The Changing Trends in Marriages

Traditions are a tough nut to crack, and they are challenging to go against. But, to the pleasant surprise of all the youth of Pakistan and all the single people and age to get married, Pakistani traditions regarding marriage are changing. Even though the progress is slow, but there is progress nonetheless. Mainly because of the following reasons:

• Western Influence: Through movies, TV shows, and other media, Western culture is starting to make a significant influence on our culture. Call it globalization or whatever you want to call it, but thankfully this phenomenon, Pakistani culture and traditions are changing, especially the culture and stigmas surrounding marriage and weddings. One of the main things to change is the acceptance of love marriages. This comes from the rise of liberalism, freedom, and acceptance of the change. But even though the stigma regarding love marriages has changed, traditional roles still exist. But hopefully, the stigma will eventually die down.
• Inter-Caste Marriages: Previously inter-caste marriages were a vast NO-NO in Pakistan, but thoughts about that are also changing. The reason behind this could be that as people becoming more educated and urbanized, they are also becoming more and more open-minded. There are still cases where these things are taken very seriously and rishtas from outside the “khandaan” or “biraadri” are rejected, but they are getting rarer and rarer.
• Changing Gender Roles: Many girls are working before marriage and they put forward their condition to continue working after marriage. As a result, girls are managing both their personal and professional lives smoothly. This, in turn, has dissolved the distinction between gender roles. Today, boys are equally involved in household chores as girls. On the other hand, girls are also providing financial support in time of need.
• From Joint to Nuclear Families: As nuclear families are replacing the joint family system, the closeness and comfort level between the partners are increasing. They have ample space to talk and strengthen their relationships. In a joint family system, the partners spent very few hours together because of lack of space due to many family members. This acted as a bottleneck in removing communication gap between the couple.