am
Yossarian;
First, I commend you for attempting to make your agency work within the guidelines. Some of what you said was great to hear, and some was, well, to be blunt, just plain silly.
It’s great to hear that the agencies are responding and conforming to the laws with ease and haste. It’s silly to hear that a few women laughing about the laws would indicate that they are in fact unnecessary or pointless. If a bit of paperwork is enough to save even -one- life, isn’t that worth it?
As for the age differences and my bringing them up, I admit that it’s based on a book I read a few years ago that was called the Gentleman’s Guide to Asian Women (or something like that, I forget), where an American man basically wrote up a book giving what he thought was a ’sexy’ underground look at the asian sex industry and young women in it, but came off as what I could only describe as a guide on how to take advantage of the vulnerabilities of cultures that are both poor and place little value on women and girls that have somehow found themselves in the sex industry. Many of the young women were sold into the industry or into marriage brokerages by their fathers or male custodians. Many of these girls said they saw it as their duty, and they couldn’t let down their families (the man writing the book seemed to see this as a charming asset to their personality, referring to it often as ‘humility’ and ‘desire to please’). Scenario’s of large age difference in pretty much any relationship where there is a barely adult person involved have genuine reason to set off red flags of potential inequity or worse in relationship foundations. So while I realise that this is not the complete picture, that this is even part of the picture to me says that there is reason to sift through it all to make sure there is a possiblity of prevention and protection. I don’t doubt that couples also can find love and happiness in these services, but in taking the good with the bad, it’s the bad we need to focus on for sake of prevention.
Finally, just so you know, it’s not generally a good thing to use feminism and misogyny as ‘opposites’, as it implies that feminism is male-hatred. It’s not. Feminism is the belief of equality for the sexes, not the oppression of one over the other. Misogyny, however, is hatred of women.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 13th, 2006 at 7:00 am
Mahku Writes:
March 12th, 2006 at 12:26 pm
…..Not to mention the link. I have a sense of humor and can laugh at it but there’s no denying that it’s insulting and demeaning to lots of people.
——————————————————-
Ampersand Writes:
March 12th, 2006 at 3:58 pm
As for the link, I thought it was funny. And although I’ll take your word that not all men who use international marriage broker sites have the racist beliefs that site satirizes, some do have such beliefs.
*****
This link is NOT funny, it is a deliberate defamation directed to all Caucasian/Asian couples including my family.
Some American Asians are totally opposed against marriage between Asian women and Caucasian men and are full of hate against such couples, including their children. Racist remarks cannot be considered as funny.
Generally I got the impression, that some posters here are truly wrong informed about Asian women living in Asia.
I read something about age difference, I am 53, my Asian wife is 54, married since 1976. Most mixed-race couples I know are married since decades, their age difference is only a few years.
Further I read about an ‘impoverished foreign national’ - I can comment only about Asia, and there are plenty of women, who really do not miss anything and often have a better living standard and educational background than a woman, who is an US citizen and living in the US since birth.
I doubt very much, that ALL American man AND women are financially better off than their Asian counterparts.
I also read something about language problems, as English is not the first language for most Asians. I see no problem - you can learn more than 1 language in your life.
For sure, not all foreign women looking for an American husband are uneducated, impoverished, unable to communicate and finally bought by a loser from the States.
This new US-law however presumes, that any US man is a violent criminal and any foreign woman is uneducated and impoverished.
There is no logical reason, why an US man should not choose a foreign woman as his wife.
This comment was written by Johann.My advice for all concerned US men is, to get on an airplane, find your foreign wife yourself and then bring her back to the USA. This is maybe the best solution for all.
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March 13th, 2006 at 1:34 pm
Kim,
Thanks for your reply. I realized the “feminist/misogynist” error about two hours later after I posted but thanks for understanding. In my head the Claritin made it sound like a good analogy.
In regards to the book you referenced, there are some valid points there but like a lot of things there are some half-truths hidden underneath. Whenever you’re dealing with an open forum like the internet, you’re going to deal with all kinds of personalities and preferences. Admittedly I had some preconceived notions about this business before I came aboard but after enough exposure I’ve been able to see the difference between the truths and rumors.
There’s a large contingent of men (normally American) who find themselves disillusioned by women from their own countries and have decided to look elsewhere. Personally I think a great majority of them lump their bad experiences with domestic dating into one huge category, unfairly labeling all American women as snobby, materialistic, or just rude. Of course, we all know that these types of negative traits exist in almost all cultures, regardless of nationality or ethnicity. These men also like to think that all feminists sit at some roundtable in an underground lair plotting the downfall of masculinity, as if they were part of the Legion of Doom or something. A lot of this comes from bad divorces or just plain old ignorance that has put them on the defensive. On the other side of the token there are American women who hold a certain bias against any foreign woman dating American men. To me this mindset is just as flawed.
When describing the cultural traits of women in the FSU, I’ve often found it hard to differentiate between our two cultures without using words like “traditional values” and the like. This is mainly because to a certain extent, many Russian and Eastern European families still operate on what we Americans would consider “Old school values”, for better or worse.
I do agree that some sites specifically use the words “submissive” in a context that can only give some men the idea of a little foreign bride who will do everything you say and ask. The irony here is that most of the women from Russian and parts of Eastern Europe couldn’t be more different. In the same way that my Irish mother would sooner smack me in the back of the head than answer my demands, most of these women have a will that is strong as steel. When talking to some of our potential clients about what they’re looking for in a wife, I can only shake my head when they bring up the concept of submissiveness in the house. If anything, these women are going to rule with an iron fist and I make it a point to tell them so.
I totally agree that if anything- a piece of paper, background check, or whatever- saves just one life, then it’s worth it. My only concern is that it’s fair to both parties and that it makes sense. One thing about the background check that falls short of the mark is accountability. See, the man can lie about his history and for the most part the Russian Agency won’t be able to find out whether it’s true or not. Because the government didn’t create their own forms, all of the agencies had to create their own. One thing that we’ve seen is that the companies based in foreign countries (which are also some of the less scrupulous ones) are doing the smallest effort possible to satisfy the law. In short, because the law doesn’t directly affect them as it would an American company, they’re just creating a simple questionnaire that cannot be verified by the lady.
We’ve actually taken the step of giving each agency the links to all Sex-offender databases in the United States, along with instructions on how to do a search on a man. Another problem is that depending on where you live, public records may not be readily available for viewing. For instance, in my county they just had a large issue at the Clerk’s office where thousands of documents got either misplaced or destroyed. This means that documents that could presumably help a woman determine whether or not the man is safe were essentially lost in the void. I guess what I’m trying to say here is that since the government went through the pains of writing the law, it would have been nice if they could have taken a little more time in planning its implementation. The loopholes and generalizations that the legislation puts forward are some of the reasons why a lot of men have begun believing that IMBRA is a conspiracy, as it doesn’t appear to give you any definable options that are legally secure and leaves the impression that you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t.
I think that if the same legislators who created this law could just sit down and work out the details, this law could really help a lot of people.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
March 13th, 2006 at 2:59 pm
Dating Industry News Hot TopicsInternational Marriage Broker Act Synthetic Validity Dating Site Pricing Receive special alerts and a weekly news summary.
This comment was written by Online Dating Insider: Online Dating Industry News.Report this comment to the moderators
March 13th, 2006 at 8:19 pm
And yet another press release - this one by an immigration lawyer discussing how the law favors the large dating sites. Does this guy hope to get more business? Well, for sure, it will agitate companies like Match.com.
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2006/3/prweb357407.htm
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 13th, 2006 at 8:48 pm
Kim wrote:
Well, that’s not why we’re saying it’s unnecessary and pointless. But the reaction this law gets is telling. Stunned disbelief to full-on belly laughs are the reaction it’s getting so far, and not just from a few women Kim. So far this law is flying under the radar (attached at the last minute before Christmas) or else it would be sitting at the top of the oddity news sections of CNN and Yahoo. Silly? How silly is a law that’s claiming to protect people while leaving 90% of the industry untouched?
One may have more sympathy for your point if the word misogyny weren’t constantly used to beat down anyone who tries to say anything about the dating scene in the US. It’s like anyone who talks about ethnic issues gets the R word. Anyone who has issues about Muslims gets called an Islamophobe. I’m sure you have a similar frustration about how the word feminist gets used.
Oh, the places we could go if we set this principle free to roam. I’m sure it would save one life to shut down NASCAR. Let’s do it.
