Why Dinka Traditional Marriage Won’t Stand a Chance in Modern Life (Part One)
5 min readMarriage: High Risks of Girls to Price Tag – ‘indirect selling’ of another human being to another
By Mamer Deng Jur, Australia
April 7, 2015 (SSB) —- Opening idea. Last month one of my mate and his beautiful girlfriend did what was forgotten for sometimes – Engagement party.
Some years back, engagements were everything to all the newly arrived South Sudanese in Australia. Every mature adult would want badly to throw in an engagement party, including myself.
But serious financial crisis and the deadly uprising of casual sex among the opposite sex discouraged such intuition among many people.
Then for that reason, engagements had become very seriously ill, like a person suffering from unknown disease. For example, HIV or AIDS, when it first strikes in small town of Kasansero, in Uganda. These people of this town (Kasansero) knew nothing about the AIDS.
So they named it as ‘slim’ because of the shocking weight loss most sufferers experienced before dying. This disease for some reasons was said by ‘many people that it was luck of education’.
My community was growing backward in every calendar year, instead of growing forward, because education is not going through them, even when they are seriously learning.
Currently, if I am not wrong, for God sake, I believe that only 40% of people in my community know what they are doing, but rest of the people are spoiled by war/spoiled by civilisation; THIS IS VERY SAD, Indeed.
On 11th January 2015, I disembarked at Perth International Airport coming from Doha. When I turned on my cell phone, I got a text message from my mate that; I was invited to his engagement party, which was going to take place on 25th January 2015. I told myself, what! Is he kidding? Because engagements were not new ‘labels’ any more. I rang him in the morning to confirm the story, but it was true. Shit ‘was going down’!
Marriage is our life and an important element of our existence. Society exists because of marriage practices in every single community.
Price tag and love don’t stand on one platform.
Today it is pretty upsetting that human beings are up for sell, nowadays our girls, worth $130,000, before discount. But I am really sure; no human being is a property to be possessed. You and I can own a property, and treat it as we wish.
But you can’t do that to another ‘human being’. To be realistic, what comes with the package of $130,000? Someone could argue both quality and quantity. Quality would refer to that property you are purchasing, and quantity would referred to the amounts of money you would pay for that property.
Dressed civilised, but minds are still illiterate
Our fathers and uncles clung to old methods of doing things. Many of them have exempted themselves from factories, and they are very happy to be constant on welfare.
So it is very easy for them to say any amount they wish to say, because they don’t work. But if it happens that they work, then they would understand that standing for 12 hours plus is not a piece of cake. Then no one would make a mistake to say his daughter worth $130,000.
Most respected and least respected people in my community will lose hearing in the factories, and some will be adding weight, due to computer work. They are working very hard to meet the closest amount amount to $130,000, to marry their sisters, in order to support the community and its cultural values.
Culture
I know it is a culture thing, Mr.D robs Mr. M to pay off Mr. J, who would be better off? Mr.D? Mr.M? or J?
But consequently, many girls don’t deserve $130,000 because many of them are jerkies filled with ‘undercover’ things.
- Excessive drinking of alcohol of all sorts – indeed such behaviour is against Dinka culture and it has zero tolerance in Dinka perspective.
- Night club attendees
- Smoking of shisha and cigarette- it also has a zero tolerance
- Unfaithfulness to their husbands/boyfriends.
- Many of them are lazy.
- Community is full of young single mothers.
All the ‘above’ undercover things may led to economical stresses and socially instability to any man in the community who was born to change his community. However, 30% of our girls deserve ‘good men’ and do deserve 130,000. A person of greatest values, and personalities can’t be exchanged for money value or precious rare stone ‘diamond’. They worth more than a diamond.
Furthermore, our marriage values and cultures had been badly influenced by our neighbours’ countries, when we were settled as ‘refugees’.
Mixed cultures
We, South Sudanese living today in Australia, were refugees, in Egypt, Kenya, Ethiopia and Uganda. These countries had their own cultures, which have had influences on our cultures in one-way or another. But it would have had been well if we had one combined culture in Australia regarding marriage.
