Rape

It is not about what either family wants, or what the groom wanted. The bride made it clear that she did not want to get married this way, even though it is part of her tradition. Yes, she did want to finish school before she did get married but she also did not want to get kidnapped and humiliated. The groom had told her that he would find another way for them to get married; he promised her that he wouldn"t do it (26:10). Yes it does constitute grounds for coercion, the groom did not have to kidnap his bride, he could have went about it in a totally different way. Just because it is a part of their tradition it does not mean that it had to be done. Does everyone always follow tradition? No they don"t. Everyone has the right to think for himself or herself, and the bride has a mind of her own, and she even stated that she was not ready to be married just yet, that clearly means that her saying no was valid and she did not want to marry him at that exact moment. Regardless of if they had plans to get married before the kidnapping or not. For example if a husband and wife had made plans to have sex on May 11th, but changes her mind when the day comes and says that she does not want to have sex with him, but he forces her to have sex with. Is that not rape? Since she had already agreed to it previously? It still is rape because she said no, she did not give him her consent at the moment that he raped her. How do you know that she didn"t recognize anyone in that van? Does she have to say her fianc"s name in order to know he is there? No she does not. Yes, she was calling for her mother because she did not want to be kidnapped or married. She was well aware of the fact that she was being kidnapped, when she got to the groom"s house she recognized what was happening and still kept saying no, it is evident that she did not want to get married to him under these circumstances. (14:55) Marriage can come up at anytime, if they did talk about it, it does not mean that she wanted to get married at that exact moment. They have talked about marriage before and when they did he promised her that he would not kidnap her, they would get married in a different way. (26:10) Even if she was ready to get married, which she states that she was not ready to be married (26:50) her saying no when they tried to put the bridal scarf on her is her not giving consent to the marriage. (14:55) I was mistaken, it was not at 26:50, it was at 26:10 which the groom had promised that he would find another way for them to get married. At 26:50 is when she says that she only accepted the bridal scarf because the families wouldn"t leave her alone unless she did so. (26:50) She said no to the marriage, she was coerced into saying yes to the bridal scarf because she knew the family would not stop unless she accepted it. Regardless if they had previous plans to get married, when they consummated the marriage, he raped her. She said no, she fought to try and get out of the car, she did not want to be there, she did not want to marry him that way and he non-traditionally raped her. Non-traditional rape is when the two people know each other but the male uses coercion to force the female into bed, which exactly what he did. Regardless of tradition, the bride did not want to get married this way, she did not to be married yet, but he forced her into getting married, and that means he raped her. She clearly said no, she even said she did not want to be married yet and he still forced her to do it. If he had kept his promise and did it another way then he wouldn"t of raped her, but since he did kidnap her, and did not let her go when she had said no, he forced her into the marriage and that constitutes rape because she did not give her consent to the marriage.