I’m sure your book was an interesting read. However, I don’t accept your attempt to link introduction agencies with prostitution. And you need much more proof that there’s a problem with these agencies if you’re going to run roughshod over the good just to get at a very few bad. Your ‘red flags’ aren’t reason enough for this oppressive legislation.
I do however, appreciate your admission that reading a book written years ago by some sex tourist horndog gives you limited qualifications to comment on these matters and advocate legislation. It’s a refreshing bit of intellectual honesty that this thread could use more of.
Yossarian wrote:
To be sure it’s one of those hysterical ‘vast conspiracy’ things. However, this law is only going to intensify that perception.
I can give a wry smile about the whole submissive woman thing. The myth of the ’submissive Asian woman’ is something that feminists and wife-searching both fall for. But having visited homes from Seoul to Surabaya I know who more often ‘wears the pants’ in the household. Unfortunately, it’s this enduring myth which helps drive this ‘poor, vulnerable, helpless’ patronizing that we see written here.
Yossarian, your attempts to bridge the gap are admirable. But it will be in vain until the other side has to show a little more inclination to compromise.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 14th, 2006 at 1:59 am
Kim (basement variety!) Writes:
March 13th, 2006 at 2:10 am
……it’s not generally a good thing to use feminism and misogyny as ‘opposites’, as it implies that feminism is male-hatred. It’s not. Feminism is the belief of equality for the sexes, not the oppression of one over the other. Misogyny, however, is hatred of women.
================================
Yes, correct, feminism and misogyny should not be used as ‘opposites’.
The opposite of misogyny is misandry.
The opposite of feminism is masculism.
Generally, feminism is about promoting women rights, but this does not mean necessarily, that feminism is considering the concerned position of a man and tries to treat him as an ‘equal’.
Many publications of feminists are containing man-hating statements, like the manifesto of Valerie Solanas.
Feminism means to restrict any man in any aspect of his daily life, and this cannot be called to be a dialog between equals.
This comment was written by Johann.This new law, International Marriage Broker Act, about how a man is allowed to look for a foreign wife is a perfect example for that.
It has nothing to do with ‘equality’ between women and men.
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March 14th, 2006 at 2:19 am
Okay, Johann, you’ve had your say. But I don’t think you’re open to respectful dialog, so I think you’re done posting on “Alas.” Best of luck to you, and good-bye.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 14th, 2006 at 11:23 am
Well Bean if you read the start of my post 188 I clearly say that the reactions aren’t the reason for saying that this law is pointless and unneeded. Pointless because it covers only a tiny part of the industry anyway. Most of the women in your shelter probably wouldn’t be helped by this law because they would have met their husbands via one of the big agencies. Unneeded because the background checks can be done by immigration. You yourself agreed that this would be acceptable in post 161 Bean.
I’m sorry about what’s happening to the women coming into your shelter. I pray that they find the good, loving men that they deserve.
As for the anecdotal evidence, of course yours is going to be almost 100% one way. After all, happily married women aren’t real likely to come into a battered women’s shelter are they? At least I see more of a random sample.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 14th, 2006 at 12:53 pm
Ampersand wrote:
Well, the data that does exist would seem to say this law is unneeded. We have 2(some say 3) cases of murder since 1995 involving husbands of foreign wives. Immigration estimates 10,000 foreign women come to the US every year as wives of American men. So that’s a murder rate of about 2 per 100,000. Far less than the murder rate of most American cities. Less than the murder rate of a lot of renowned ’safe’ countries of the world. In fact this data may lead many to believe that this kind of marriage should be encouraged. Furthermore, it’s about a tenth of the murder rate of domestic American marriages.
I wouldn’t call it an admission so much as a lamentation. The media has been in the hip pocket of your side on this one. This has helped perpetuate myths such as “These guys are all fat, bald losers who can’t find American women.” or “Most of these women are sex slaves.” It also has helped standardize slurs such as “Mail-Order Bride” or “International Marriage Broker.”
So? People might also lie to avoid the IMBRA law as it exists now. Shall we throw it out then?
Nobody’s saying ‘we can’t do anything…’ I believe that most guys who have come onto this blog have agreed that background checks at the time of immigration are a good thing for protecting both sides. The woman who died tragically is not a made up myth by feminists. The myth is the idea that there is an epidemic of abuse of foreign wives (as has been claimed in so many words.)
Please expand on how it is self-evident that the proportion of such women in IMB-initiated relationships is going to be significantly higher.
One way that feminists could begin to dispel this idea is to withdraw IMBRA and replace it with a more all-inclusive law rather than the narrow-targeting one we have now.
As I understand it you advocate this law to protect women from murder and beatings. What you’re talking about here is protecting them from a broken heart. I don’t believe it’s the role of government to do that.
If they sell out all of their stuff before they get the visa that would be a lack of common sense on their part for which they should mainly blame themselves, not the lack of any laws or information about their rights.
I doubt such a check performed by immigration would cost the women anything, except perhaps in the form of higher visa fees. Furthermore, it would be exceedingly complicated for men to perform checks on women they haven’t met yet and want to say ‘Hello’ to. Therefore IMBRA would create an inequality here. However, at visa application time both sides could get the unvarnished truth about the other at the same time. Sounds like a good way to me.
And if I used wording like this on you or your friends what would be my chances of getting banned Mr. Moderator?
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 14th, 2006 at 1:31 pm
Some? Do you have any idea of the percentages involved here? Something like 90% of the industry is in the companies that your law exempts by name. I call that pretty pointless.
Bullshit huh? (And Ampersand, is this your idea of ‘respectful dialogue’ that you were talking about as you sent Johann yodling into the night?)
Bean, please don’t make me go all the way up and pull down post 161 where you said that background checks at immigration would be just fine. If it is just fine why wasn’t the law written like that in the first place? It would have saved a lot of trouble because your law’s gonna get thrown out of court for being unconstitutional.
Not letter perfect by statistical theory perhaps. But a sample taken from dozens of countries on several continents of couples that I generally met by chance? Compared to a shelter where it’s PRE-DETERMINED that all the women there will have this problem? Not as valid or true for what? You need more evidence than you’ve shown to prove that there’s a problem of epidemic proportions that warrants such a law. And did you get the husbands’ side of the story?
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 14th, 2006 at 1:42 pm
Well Bean I get my statistics from the drafters of this law. After all they claimed that there’s some sort of epidemic of abuse from these marriages. As evidence of this they have only produced these examples. If someone is going to propose that a law is needed the burden of proof is on them to show that need. If there are more murders where are they and if they aren’t any different proportion to the general population it can be argued that this law isn’t needed.
By the way, there was never an opportunity for such debate because this law was attached at the last minute to another piece of legislation. It’s questionable whether all the senators even knew they were voting for it. At the very least you have to admit that in our country all laws should have a free and fair debate before they’re enacted. This bit of thief in the night legislative naughtiness is a travesty of our system.
And Bean I wouldn’t lightly call you a liar. If you were on the other side of this issue you would be out on the street with Johann.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 14th, 2006 at 3:00 pm
Unfortunately I think we all have to reside ourselves to the fact that this is the most appealing method for lawmakers to pass what could be controversial bills. Everything from the Patriot Act, No Child Left Behind Act, and IMBRA have all been passed through methods similar to this. When nobody knows what you’re about to push for legislation, it’s easier to sneak it through. One provision of the No Child Left Behind Act which states that military recruiters MUST have access to student’s contact information was stuck in the very back of the massive document, thereby making it practically invisible for the average reader to find until it was too late.
Again, I think that everyone here has good intentions for what they’d like to see implemented through this bill, it’s just a shame that we can’t come to any one agreement on what would work. I’m sure after March 20th we’ll see the Government’s rebuttal to the restraining order and things will become a little clearer.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Or maybe not, who knows?
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March 15th, 2006 at 7:12 pm
Just remember the first woman who becomes a victim of domestic violence from one of those “exempt” sites and gets killed or badly injured law makers who voted for IMBRA will be held accountable. In all due respect Ignorance of the law is no excuse even for lawmakers who failed to read IMBRA when they voted. Its the legislators conscience and reputation (not mine) that will be at stake. Legislators: you should consider addressing this issue NOW.
We want to work to prevent violence against women and support the Violence Against Women Act but the tiny IMBRA portion of the VAWA needs to be repealed. Once IMBRA is repealed the interested parties should reconstruct a law to truly prevent violence against women with a logical/sensible means to accomplish this.