I will illustrate this point of view, by giving an example of Julius Nyerere. When Nyerere was a Prime Minister of Tanzania, he had a belief that in a nation made up of hundreds of different ethnic groups and coming from backgrounds as distinctive as Tanganyika and Zanzibar, then multiple political parties would destabilise the new nation.
So what he did, he had to move to suppress oppositions in all forms, not just the parties but culture themselves, and he tremendously introduced a policy that banned all language except his native Kiswahili.
Everything was nationalised, private businesses were destroyed, and Nyerere implemented a policy of ‘Ujamaa’ a little cousin to communism ideologies.
By applying Nyereres’ idea to my opinion, I think we, as a community, needs to have a policy regarding marriage issues in order to unit us as one.
Conclusion
Therefore it can be concluded that, our current marriage arrangements in the West need more justification to be done to them. I hope one day, my daughter will be a free woman in her own right, to do anything she likes, or loves and marries a man of her choice. I believe that, there would be no day, I would stand before everyone and demand that my daughter worth $130,000 dollars.
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About Post Author
MDJ,
The issue is a serious reality. Too much greed has engulfed our communities in diaspora. Elders must regulate the traditional marriage.
Thanks, for writing this article.
Thanks, Kur Wel Kur i hope one day they will think and do the right thing.
Thanks Mwalimu Nyarere
Thank you, Arok Deng Mabior for your thoughtful acknowledgement. Thanks.
You’re highly welcome brother!
See you tomorrow at Adelaide!
I see you on the weekend brother.
I completely concur with you Mr Mamer DJ, I know it is terrible, it’s horrible, It’s wasteful, it’s denaturing, it’s humiliating and finally, it’s dangerously hell if a wise boy marry a girl of such characters and attitudes which you have unequivocally describes. Culture is always good globally, but for the Dinkas, it has become even disadvantageous to most strong, ambitious young men from Dinka, especially Dinka Bor. How can someone demand far more than half a house value for a single girl or a daughter?
Dinkas marry because of tradition not necessary a cultural verdict at this very moment. To me, tradition is a fix variable contrary to culture which is changeable. every man pays to marry his own wife because his mother was also paid off by his dear father a while before, that is a proud part of it, you look good in the community or society if you pay than not paying though, some girls awful, full of lust than their mothers nowadays?, most likes cooperate breeding like cows or pigs, in some Australian state, you would that one single women has seven to eight children biologically from other four to five fathers, it is shocking, indeed bad part is that, these women, only 3 out of 10 would stay in a house with a man and no mail or living details in such address. Any of these four casual men in her relationship, chance of being a future husband is only 10 percent it is real and is happening in the Dinka communities. Should people pay for such girl in the first place or not?
Because girls are associated with their mother’s actions or history of the past or present, in context of their moral worth, both strong moral and immoral are examined in order to be marry.
Culture again has currently disadvantaged 60 percent of young energetic, handsome Dinka men across the western world (Diaspora)f from 2004 onwards, in contrary had advantaged most girl’s families whose their daughter is not even in her husband’s house. So where is that imbalance come from if there is a valid cultural respect?
Nevertheless, there is a saying from a little ferry animal (Awuan), it says, “she don’t care if her mother stops having more siblings as long as she is born”.
That is exactly what Dinka’s girls are doing currently. Once you pay, high potential of risk or crisis begins. If you don’t pay, then no crisis but unfaithfulness exists. Fortunately, no losses if this infidelity uncovered at any stage of the relationship, Good news. However, children from separated parents experience worse relative poverty being imposed on them, especially by their mother. This is no joke; women do it deliberately to stay alone for exotic pleasures that don’t involve kids in the long run. It don’t matter she is 16 or 50, it is just as another catastrophe in the west than the war in south Sudan. Historically, from Dinka’s perspective, no man that spoil the house but a woman, this is in a context were there are children in the relationship. Any women with two children or more is culturally denies remarry especially to unmarried men with the exception of remarry as second, third or a hundredth wife’s position, or alternately to the deceased or really old or disabled guy. These types of women (are) were stigmatised as morally weak, susceptible to irresponsible men and highly prone to diseases. However, this is still questionable if there was dowry equivalent to children paid or are to be paid. 15 percent of Dinkas women stays home for such amount until their daughters are later married so as to pay-off the rest, this was a great hope putted forward by our forefathers. Unfortunately, that compromised hope is lost eventually; it was not like a loan but was a kind of sustainable society nurturing.
