Why do people marry outside their culture?

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ontheway1

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Some of us remember the song “American woman” from way back when. I begin with this song as an introduction to a story about five catholic friends that opted for what could be called an “imported” wife.
One friend married an Asia woman who is a buddhist. One married another Asian buddhist. Two friends married Egyptian muslim women and one married a Philipino girl. They all have been married for years.
None of the marriages involved a visa wife, or a girl who married an American to get permanent residence status. The last guy on the list acutally relocated to Asia and lives there. His wife is probably Catholic.
I talked to a couple of the guys I am still in contact with to ask for their choice of a spouse. The reasons are many and varied, but I thought I heard the “traditional values” theme in their answers. This struck me as a little odd, as I would expect different values from women of such diverse backgrounds.
It must have taken these guys some time and thought to choose to marry outside their culture and religion. Are they finding values in foreign women that they can’t find in American Catholics?
I am now wondering if these are just rare and unique cases, or is there a detectible pattern there. Anyone else have similar experiences and know people like that? Just wondering.
 
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After reading your OP, I still don’t understand why you married an Asian, which is the title of your thread.
 
Ahm. Actually, I did not. I probably could have named the thread something like “They married Asians”, but that just sounded somewhat alien to me. So, I used the first person pronoun.
Plus not all the marriages I described involve Asian women as two are from Africa.
So much for poetic license.
Two of the people I have described actually live in my neighborhood. One is now overseas and the remaining two have moved away or I lost contact with over time.
I suppose that these marriage situations are common in large metropolitan areas, and may be very common in places such as NYC, LA, London, etc.
 
If anyone else has similar experiences, friends, situations, or if this is just something that I just happen to have run into.
Oh, there is also the interreligous theme running through these stories. What prompted these men to marry otuside of the church or even Christianity?
 
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Yeah, my Dad’s friend married a woman from Japan. She’s a wonderful wife and mother. She’s no different than any other well adjusted human being.
 
Well, the Catholic guy I knew who married an Asian Buddhist lady married her because she’s beautiful and he loves her. They have two college age kids and a nice life, but they are very modern. Not looking for “traditional family values” or any of that.

Another Catholic guy I knew who married a Filipino Catholic lady was clearly looking for a traditional wife because he himself was a traditional Catholic, very conservative, and wanted a wife who would stay home and raise a large family while he went out and worked hard at his profession to support them all. He made an appropriate match.

I don’t think there is any pattern to these marriages, given that something like “Asian Buddhists” are not a monolith. There are Asian Buddhist ladies who want to be SAHMs and marry a good provider and have 6 kids, and Asian Buddhist ladies who are doctors, lawyers and professors and would like to keep that up after marriage. Same for Egyptian Muslim ladies and Filipina ladies and so on.
 
ontheway1 said:
Anyone else have similar experiences and know people like that?
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I don’t think there’s any particularly uniform reason why people marry outside their religion or culture.

That being said, in the modern day many people are more inclined to think less negatively of inter-religious and inter-cultural marriage which in most cultures was (and in some parts of the world still is) significantly taboo.
 
If you have ready enough of my posts you would have noticed that this (being tactful) is an art I am in the process of acquiring. Not always successfully. 😧
 
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There’s no tactful way to answer your question, but the answer is pretty straightforward. Modern politically correct hypersensitivity prevents explanation, but therein lies the answer.
 
I don’t think it’s any secret that some people within a common culture may not match up well in a relationship with others of that same culture. In those cases those people may either look for other outliers within their culture, or look for companionship with people from other cultures. In the case of the OP’s friends they seem to have found connections with women who it seems come from a culture more traditional/conservative/etc. than the one they are from. There’s certainly people in the opposite direction who find themselves in a more traditional culture finding attractions with people from more non-traditional/liberal/etc. cultures.

There will always be percentages of people within a culture whose opinions vary greatly from the majority, and sometimes romantic relationship come easier with those outside their native culture. As long as all parties are happy, then good on them!
 
Tis_Bearself said:
I don’t think there is any pattern to these marriages, given that something like “Asian Buddhists” are not a monolith. There are Asian Buddhist ladies who want to be SAHMs and marry a good provider and have 6 kids, and Asian Buddhist ladies who are doctors, lawyers and professors and would like to keep that up after marriage. Same for Egyptian Muslim ladies and Filipina ladies and so on.
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Aboslutely right. One of the ladies is an academic, one a businesswoman, one is a SAHM, and I don’t know about the other two. Not trying to generalize at all here.
 
I could ask my dad why he married an African American woman, but I think the answer is obvious: he loved my mom. To the best of my knowledge, her being African American was not a factor. Likewise, I do not think my mom intentionally set out to marry a white man.

I am going to presume that you posted this with the best of intentions, but there is also an ugly side to men who deliberately marry Asian women. As you may know, there is a subset of MGTOW (Men Going Their Own Way) who do not have relationships with women but make an exception for Asian women because they are perceived to be more submissive/subservient.
 
@do_justly_love_mercy, I think you were the first person honest enough to say that.
 
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do_justly_love_mercy said:
I am going to presume that you posted this with the best of intentions, but there is also an ugly side to men who deliberately marry Asian women. As you may know, there is a subset of MGTOW (Men Going Their Own Way) who do not have relationships with women but make an exception for Asian women because they are perceived to be more submissive/subservient.
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Right again. And, two of the three ladies in quesion are not Asian, Of the three that I know fairly well, not one could be classified as “submissive”. 🤣
And I did hear about the MGTOW, but I thought that they just didn’t ger married at all?
 
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do_justly_love_mercy said:
I could ask my dad why he married an African American woman, but I think the answer is obvious: he loved my mom. To the best of my knowledge, her being African American was not a factor. Likewise, I do not think my mom intentionally set out to marry a white man.
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Am I correct in assuming that they shared a religion and culture?
 
ontheway1 said:
Right again. And, two of the three ladies in quesion are not Asian, Of the three that I know fairly well, not one could be classified as “submissive”. 🤣
And I did hear about the MGTOW, but I thought that they just didn’t ger married at all?
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That is good to hear. Of course, most people who marry people from different cultures or religions do so only for the best of reasons. But it’s also reasonable to stay alert for those who have ulterior motives.
ontheway1 said:
Am I correct in assuming that they shared a religion and culture?
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Religion, yes. Culture? Probably more complicated.
 
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