(I am a private citizen expressing my concerns. No affiliation to “Marriage Brokers”)
This comment was written by Dan.Report this comment to the moderators
March 15th, 2006 at 9:27 pm
Hey Dan - why the exemption? No person on this blog who supports the law has been brave enough to offer their opinion as to why, despite being asked numerous times. What is your opinion?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 15th, 2006 at 10:18 pm
Makhu - I think it’s bullshit to say that using swear words is necessarily disrespectful. Me and my friends use swear words all the time in conversation, including saying things like “that’s bullshit, because in fact, statistics show X.” I’m against personal attacks, but not against swear words.
Here’s what Bean wrote:
The emphasis in that is clearly on correcting what Bean sees as an inaccurate statement, not on attacking another poster. She’s attacking the argument, not the person, which is exactly what I ask of posters here.
Whatsisname wasn’t banned for swearing; I don’t recall that I’ve ever banned anyone for swearing per se. He was banned for a combination of incoherence and his obvious contempt for feminists and feminism.
* * *
Broham - as a matter of theory, IMB sites are going to create a far, far higher level of power imbalance than a site like Yahoo Personals does. There’s good reason to believe that IMBs are simply more dangerous to women. That, for me, is more than enough to justify the exemption.
But let’s ignore that (as most of the pro-IMB folks have done). It’s politically unrealistic to think that such a law could have been passed for all dating sites. When doing X & Y to protect women is not politically viable because X is politically impossible, it doesn’t make it therefore okay to not do Y to protect women. Politics is the art of the possible, not the art of the ideal.
You’re in effect arguing that it’s unfair to American abusers who use IMBs that they get regulated more than American abusers who use the big sites. Well, I guess it is unfair, but you know what? I can live with being unfair to abusers. And if this law, which creates a very minor inconvenience to non-abusive men, leads to saving even one abuse victim from being abused, then I can live with that, too.
And for the record, if someone were to find a way to make a practical law requiring dating sites (both IMBs and non-IMBs) to do a check on all users, and refuse to allow users with a history of domestic violence to use their services - I’d totally favor that. And if someone were able to pass a law requiring that all Americans, regardless of how they met, have to go through a criminal background check before getting a marriage license - so that every person getting married would have access to the record of the person they’re going to marry - I’d favor that too.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 12:16 am
Well Ampersand…selective enforcement…selective interpretation…the way you handle this just plays into the hands of people who have this attitude of feminists that you decry. If you can’t handle a robust discussion you really shouldn’t have a discussion at all. You may not like the way you’re seen by the world in general. But if you do a lot of walking and quacking a certain way (and you’ve definitely had a good quack with this law) over a good, long period of time you should expect to have some explaining to do.
And just to be clear, I don’t particularly mind the bullshit thing. But on this site you seem to be so prickly and quick to hit the eject button. I think you and I both know that if I had used it first rather than one of your club of chums, I’d have been in pretty hot water. And my statement was accurate anyway, if not understood very well.
And can I now assume that it’s ok to call someone a liar and that it’s ‘attacking the argument, and not the person.’ After all I was just using the information that’s out there, the information that the crafters of this law gave as a justification.
A matter of theory? Well Hitler had a few theories about race that he made national policy. If you’ve got a theory let’s put it out there for fair, rational debate. That didn’t happen in Congress which is why this law could be kicked back for better due process. And if you’ve got theories which are ’self-evident’ and ‘good reason to believe’ you need to expand on that much more to be able to complain they should be matters of law.
Well, some of these ‘minor inconveniences’ are or will be:
1. A scammer’s dream. If you’re fine with having all of your personal info scattered around the internet that’s affair. But I would hardly call identity theft or other fraud a minor inconvenience.
2. Small introduction sites have already shut down. Their greatest crime is that they don’t have the resources to comply with this unfair law. Having your business shut down is not a minor inconvenience.
3. Reduces the number of possible contacts for marriage. It’s hard enough to find one’s life partner without someone making it even more complicated. For many people this is the most important decision in life and the government getting in the way is not a minor inconvenience.
Most of these men who use these sites are not abusers. Your ‘if we only save one’ argument is flawed and dangerous to apply as a general rule.
I am, however, heartened that you express support for having a more general, inclusive law. We’ve all agreed that it’s a good thing to have some measure to protect people against abuse. Let’s work to see that there’s a law that’s fair and useful for all.
Also, people may begin to have sympathy for your displeasure about the reputation of feminists if you would stop joining in on the unfair villifying of foreign introduction sites and the men and women who use them.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 1:11 am
Well, there you have it Broham. It was the cheap and easy way to go. Just grab for the low-hanging fruit. Never mind that Y doesn’t hardly protect any women and has all kinds of fairness and constitutional problems. If they had tried X they not only would have lost, but the ridicule of what they propose would have made feminists late-night joke fodder for years to come.
Let me tell you what’s happened here Broham. First you choose an easy target, one with little political influence. One that’s already been villified in the press for years and so probably won’t gather much sympathy. The target has to be small so all this can be kept quiet. If much general attention comes to this law it will stop it dead. Gather a few sensationalized cases of abuse or worse. It doesn’t take many, even if there’s really no general evidence that much abuse exists. Just enough to get sympathy.
Now, mind you, even with all these advantages this law still didn’t pass. It’s been out there for years. So, finally, just attach it to a good, popular law at the last minute to avoid debate and attention. And the ship sails, with this last-minute measure strapped to the bottom of the keel, generally unnoticed. The politicians who pushed the law get to put a feather in their cap and proclaim that they’re doing such good.
And for good measure proponents on sites like this go “Hip, hip hooray!” and pat each other on the back, convincing themselves that they’re dong something for the ‘poor, vulnerable, victims’ of the world.
It’s good to see Amp admit this was all about political expediency. Really we knew it all along. Hopefully the judicial branch won’t be so give over to special interests on this one.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 1:23 am
I really loathe the “we both know that you’re not telling the truth” formulation. First of all, it’s condescending. Second of all, unless you have mind-reading powers, it’s clearly not a true statement - you have no way of knowing what’s in my mind. And third of all, it’s a personal attack, because - unlike the word “bullshit” - it unquestionably accuses the other person of being a liar.
I do have a double-standard; people who make the blog more interesting for me get more leeway than people who bore me. I’m perfectly open about this double-standard in the moderation guidelines. However, in this case, the specific double-standard you’re accusing me of, regarding swearing, simply doesn’t exist. No one has ever been banned by me just for swearing, regardless of their ideology. Period.
Furthermore, rereading Bean’s post, she never accused you of lying. As I already pointed out, calling someone’s argument “bullshit” is not the same as accusing them of being a liar. Bean could have replaced “bullshit” with the word “nonsense” and the post’s substance would have been unchanged, because her post was focused on the argument, and made no personal attacks.
If you want to stay here to debate the issues, you’re welcome to. But if you with to continue making personal attacks on me, go do that in your own space instead of mine.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 2:15 am
Well, obviously you didn’t read very well. Let me help you.
And I’m not reading your mind. I’m reading this thread. Guys on one side of the issue get rapped. People on the other side who do similar or greater things are untouched.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 3:19 am
I’m trying to imagine how you could have made that more condescending.
You’re right - in a completely different post from the one you quoted, Bean said you had lied. My bad.
On the other hand, you’re switching targets - I didn’t reread the entire thread. I reread the particular post you quoted and complained about, in which Bean said “bullshit.” If that wasn’t the post you were complaining about, then you shouldn’t have quoted it; you should have quoted the one you were complaining about.
Nor do I see how Bean calling you a liar (which she shouldn’t have done) makes it acceptable for you to call me a liar.
Anyway, it’s obvious that you have no ability to make your argument in a respectful matter; you’re all about making attacks on other posters and treating people with contempt. If you had more confidence in your argument, you wouldn’t have to spend so much of your posts attacking me personally.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 8:00 am
3. Reduces the number of possible contacts for marriage. It’s hard enough to find one’s life partner without someone making it even more complicated.
There is a funny! Ha. Most of my friends are people that I have been friends with for over 10 years. I don’t meet many new people. Some of my friends are people that I was in middle school with 25 years ago. My circle of friends and acquaintances is pretty damned small. Yet I was able to find my life partner (twice if you count my mistaken first try) without the help of an IMB. I met my spouse via the personals in a local free paper. Although that was somewhat stressful, it was less than overwhelmingly difficult. You want to know how else I (the guy who rarely meets new folks) meet new people? I volunteer for things that I’m interested in. That really ups your chances of meeting somebody with similar interests. Sorry guys, I just don’t see the limiting of IMBs as a major issue. Especially not if the purpose of the limits is to make people safer.