Additionally, Elders of these times are the slowest elders ever in the Dinka history in decision- making, especially the one in the west were their children are transforming from real cultural human to nonsense. The chief paramount Mr Ajang Duot was not just an elder or a leader but an obliged head- person who has to think about what to do for his people in all angles and aspects of life to sustain a safer path to both intra-generation and intergeneration, he was a magnificence elder. I don’t really know whether today’s elders are victimising the current generation or just trying to extinct the social norms of marry relationship of Dinkas. In two months alone this year, 2015, five beautiful Dinka Bor girls, left their parent’s houses for another culture disowned community. All these girls were closely looked at by most Bor youth as worthy ones to merry but recently turned out that they are to be married in the dark as they choose to. Our Dinka culture could be too controlling to them, in their
parents’ house or in a future Dinka husband’s house. That could be one of the reasons why they left for externals who will pay less or never to their families. It is of no regret that cultural community of Bor will not prosper in the west. We save all our money to marry straight girls while girls from the same Dinka community are hunting for man or boys whom they can spend their own money as boyfriend or girlfriend. Most Dinka Bor young men accumulates their finances and later ended up in losses after a girls (ex-wife) looks for externals whom she will enjoy the money and life with for no pay to her parents as dowry and pursue a come and stay family in other close by Suburb comfortably despite the large sum paid by ex-husband. No repayment to the old Husband and no even a formal talk between the couple’s families culturally after the incident. It is astonishing to see a marriage woman deliberately turning back to be someone’s girlfriend, “cultural shock”. This is a matter is to be look at Bor societies only to understanding social environmental change. They failed to recognise that they left their homeland in Sudan conditionally, everyone else was exposed unconditionally. Other Dinkas just chose (elective) to join the national liberation movement in few numbers especially the young, their homeland is stable and still inhabited by elders and the like. So Dinka Bor is the vulnerable group in marriages, compare to other Dinkas or cultures across South Sudanese living anywhere.
I could remember that, in the former Dinka culture and traditions. Marriage is always cultural as does the divorces. We didn’t really have Absolute separation because no one would ever before live with any Dinka girl for free either or before marry.
So why should we not marry culturally and separate or divorce culturally as well, in the day light as Ms Adol Majak for her daughter somewhere in Australia, I head about such brilliant decision she made. This lady, She got the culture and respect of tradition in her, I wishes her the best on behave of greater Bor community, she just got it right, she will live a bit longer for that credit. Nothing is unusual in a relationship, so why people hide when they know their daughter is ruining somebody son’s up after a genuine payment of huge sweatshop money (migrant factory work). If the girl thinks
she is mistakenly married, then she have to pay back the dowry herself or her family pays. No free lunch. That would be the best cultural justice, I think time frame is needed for all unstable fragile relationships to be restored or terminated. 12 to 24 weeks is the best otherwise 1 year is as unhealthy for real capable men to recover, young men should not gamble with separated wives. Nothing is good about them as they roams in the communities preaching nonsense about former husband especially among her ex-husband’s relatives and friends. They don’t go that far to allege all these propagandas about her previous relationship.
Face book is another modern technological uncovering family issues, most married women have on line friends whom she navigate her own husband and definitely has oral sexual conversation without her partners knowing, this does not take that long for these women to rock up with such online men despite she looks like a good wife in the house or bed room. It is a serious bio-surveillance problem and likely enhances promiscuity (several casual sexual partners) breeding system. Women (Girls) with their mothers living closer or in the state, who thinks they are beautiful are the worst of all, dumping children in their unreasonable mother’s houses and then move around as she wants!
By 1.3 years’ time a lot of nasty things might have happened to her in the street. Just don’t bother; you could lose your dignity and good reputation rapidly than you think to street guys. Dangers follows your ultimate success at this level. So real intellectual men should watch out
Thanks Daniel, your thoughts and view about Dinka Bor’s culture are so great. Thank you.