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 8:08 am
I am oh, so tired of the fragile male ego defense for worthless social constructs. If *you* have poor social skills, work on them. It isn’t hard to find a life partner, not if you have respect for the potential other half of the relationship. If you go into it thinking that this individual is capable of being “brokered” to you, well… that might just be the reason you’re finding it so difficult.
FWIW, men have no birthright to be partnered, no birthright to be married, no birthright to have sex. If they desire marriage, they should be willing to work for it. Otherwise what they’re looking for is a live-in prostitute.
This comment was written by Q Grrl.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 9:16 am
Ah, more nice, respectful arguments.
Squid, that’s fine for you and I hope your second try works. But kindly accept that other people may have different ways of finding someone and it’s wrong to make laws impeding them. It’s not like the guys who go overseas are dumb and never tried all that stuff you said.
And Q Grrl…Damn! With a girls of your ’social skills’ so plentiful on the scene in the US I just can’t understand why guys look elsewhere for their wives. So much man-hating packed in a couple of paragraphs. What was that opposite word someone posted for ‘misogynist’ a few days ago? The eyes already glaze over after seeing ‘fragile male ego’ in the first sentence. And you talk of showing respect? Ha! Stop swallowing the party line about guys and foreign wives and maybe you’ll have something useful to contribute to the discussion.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 9:29 am
Well Amp surprise surprise we don’t like each other much. But I’ve been nicer to you than anyone else who ever advocated trampling all over my rights and those of my friends. If you’re going to get all knicker twisty over ticky tacky stuff people write here, don’t be surprised if I call you on your bullshit bias and start talking a little trash of my own.
Anyway folks that’s it for me here. The basketball’s starting, among numerous other better things I have to do. You’ve pretty much shown me all you’ve got to say on this subject and honestly you’ve got nothing. You’ve got no real backup for your positions other than airy fairy theories and your uninformed notions of what and who this whole business is about.
I’m confident this law will be flushed by the judiciary in good time. But if not and some day in the future I have a friend who’s thrown in jail and separated from his wife because of the handiwork of people like you I’ll hold you in my loving memory. I’m sure Stalin will be applauding from somewhere.
This comment was written by Mahku.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 9:38 am
No, no, Mak. Get your dumbshit stereotype right. The reason guys like you have to look for brides overseas is because we’re all lesbians here in the U.S.
This comment was written by alsis39.75.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 10:11 am
I wish there were more girls [sic] with my type of social skills on the scene. The sex is always hotter that way.
This comment was written by Q Grrl.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 10:24 am
Mahku: stop swallowing the party line that man-hating is a bad thing.
;)
If guys are “looking for wives” then I have a shit load of criticism about their fragile male egos. ‘kay?
This comment was written by Q Grrl.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 11:04 am
You know what? I just now get why the IMB defenders who have posted here fill me to the brim with an utter lack of sympathy. They don’t seem to have a whole lot of interest in the culture from which they are trying to find a wife. That and the fact that we haven’t seen any women posting here on how great it was to find a Russian husband. Oh, and the fact that their issues with IMBRA extend to concerns about American men - no mention of the stomping on the rights of American women.
When one goes looking for a life-mate, one usually does the search for themselves. For example, if I want to marry a one legged, mustachioed, tatooed, beringed pirate I would set sail on a pirate ship. Likewise, if I wanted to marry a Russian woman, I would spend a lot of time in Russia. I have no problem with either scenario - tastes/fetishes are as tastes/fetishes do, after all. However, I would not go through a PMB (Pirate Marriage Broker) to find me the pirate of my dreams. If I don’t actually spend a significant amount of time in Pirate culture, how will I know whether or not I really want to marry a Pirate? Will I be compatible with somebody in whom Pirate culture is strongly ingrained? I can’t answer this without spending significant amounts of time around Pirates & Pirate culture. If, on the other hand, I just had a Pirate fetish & enough money and I wasn’t really looking for a life-mate I suppose that I’d consider going through a PMB to find a pirate.
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 11:10 am
… or the counter point of all these straight men whinging about not being able to find a partner; they should try being a gay man living in the closet. Never seemed to stop those guys from hooking up.
This comment was written by Q Grrl.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 11:18 am
Well, Q, always bear in mind that “lesbian” and “social skills” would go hand in hand for the Maks who walk among us. It’s a shame you have to harsh their buzz all the time by refusing to take either as criticism.
This comment was written by alsis39.75.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 11:31 am
Yeah, maybe I should just go around touting “Damn Skippy” every time they call me out!
[... where *is* that island Falwell promised us in the 80's?]
This comment was written by Q Grrl.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 11:55 am
They paved it and put up a Mal-Wart. >:
This comment was written by alsis39.75.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 5:38 pm
Okay, that’s enough. Banned.
(I know, I know, s/he said they were done posting here anyway. But in my experience, anti-feminists who post “I’m done here, bye” almost always come back.)
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 5:55 pm
Amp Wrote:
Woah!! By golly, that’s getting to the heart of the matter. Now, you have really got my curiosity peaked. Ok, but you can’t keep me hanging -
1) what exactly do you mean by “politically impossible?” (”PI”)
2) why do you think the law’s application to X may be (or is?) PI?
3) if the lawmakers did not include the exemption of X in the law (that is, the law was silent regarding X), would all X be classified as IMB’s (based on the definition of an IMB in the law)?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 16th, 2006 at 6:04 pm
But in my experience, anti-feminists who post “I’m done here, bye” almost always come back.
Feminists too. ;)
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
March 17th, 2006 at 5:50 am
Amp Wrote:
“It’s politically unrealistic to think that such a law could have been passed for all dating sites. When doing X & Y to protect women is not politically viable because X is politically impossible, it doesn’t make it therefore okay to not do Y to protect women. Politics is the art of the possible, not the art of the ideal..”
Woah!! By golly, that’s getting to the heart of the matter. Now, you have really got my curiosity peaked. Ok, but you can’t keep me hanging -
1) what exactly do you mean by “politically impossible?” (”PI”)
2) why do you think the law’s application to X may be (or is?) PI?
3) if the lawmakers did not include the exemption of X in the law (that is, the law was silent regarding X), would all X be classified as IMB’s (based on the definition of an IMB in the law)?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 17th, 2006 at 7:35 am
your right people always come back to see how things have progressed. I couldn’t help myself after my break. At least the monitor has shown her true colors.. the man hating and intollerance for anti or or even non feminists is now in full swing..
there will never be any compromise in this blog because the feminists posting here are on the fringe.. thank God we have Federal Courts and Judges that do not make assumptions that men seeking a foreign partners are deviants and criminals. Just like I do not assume lesbians are deviants that should be regulated and forced to give up their personal history to communicate with another lesbian..
IMBRA will go down in defeat, because the law violates the 1st and 5th amendments of the constitution.. the process has already begun and on March 20, 2006, the Judge in Georgia will make the restraining order permanent
So I will check out availability in the “Useless Federal Regulation Graveyard” to see if they can take in one more law that tramples all over the constitution…. oh, i already called and there is plenty of room..
maybe your supporters that push through laws like IMBRA should consult with an attorney that actually understands constitutional law before wasting so much time and energy .. IMBRA could have been a good law if radical feminism would have stayed out of it.. “damn skippy”
This comment was written by Dave.Report this comment to the moderators
March 17th, 2006 at 9:04 am
Just as an FYI:
These posts were made by Gary Bala, an immigration attorney:
Immigration Regulations on IMBRA
Today, March 14, 2006, I spoke with the Director of Regulatory Management at USCIS (Immigration Service).
Immigration is working on the promulgating regulations to implement the
IMBRA law. These are the rules which may help to clarify many questions
under the new law. It has to go through various drafts and supervisory
approvals. No decision has been made yet if the IMBRA regs. will be
“interim” or “proposed”, but a public comment period is expected. The publicwill be allowed to comment on the implementing regulations, which will be taken into account before the final regs. are issued.
(The Federal Court’s TRO Order did not come up in our conversation. I did
not raise it, nor did I feel that it was appropriate to do so in that
context.)
I was informed that the regs. are expected no sooner than in 6 months from
Jan. 2006, the date of the law; in other words June 2006.
The regulations are just meant to help implement and clarify the law. They are instructive in nature and meant only as guidance. That is all.