Thanks Guys, I think for few, not all Dinka clans should closely monitor how they pay the dowry, I just don’t agree with an idea to stop or reduce high demand of dowry payments from girl’s families. What it need is to regulate it, not all girls are priced the same; every man knows the secret of his wife’s worth as does your sister. So high price-tag is just a normal cultural verbal exercise to move and celebrate the day event, in an opposite direction to real a natural love between a girl and a boy.
Here are the ten questions that could help transform the ideology:
1. Who are you paying for?
2. Who is receiving the dowry?
3. Is that the limit of all future payments? Or do men need to help them out (in-law) afterward or not?
4. Is there any hidden interest from a marrying girl in the relationship itself? (Differ between those in Africa and the west).
how dare can you pay/ marry someone you knows girlfriend, it is sometime ok for a reasonably divorced woman if that is your only moral worth, ( honour problem).
5. Do you have to pay right now or should it be later after a good glean of knowledge about her and her family? (West only)
6. Where/ how did you met the girl and how she ended up to be a burden to marry? (Traditionally imposed).
7. Is a girl a straight or have kids in the hid out? (Including multi-abortions, adaption or kept in her mother’s house)
8. Is the sum of money demanded marches the girl’s outlook?
9. Is there any assurance from the girl’s family that they are cultural enough to last? (Monitoring the relationship is a shared concern between families of both).
10. Do you know any propounded history of her mother or elder sisters who are/ were already in a relationship? (not innate though, but learn behaviour)” animal science”.
Finally, young men should stop paying or negotiations about their relationship to anyone (externals) other Paying to wrong people is inevitable.
NB, I would advise that People should not pay real dowry to these particular people if you want your relationship to last or with no regret if it terminate, unfortunate phase:
Avoid paying to:
1. Mother-in-law if she is the only one alive or present in the place. However, she is only entitled or eligible for an immediate needs or assistance such as energy bills and basic stuff like jewellery for prides. (This is probably what their daughter’s boyfriends are doing after terminating the first cultural marriage or relationship)
2. Step-brothers, because they are about a quarter in their biological trait to the girl with due question mark for relatedness.
3. Real younger brothers to a girl.
4. Step-fathers. (not related at all, but with exception of up-bring only, that does not equate or attract any dowry payments)
5. Other extended family members, young male or old male persons.
6. Any Community cultural pressured de-facto groups, (no authorisation to be accepted)
People has to pay to:
1. A real elder brother of the girl (reasonable person with no time pressure or condition attached).
2. A real biological father of the girl (time pressure is alright here because he paid for the girl’s mother if any).
NB. Marrying men must be patient despites pressure for dowry from anyone and search for these people, real elder brother real father anywhere they are currently or in the near future. Doing so is the only sources of wisdom for their daughter or sister not from the other categories such as a mother of a girl.
Also remember. Any mother don’t holds any wisdom or courage to her daughter’s children (granny) she is only best for care position. Only a father does for both daughters and a son’s children. However, a mother has this capacity for her son’s children only at some limits. So people should not worry about any noise made by mother- in-laws at all.
To conclude, if concern groups deliberately ignore this cultural facts, then they could end up in unanticipated jail or else commit suicides murder to themselves in the Dinka communities.
Good thoughts. Thanks.
Thanks Mamer for the piece. I admire the way you dissect this social-ill in our community. Marriage ‘s price has become a major social dilemma in our society. It has been lurking for over 2 decades now and counting and never has there been any agreed head-on approach and mechanism to tackle it unlike our formers. It minimally used to be 30 cows right before 90s and that didn’t just come out of blue. Someone/fews somewhere within our community sat down and deliberated on it and set the standard. I don’t know why not now. Why can our legislatures in forms of politicians, chiefs, and elders sit down and fix it? It is not that difficult given the benefits that come with it. Young men will not go outside their community to find the less expensive partners( marrying Kenyans and Ugandans or non-local). It will discourage the eloping or unwed pregnancies that are routed to sectionals feuds. The stocks of girls and boys that have stagnated and risked remaining without families for rest of their lives will easily liquidate and create families that will surge the dwindling population in our areas.
However, much indebtednesses go to Kuol Manyang for his earlier willful attempt. I heard Kuol Manyang tried his best at early 90s. It is said he lowered the price to 15 cows at a minimum after the 91 incident. This is believed to somehow have checked up things then. The huge stock of girls and boys that were scared to exchange and establish due to lack of resources liquidate fast thereafter and we now have a good and strong generation that are beneficiaries of that policy.
Thus, it sojourned. No idea when it stopped and why. It is still mystical and somehow a mystery of how it died away. Grapevine said the stakeholders killed it at their own interest. After Kuoldit ‘ s imposition, marrying families found a loophole to stealthily connive on the policy. Instead of publicly executing the trade, they would secretly arrange the marriage under the table and assented on whatever amounts of cows or moneys they would want to reward one another contrary to 15 cows benchmark. This pushed up the price beyond the 15 and 30 cows benchmarks that were simultaneously set. I’m not sure how high it has went now? Hence, trending stories and to acknowledge your stated figure, said it has went up from estimate $30,000 to $130,000. This is astonishingly shocking. It has really defy the old adage. It is no longer true that “what goes up must comes down”. I guess that zealous believed of gravitational principle does not work here. Thus, the question is, how high can it go before it becomes too high? I assume inertia of that market will give us answer one day. But with these avarice and lazy mindedness of our seniors, there is no telling as to when and what will curtail this hyperinflation of dowries. Worst-case scenario is that it is still climbing.
It is mysteriously astounding to wonder as to what is causing the spike. The quality of girls nowadays are not better than the old. They haven’t got prettier at least to my naked eyes. Let alone their baggage behaviors like clubbing , smoking , and drinking which your article explicitly defined. Most of them if not all have supplemented their beauty with these exotic stuffs such as wigs, clothes, and bleach ( the worst) which blurred their natural beauty unlike our mothers. So what is it? Is it the education? Probably . That’s the only value today girls would acclaim to have added unlike their mothers. However, with few cross-examinations, these educated few have no tangible qualities to cause the spike. Most of them have no characters to be exact. They have empty egos, coupled with unrealistic independency that cause more marriage’s turnovers.
Furthermore, I don’t know when our community will realize that this tradition is a huge hurdle that need an immediate remedy. It is taxing our future societal ‘ s development and progress. These wasted money can be channelled to some positive things that will yield a better future growth instead of being devoured overnight. The money can be used to support the kids that would be bored into the new family. I’m not saying they’re not being supported, but i would be better. This used to be the traditional way of thing then. let alone asking for minimum, girl’s parents used to bring 2 to 3 cows when their daughter gave birth. They did this because they did not want their daughter and son-in-law to struggle right after their first baby/establishment. This notion has faded us. Soon the marriage is over, girl parents would not have much concern. To be brutally honest , the marriage ‘ s monies have not economically suffice any families’ needs. Many families if not well structured prior to the dowry are still broke and worst off despite the receipts of payments. Dowries as of now are partially like robbery or casino monies. They come fast and go fast. Most of those money finish before one month. The first taker is the luxury dinning ( sodas, alcohol,and foods) that are performed during the marriage. After the nice treat of luxury meal from marrying family, the married family immediately reciprocate. The finance this with the dowry money. Second taker is the relatives. Their take if in form of money which is common today is used on transportation. Most come afar and they have no other mean to get back. Therefore, they use those proceeds to finance their trips back.The small left have no major impact to that family’s needs. Despite the huge payments, the parents of the girl would still hope for more. This added up the already incurred debt from the dowries’ payments. It could be better if these monies were used to do something that will yield growth. For instance, startup small business .
Finally, I think it is a demanding time for our community to re-evaluate its marriage status. Our community have went through many political, social, and economic upheavals that would have forced it to change but not up to this date has anything improved with overpricing. The tradition is still being perpetuated and passed on to next generation. It seems like nobody care. Nobody sees it has a demise to our future progress. We need to urgently reexamine our dowries’ policy. If there are no policies, it is better to write fews like what our forefathers did.