It does NOT mean that until they are released, there is no law and no one
has to do anything. It does NOT mean that until they are released, “they
(Immigration) are confused” or won’t implement the law or anything else. The law is still the law is still the law, even before the regulations are
published.
The regulations will most likely apply to all parts of the IMBRA law, not
just the part about filing for a fiancee visa. We just have to wait and see
exactly what the regulations say when they are released for the public
comment period.
Furthermore, the public comment period does NOT necessarily imply public hearings, administrative hearings, public “town halls”, public votes, or anything else. Most public comments are done individually by a person, company or member of the public, and are allowed and expected by mail, E-mail or fax only, and only to the designated Immigration Office.
That’s that. Take it as you will.
Happy St. Patrick’s Day.
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
March 17th, 2006 at 1:33 pm
Man-hating? Geez, how stereotypical can you get?
Banned.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 17th, 2006 at 5:36 pm
I see this as a positive, but I fear, as with most legislation and regulation, that it will fall far short of solving the problems it was enacted to protect. I just hope that the failure is not as spectacular as FEMA’s post Katrina.
I fear there will be loopholes upon loopholes, and I will just have to reserve judgement until the regs are released and the law has been in effect for awhile.
This comment was written by Mendy.Report this comment to the moderators
March 18th, 2006 at 1:31 am
Roofles. The man hating ‘monitor’ is not a her, it’s a he. Who’s true colors are showing now?
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
March 20th, 2006 at 2:31 pm
Ampersand, does your name by any chance come from the character in the comic, Y-the Last man? Or is it just in reference to the symbol? Just curious.
Mendy writes:
My god, don’t even get me started. I live close to the Gulf and that whole region is still basically untouched by the supposed FEMA help that Bush promised. I don’t think anything (hope, hope, hope) will ever be as big a failure as that.
This law will still be around in a couple of years, that much I’m sure of. Whether or not it will hold the same weight as when first introduced is a different story.
If I’ve learned one thing through this thread it’s how little I truly understand of the feminist movement. Even though I grew up around a lot of amazingly independent and powerful women (many of whom contributed extensively to Women’s Lib in the 1960’s), I still never really got a full idea of what the entire movement was about. I mean personally, I agree that there should be no difference between the treatment of men and women but I take that to the utmost extreme. In college however, I always got the impression that there’s something like 1 million different interpretations of what Feminism truly stands for. Anyone care to enlighten a simple caveman?
This comment was written by Yossarian.Report this comment to the moderators
March 20th, 2006 at 3:00 pm
Definitely not! I was using “Ampersand” for years before Y The Last Man came out. I just think the word is cool.
As for what different kinds of feminists believe, I sorta-kinda addressed that question in this old “Alas” post.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
March 26th, 2006 at 5:57 am
At least you have Bill Oreilly on your side. His disgusting Fox News program on the subject (march 22) shows that you have the anti-premarital sex crowd on your side.
Oreilly showed a perfectly normal international dating site with great photographs…but implied these women were whores. Then said that men would get fiance visas to “have their way sexually” with women for 90 days before sending them home.
Fox News is on your side. The FReepers are FreeRepublic.com, the most notoriously conservative site on the Internet, are TOTALLY behind the feminists on the IMBRA Law. I got personally banned from FR because of this subject.
On April 3rd the hearing for the permanent injunction will take place.
This comment was written by Jim Peterson.Report this comment to the moderators
March 26th, 2006 at 1:28 pm
I wonder how many shots of whiskey Layli Muro had before (and after) the show. Wow, talk about taking one for the team that supports IMBRA. But really, does anyone on this entire blog think that Legal Momentum (NOW), Tahirih or any other supporter of IMBRA is focused on the TRO? In my opinion, they probably just snickered about it and went on with more important things.
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
March 30th, 2006 at 3:15 pm
Layli Miller Muro, a lawyer specializing in the new political Mcarthyism…creating an atmosphere of suspicion having a corps of people looking for these suspicious men who might potentially abuse foreign women. Looking for them in any schoolyard, any building, under every bed in America.
“Deception, distortion, exaggeration … all are forms of lying; and in any form, lying is to be deplored and condemned, especially when done by public persons in public forms.”
This comment was written by Dan.Report this comment to the moderators
April 1st, 2006 at 6:35 pm
What I had feared is actually going to happen: a long drawn out battle in the courts. Two stubborn sides and that is the result. The restraining order will most likely be upheld in the Georgia court on April 3, if not made permanent. In addition, there is now a class action suit brewing at the national level. Granted, none of these actions will overturn IMBRA in the near term, if at all. What they do cause, however, is a hold up in the courts and that will enable all the brokers to temporarily operate as before. The folks at Tahirih will be in court in Georgia on Monday to defend their law and in a few months, some other place doing it all over again. With just a tweak of some of the law’s provisions, as discussed above, none of this friction and the upcoming pitched battle would be happening.
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
April 4th, 2006 at 5:41 pm
Ms. Miller- Muro assisting the Attorney General in the law suit spent most of Mondaymorning testifying with judge Cooper seemingly not satisfied with her questionable factual information.
This comment was written by Dan.Sometime tomorrow I will write an article entitled, “Federal judge angrily denounces International Marriage Regulation act as Political Mcarthyism”.
Report this comment to the moderators
April 6th, 2006 at 12:03 am
Dating Industry News Hot TopicsInternational Marriage Broker Act Synthetic Validity Dating Site Pricing Receive special alerts and a weekly news summary.
This comment was written by Online Dating Insider: Online Dating Industry News.Report this comment to the moderators
April 14th, 2006 at 12:16 pm
Ms. Miller-Muro will not be assisting the AG in the next case. The plaintiff’s attorney in the EC case should have been standing on his head objecting to that move. It is the government’s law, and they are the ones left holding the bag and responsible for defending it. Good luck.
I hope Ms. Miller-Muro shows up for the next case (which is coming soon), and isn’t offended when the Courtroom door hitting her butt on the way out. The government better start hiring some more attorneys, because they are going to be wasting a lot of time defending a law which is about to sink like the titanic
This comment was written by Dave.Report this comment to the moderators
April 18th, 2006 at 11:32 am
Who says that Ms. Miller-Muro will not be assisting the AG in the next case? What case is that? Where did you get your legal degree? Dave, that’s a judges decision, not yours, not a lawyers, but a judge. Unless you can show me something official (instead of your anti-feminist words), than it means nothing.
This comment was written by Suan.Report this comment to the moderators
April 19th, 2006 at 10:18 am
If the Federal Judge in the EC case declares the IMBRA unconstitutional and imposes a permanent injunction, then Ms. Miller-Muro (who helped to write this Law) will lose much of her credibility if she tries to assist in the next lawsuit against the IMBRA. Also, if EC wins its case, I will write a letter of complaint to the Congress that our taxpayer money is being wasted on Tahiri Justice Center, which used the taxpayor money help to write this Unconstitutional Law.
This comment was written by Albert.Report this comment to the moderators
April 20th, 2006 at 6:10 pm
Ms. Miller -Muro / Attorney General cited a “Research Project” written by EQUALITY NOW in 1979 in the European Connections case against IMBRA : “The Willingness of mail order bride companies to provide services to violent men”.
The “Research project” consisted of “Equality Now” sending “mail order bride” companies an e mail purportedly from a man seeking to obtain introductions from foreign women, who in the e mail stated he had plead guilty in connection to assault on 2 former wives. Most of the respondents were willing to accept him as a customer including (ironically) some of the companies that IMBRA law carved out an exemption for.
The research methodology in the study has some serious flaws and the research ethics were morally abdominable including serious violations of ethics standard codes of research conduct for social science research projects by Federal standards. The participants of the study were not notified and the results of the study were not reviewed by various public segments required in any credable research study. Furthermore the study fabricated the results and misrepresented the data including only 25 companies (affected by the IMBRA law) in the study out of 200 companies that legacy INS estimated at the time of the survey in 1999.
Judge Cooper in Georgia is probably laughing at the Plaintiff’s cited “research study” more analygous to to a heresy withcraft trbunal.
This comment was written by Dan.Report this comment to the moderators
April 20th, 2006 at 7:00 pm
There are some on this site who seem to enjoy making up things that are absolutely not true (and all verifiable in the public record). Ms. Miller-Muro was not in Atlanta for the TRO hearing and did not testify in the European Connections case. And, large dating services didn’t hire lobbyists to oppose IMBRA. Congress, on their own, recognized the difference between services that help men and women date on equal terms and services that commodotize women from developing countries for American men. Finally, no taxpayer money was used to advocate for the passage of IMBRA. It is all verifiable…look it up before you spew lies.
This comment was written by confused.Report this comment to the moderators
April 21st, 2006 at 2:42 pm
The proponents of IMBRA have used deception, distortion and exaggeration to pass IMBRA a law that severely impacts a mans privacy rights and also a violation of Constitutional rights. When the law was passed there was no statistics presented, no questions answered, no hearing. The IMBRA was deceptively attached to the back end of the Violence Against Womens Act (VAWA) up for extension and expected to easily pass. Most law makers did not realize the IMBRA portion was attached to VAWA.
The only way the proponents could get this law to pass was to exclude
the largest mega dating sites who have the money to challenge and easily win a law that is obviously a violation of Constitutional rights.
The proponents were so desperate to pass a law to regulate International datinng that Senator Maria Cantwell and John Miller presented false and misleading testimonty before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on July 14, 2004 claiming a Nexis between International marriage brokers and human trafficking of women into the United States. They presented this testimony even though they had prior knowledge that a previous legacy INS study that determined no correlation existed between IMB’s and foreign Traffficking of women into the USA.
In terms of statistics the proponents at one claimed 59% of International brokers had domestic violence an absolutely refutable statistic. The Layli Miller recently indicated “no way of definately knowing ” what violence rates occur in reference to International marriages involving mail order arrangements.
I could go on and on regarding specific examples of fabrication of statistics, misleading factual information , unethical research methods that the proponents have used to pass IMBRA 2005. It won’t matter because by this time next week IMBRA will be repealed in its entirety by Judge Cooper.
There is an old saying that is applicable here. You can fool all the people some of the time or some of the people all the time but IMBRA proponents can’t fool all the people all the time and jJudge Cooper is not fooled easily. … the judge will likely repeal IMBRA.
This comment was written by Dan.Report this comment to the moderators
April 22nd, 2006 at 7:37 am
Confused, I see that you posted the same text on the Dating Rights website. In case you have not seen the responses, here they are. You really should not post there as it fuels more defiance which leads to more financial contributions from anti-IMBRists. These funds are being used to mount a class action suit that will lead to more gender friction in the United States.
_______________________________________
Perhaps. Nothing you can do about it.
Just like you can’t do anything about everyone at the Tahirih Justice Center, LifetimeTV, and Legal Momentum (former NOW Legal Defense Fund) who seem to satiate themselves by formulating and promoting propaganda that masks their true sociopathic agenda.
Rather than search all over the net, perhaps you could provide some links to these public records as that would be useful.
Well, whether Muro was or was not there at least makes for some interesting trivia. So tell me, why do think a federal judge determined that a TRO was warranted?
Large dating sites would have been foolish to oppose IMBRA - Do you know why?
If it so clear, as you claim, then why didn’t Congress just ban international dating sites? After all, that would have immediately ended this route to foreign women along with the websites that Muro and other bitter scorned feminists find so offensive.
I have a lot of faith in Congress, about as much as I have in the feminists that spew the same old garbage over and over and over again.. Those ladies from developing countries that you speak of may never be on the same “economic terms” as men in the USA, but this does not mean they are the helpless idiots you make them out to be. These women do not care about what you think because they see through your agenda.
Here is an idea, go to the Philippines and save all of these ladies from becoming slaves to American men, I am sure they will roll out the welcome wagon for you… maybe you can “educate” them on how to hate American men.
That’s good. No sense in creating millions of really pissed off taxpayers.
We take liberty in spewing lies…and do enjoy that it annoys you. Care to guess from what groups we learned this technique?
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
April 22nd, 2006 at 9:07 am
Broham, at the point when you start calling well-respected feminist groups “sociopaths,” it’s clear that you’re not willing to engage in civil discussion.
You’ve been banned. Please don’t post on this blog anymore.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
April 22nd, 2006 at 9:57 am
Pardon me. I have not called anyone anything. If you read the introduction to my post, you will then know that the text that follows is from another website. My point is to stop the agitation of a very formidable group by suggesting that folks who post here do not post there.
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
April 22nd, 2006 at 1:09 pm
Okay. Reading back through this thread, you’re right; you’re one of the very, very few people on your side of this argument who seems able to make a case without resorting to either overt misogyny or insults (apart from condescending “no one will have the courage to respond to this point” remarks). So sorry I misread your post, and I’ve unbanned you.
However, in general, I don’t like comment-writers to post long quotes from other sites with little original content - especially if the content is insulting to feminists. Next time, it would be better if you could just post a link saying “in case you didn’t see it, people have responded to you here.” Or, for that matter, you could refrain from bringing up the matter here altogether.
Confused, for the same reason, I’d prefer you not use my site to repost stuff you’ve written elsewhere. Linking to it suffices.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
April 22nd, 2006 at 10:47 pm
I just read an article about international dating in an online dating magazine and it states that there has been an exponential growth of American men going overseas and finding foreign brides. What is known is that many are rich and well educated American men, who are highly successful in their careers - so they are far from being the “losers” that the media portrays them to be. The article also quotes that if the present trend continues, in 20 years, about 25 percent of American men will be married to foreign ladies. Now, an attempt was made to help prevent this by the government passing the International Marriage Brokers Regulatiuons Act 2005 (IMBRA), but a Federal Judge has imposed an injunction against it, stating that it violates American men’s basic rights to seek brides overseas. So American men continues to go to Russia, Ukraine, Columbia, Phillipines, Thailand, Brazil, China, etc. in droves to find their brides. Soon, the international marriages will become main stream in our society, unless something (such as IMBRA) puts a break to it. What are everyone’s thoughts on this?
This comment was written by Albert.Report this comment to the moderators
April 23rd, 2006 at 6:50 am
I have so many thoughts about this law that it is hard for me to know where to begin. I mostly been a reader and not a poster, but today I decided to put down a few of my thoughts.
Thought 1 - has the trend changed? At one time I couldn’t find anything against IMBRA, but now I seem to find it everywhere. This either means people who neverhad anything to say about the feminist movement before have been woken up or people are changing their minds. At face value I was all for IMBRA until I read it. Goodness, it is so anti-male, anti-marriage to foreign ladys and anti-smaller dating sites v.s. larger exempted sites, that one can’t help but to root for IMBRA to go away.
I challenge all those who are pro-imbra and comment on any section of the law that talks about international dating sites and back ground requirements. I won’t list my answers here to keep the post from getting too long, but would gladly answer each one who thinks this law and its articles are good. But first read it and list the article from the law you are for.
Thought 2 - Albert’s post above my post caught my eye. One of the major components of Americans marrying foreign ladys is also U.S. military. By far they are not losers. I have a friend in the U.S. Army who met a Philippine lady during his tour. He left but could not get her off his mind. Bottom line, it was the whole package that attracted him to her. It is one of those things he has a hard time describing, but the gleam in his eye tells the whole story.
Thought 3 - Glad that Ampersand reinstated Broham. The initial ban made me say “what” and my thought was, this site is pro feminist and any one who opposes it is going to be banned. Not sure the politics of the site, to be honest, but in my view it is a great neutral site to post all view. Thanks for having it.
Bob
This comment was written by Bob U.S.A..Report this comment to the moderators
April 23rd, 2006 at 4:03 pm
(You don’t need to post this on the blog)
Ampersand, you said that I should not post things here that I have posted elsewhere, but this is the only place I have posted it. When you said that, I googled my posting and it appears to have also been posted on something called “online dating rights.com“, but I did not put it there. I find it creepy that someone cut a posted my comments on another blog and made it appear as though it was me. It was not. (I’ve seen that site before and the level of dialoge is very immature…I don’t even look at it anymore.)
This comment was written by confused.Report this comment to the moderators
April 23rd, 2006 at 4:14 pm
Several postings seem to misunderstand what IMBRA does. It doesn’t prevent anyone from doing anything. Men are free to meet and marry women abroad in IMBRA. It only requires the sharing of information about a prospective American spouse (man or woman) with their prospective foreign spouse (man or woman). The frantic response to IMBRA by people who oppose it would only make sense if someone had an extensive criminal record and feared a woman knowing about it. Even under IMBRA, a convicted criminal is still free to meet and marry whom he chooses…she would just know about his past. I wouldn’t think that getting to know someone should be that much of a threat. In fact, I think that it would work to foster more long-lasting relationships. I’m all for international relationships! The world is getting smaller every day.
This comment was written by confused.Report this comment to the moderators
April 23rd, 2006 at 5:30 pm
The post by confused I had to comment on and maybe even offer another example, if I may. The danger to the male disclosing personal information before he gets to know the lady is what most object to. Would you care to disclose any personal iformation to a stranger without getting to know him first? The government is asking men to do that?
Obviously when you first meet someone, no matter if on the net or at a local club, it is mostly an attraction you feel towards that person. This draws you in to get to know the person and in turn let them get to know you. If the relationship develops, you both become more open with your personal life. Rarely (unless you are a strange bird), do you at the initial stage of a relationship disclose how many times you have been married, any possible violations in your life that may of happen years ago, etc.
The danger is disclosing such information before you get a chance to know the person, may be used by that person for the wrong reasons. Especially since that information can be so easily scattered by the net (heck, you were upset when someone took something you wrote and you say posted elsewhere).
Ok, maybe my point will fall on death ears, but there is a danger there no matter if you think so or not. Just put yourself in those shoes for a moment.
This comment was written by Bob U.S.A..Report this comment to the moderators
April 23rd, 2006 at 7:26 pm
The European Connections Case will likely be resolved this week. At the heart of the matter is the ability of the defendants to conclusively prove that IMBRA serves as a reasonable and rational approach to address a “growing governmental concern” regarding alledged increase of domestic violence associated with Int. marriage brokers. On page 17-18 in the defendants memorandum (March 31, 2006) the defendants cite an increase in K-1 and K -2Visas being issued along with” documented statistical evidence of high rates of abuse in marrriages resulting from these International marriage brokers”.
Both the proponents of IMBRA and the defendants have been unable to demonstrate any accurate comparison of violence rates for International marriages (through IMB’s) compared to the overall violence rate for US marriages. The proponents and defendants alike have cited an array of confusing and misleading statistical information. For example Layli Miller Muro recently stated on the O’reilly factor she had”no definitive way of knowing” what percentage of the “mail order bride” marriages were involved in abusive situations. The Miller-Muro cited a study stating that “more than 50% of legal Immigrant Service providers were seeing women who were being abused by men they met through Int. marriage brokers”. (This study cited is confusing and destroys any credible accuracy in terms of domestic violence).
To confuse matters even more the defendants memorandum ( dated March 31, 2006) cited the preamble of IMBRA (2003) claiming “49.3 percent of foreign immigrants reported physical abuse by an intimate partner. This is clearly a mistake by the defendant with a misrepresentation of facts. The study cited involved hispanic women in the DC area none of who had met their husbands through a mariage broker.
The defendants and proponents of IMBRA have failed to demonstrate any reliable evidence (statistical or factual) demonstrating a higher rate of violence for International marriages (through IMB’s) versus all marriages in the United States and thus Judge Cooper will likely rule in favor of the Plaintiff.
This comment was written by Dan.Furthermore when
IMBRA was passed it did not pass “Constitutional muster” since there was no hearing or statistics presented. Therefore defendants are on the defensive and must prove the law is warranted which they haven’t done.
Report this comment to the moderators
April 23rd, 2006 at 8:07 pm
I understand why someone might be put off by having to share criminal background information with a prospective spouse, but it seems a small price to pay for protecting women from really bad guys - and it is clear from the murders reported that there are at least some bad guys. Heck, you have to share criminal background information to get a job…to get an apartment. Finding your true love should be at least as important as an event as finding a job or apartment. If you truly value the intelligence of an immigrant woman, sharing with her information so that she can make an informed choice, up front, is only respectful.
This comment was written by confused.Report this comment to the moderators
April 23rd, 2006 at 10:05 pm
confused Writes:
Confused, you are correct. And certainly, we can agree that, just like you, her intelligence will enable her to ask for information that SHE considers important while getting to know more about a man she is interested in. Of course, just like you, one cannot think of every possible thing to ask. Fortunately, when applying for a visa while still in her country, she will be made aware of any and all “bad guy” things. Therefore, out of respect for her, she would be receiving, “up front,” all the information she needs to make an informed decision. If you prefer that the woman’s intelligence be insulted by providing information before saying “hello” in a love letter, PLEASE TELL ME WHY.
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
April 24th, 2006 at 3:39 am
“Confused” has stated, “I understand why someone might be put off by having to share criminal background information with a prospective spouse, but it seems a small price to pay for protecting women from really bad guys ”
The IMBRA requires extensive information for a variety of crimes from DUI to murder with no distinction between conviction (gulty or not guilty) . There appears to be no period of forgiveness for even simple violations of the law . Lets say you were arrested for DUI 35 years ago and were found not guilty.. you still must declare the crime even though you were not gulty. IMBRA is “to “Broad based” here implicating anyone accused of a petty crime 35 years ago.
Confused has stated. “heck you have to share criminal information to get a job”. The truth of the matter is the background clearance (check) required for IMBRA is more comprehensive then getting a Top secret clearance for National Security positions.
IMBRA is too “broad based” unduly infringing upon mens privacy rights. One could argue submission of criminal information is a petty thing… but when your fiancee Visa gets put on “adminstrative review” by USCIS for a year because of a petty crime (including non guilty convictions) 35 years ago it IMBRA unduly burdersome.
This comment was written by Dave Root.Report this comment to the moderators
April 24th, 2006 at 8:48 am
Dan, I am afraid you need a bit of a legal education. As a matter of law, the government and Tahirih don’t have to prove a thing to have imbra upheld. The law is STRONGLY PRESUMED CONSTITUTIONAL and it is european connections and (sex) tours that has to prove that imbra is totally irrational, that’s just the law
This comment was written by Sun Tzu.Report this comment to the moderators
April 25th, 2006 at 2:38 pm
Regarding your OPINION that the “law is strongly presumed constitutional”. Apparently the judge isn’t presuming IMBRA is constitutional by placing a TRO preventing the law from being implemented. In fact Judge Cooper had stated, “The Court found the Plaintiff has a “substantial liklihood of success on the merits”.
This comment was written by Dave Root.Report this comment to the moderators
April 25th, 2006 at 2:46 pm
Sun,
This comment was written by Dan.Regarding your OPINION that the “law is strongly presumed constitutional”. Apparently the judge isn’t presuming IMBRA is constitutional by placing a TRO preventing the law from being implemented. In fact Judge Cooper had stated, “The Court found the Plaintiff has a “substantial liklihood of success on the merits” …reading between the lines to mean” The defendants (Tahirih and government) must prove ” IMBRA is rational”. (That explains why the defendants memorandum was 24 pages long).
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April 26th, 2006 at 3:04 pm
I just heard that Tahirih filed a 100 page briefing document a few days ago. Thats definately a mistake with the appearance that
This comment was written by Dan.Tahirih is desperately trying to defend IMBRA a law that obviuosly
is legally flawed and unconstitutional. The only reason IMBRA passed in the first place was because supporters of IMBRA deceptively attached it to the back end of the Violence Against Women Act whichwas up for re extension. Most of the legislators didn’t realize IMBRA had been attached to the VAWA. Previous to its passage in December 2005 IMBRA failed to gather much support since it was viewed as a serious violations of mens privacy and Constitutional rights.
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April 26th, 2006 at 4:21 pm
It looks like another lawsuit besides EC is now coming the government way. ODR just posted this:
The plaintiffs we have come to know, have filed both the complaint and TRO today in Ohio Court. The TRO is expected to be ruled on this Friday but not certain yet. Aagin, the plaintiffs who filed want to thank you for all your efforts
This comment was written by MOB.Report this comment to the moderators
April 26th, 2006 at 7:27 pm
So, the IMBRA war is well underway. I wonder, has there ever been a feminist vs male rights case taken to the federal level or is IMBRA breaking new ground? And to add to all this is the irony that the battle is over the rights of men to freely communicate with non-feminist women. Its quite a plot and may actually make a good TV mini-series.
This comment was written by Broham.Report this comment to the moderators
April 27th, 2006 at 10:50 am
ON APRIL 26, 2006, SUIT WAS FILED IN THE U.S. DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF OHIO (DAYTON DIVISION) CAPTIONED: “AMERICAN ONLINE DATING ASSN. & STRICKLER V. GONZALEZ”, CASE NO. 3:06cv123, CHALLENGING IMBRA. THE CASE IS ASSIGNED TO JUDGE THOMAS M. ROSE, AND IS TENTATIVELY SET FOR HEARING ON THE TRO MOTION FOR MONDAY, MAY 01, 2006
This comment was written by MOB.Report this comment to the moderators
May 1st, 2006 at 10:06 am
The Ohio Lawsuit that was just launched against IMBRA utilizes further arguments that the EC case did not use…which will help stop the feminists from appealing an EC decision with success.
The new AODA Lawsuit in Ohio, launched with the critical support of two American women lawyers, argues:
1) The Right to Association (2nd Amendment) and
2) The Right to Privacy (which is not in the Constitution but has tons of precedent)
The new lawsuit even mentions Roe vs Wade as a privacy precedent…among many others.
Also…a case where mentally retarded people were discriminated against because they were “politically unpopular” in a community that did not want a home for them built…was used as an example of IMB customers being persecuted only because they are politically unpopular.
The only thing these lawyers are leaving out, which the EC lawyers also left out, is that half of all foreign women on IMB sites do not have email and, therefore, could not “approve” of criminal background forms and then 300,000 women would have to be deleted from the Internet ASAP if IMBRA ever came into effect (which theoretically could be tomorrow if the Ohio judge doesn’t grant the additional TRO).
Also, neither lawsuit states the obvious: that IMBRA allows men to lie on the background forms…which means that this part of the law would be useless and harmless if it weren’t for the above fact that so many women don’t have email to allow them to quickly approve of the useless forms, 100% of which would state that the male had no criminal background.
The new lawsuit does point out, however, that an IMB customer named Mark Strickland states that foreign women tend to ignore the background forms, even though he has no damaging information on them, and this he believes is a major impediment to free speech.
This plaintiff is correct on this: a submitted form that has no bad information on it…will be ignored because the women will also see no important information such as age, height, job, photo. They won’t understand why all this *relevant* info was not on the form.
So IMBRA will do what it was secretly designed to do: create a barrier between American men and foreign women…a barrier that seems small…but which can make all the difference in the world.
Remember what I said above: No intelligent man with a criminal background would ever tell the truth on an IMBRA form, making the forms useless.
This comment was written by Jim Peterson.Report this comment to the moderators
May 5th, 2006 at 12:29 pm
The original purpose of IMBRA was to prevent violence against women who met their husbands throught an International Marriage Broker/Agency (IMB). But is the violence rate higher in these “mail order bridge” arrangements?
According to Congress at least * 8,000-12,000 foreign women entered the United States each year as a “Mail order bride”. Over a ten year period this means approximately 100,000 women have entered the USA as a result of “mail order bride” arrangements. Only three of those women have been killed by their husband in 10 years. Deplorable nonetheless but in the same 10 year period 14,000 American women citizens have been killed by their husbands or intimate partner.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to calculate the “Intimate Partner Murder Rate” for women who met their husbands through an International marriage agency. Simply divide 3 by 100,000=.003%
The “Intimate partner violence rate” for all marriages throughout the US can be found by dividing 14,000 by 80,000,000 women (married/ living together)=.0175%
Based upon these calculations the murder for these International marriages (Mail order bride arrangements) enjoy a far lower rate of murder compared to all US marriages. This would be expected since the average age of IMB clients is approximately 44 years. Simply because of their age these men are well educated, earn higher salaries than average, have well established careers, and thus they are generally responsible.
This comment was written by Dan.Report this comment to the moderators
May 6th, 2006 at 8:12 am
Please do not make mistake about REAL intention of the IMBRA. It is goal to take out of business smaller web site that are not exempt. The law is going directly after web site owneres, threatening with $20,000 fine and 5 yeas in jail for selling $10 - $20 address.
This comment was written by Leon.I myself purchased a share of such Web site after finding my future wife on it and been running it for a year. Trust me, the law was crafted in such way that was ABSOLUTELY ECONOMICALLY not feasable to comply. Most of the Ladies on the Web Site only have cell phones and they are all prepaid, meaning that calling party pays and trust me, it is much higher rate than in US. We will have to spend more money on just phone calls than we will make from the sale. And by the way, MAIL does not exist here, period.
So for several months we were trying to find the economically viable way to comply. If the law would require us to secure ladies consent during Personal introduction, it would work. But NO way it will EVER work for just saying Hello stage.
By the way, we sometimes are dealing with some male as..les who uses our web site to call and harrass the ladies on the site. We tell ALL our female clients to contact us IMMIDIATELY in that case and we 1. banned the guy from the site 2. trying to contact him personally and talk some reason into the guy. 3. contact the authorities. You won’t believe how many times we have forwared the requests for under-aged girls to the FBI and INTERPOL.
Ok, now the law will take us out of Ligitimate business. But trust me, were is a demand there is always going to be a supply, but future suppliers will not as clean as we are. It is as siple as Tax : make everybody pay 15 - 25% of their income in taxes and you have a law-abiding citizens, make it 55% or more and you have a nation of tax cheats.
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June 7th, 2007 at 5:43 pm
there are abuses on both sides of the fence on this international marriage broker idea. i was a lonely, heartbroken divorcee who met a filipina through a dating service. she told me everything i wanted to hear. i visited the phils to prove i met her; a year later, after uscis forms were approved; i went to the phils to pick her up and bring her to the usa under the fiance visa program.
This comment was written by tom anglin.we went to indiana where her cousin’s fiance lived just as soon as her cousin arrived in the usa on a tuesday. wednesday afternoon we were married; i left indiana early friday morning to return to new england to settle some affairs; with plans to return to indiana in about 2 weeks. the following monday, i called the cousin’s home all day; no answer; i called all day tuesday about every hour or so.
AS A SIDE NOTE, MY NEW BRIDE AND I NEVER SLEPT TOGETHER; as she always was finding excuses, so the marriage NEVER was even consummated.
approx 7 pm when i called, the cousin’s fiancee answered the telephone and told me my new bride and her cousin had run away together. this happened in march of 2006.
apparently, all these 2 filipinas, MY NEW WIFE, and her cousin wanted to do was to get to the usa asap, get someone to marry them so they could stay in the usa for beyond the 90 days allowed by a fiance visa, and then disappear. green card city for sure.
to make a long story short, i filed for divorce, but as most people know, you need both parties present for the courtroom. finally, on may 22d, 2007, over a year’s time trying every means and ways to locate ‘my wife’ unsuccessfully, i have finally been able to at least get into the court system.
now, i live in the archaic state of rhode island which has a ruling that people have to wait a minimum of 3 months BEFORE a marriage can be finalized. also, since the term “anulment” seems to be an unheard of thing around here; which is what i really wanted since the marriage was NOT consummated; so i had to go through a regular divorce proceeding.
therefore, to add insult to injury, it will be at least a year and a half that my life has been on hold because of just one little mistake, of believing that this filipina loved me and wanted to make a life of happiness together; however, as i soon found out; all she loved was the idea of a green card.
for anyone out there interested in these things; CAVEAT for sure; almost 3 years in time which i can NEVER recover; in addition to the approx $20,000 in expenses, including the legal fees. i can earn the money back as long as my health stands up; but i cannot ever recover the 3 years of time which have gone forever.
for all lovers out there; again, there is abuse on both sides of the case; as for me; although i am very good at most things, as i am sure most people are; however; NONE OF US ARE MINDREADERS; so if someone tells me they love me; or you or anyone else; how do you know ?????? life is a gamble; you just hope you choose right more than you choose wrong.
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June 12th, 2007 at 7:21 pm
[...] This question remains unanswered. The truth is that the lawmakers are cowards and did not want a confrontation with the likes of MSN or Yahoo or Match. The link to this discussion is here: [...]
This comment was written by The crazy fuckers just did this… « Don’t Marry.Report this comment to the moderators
May 23rd, 2009 at 8:33 pm
I am a Filipino and I would very much like to see web sites like filipinawives[dot]com banned. I really hate the negative stereotype of Filipino “mail-order brides”. When you use the words “Filipina” and “bride” in a search engine, how many “mail-order bride” web sites are listed?
Filipinas are intelligent and well educated, but western women are more progressive with women’s rights. It would be good if western women could come to the Philippines and contribute to the Filipino feminists. Often people here are unaware of the unusually high level of anti-feminist feelings amongst the western men that seek Filipina wives. They are often unaware of the reasons why such men have rejected western women (or were rejected by western women). Such reasons commonly include anti-feminist feelings.
Filipinas are not house slaves, our country is more progressive and I hope soon that Filipino “mail-order brides” will never be spoken of again.
This comment was written by Pinoy.Report this comment to the moderators