]“Get married” Is all that my family and friends seem to be telling me to do these days. And then do what? Foot the bills and run the household? Today married, tomorrow divorced isn’t that the theme of the century? I mean given the rate at which marriages seem to dissolve nowadays who in their right mind would actually want to do that? Its hard to find a decent being who is willing to talk the talk and actually walk it, so how is a girl supposed to get hitched? My wife has section 8 and my kids are on welfare hence I don’t need to be working is now almost a norm among our community. Has finding a job, paying the bills and being a man become so hard for our so called ‘men” OR did the women snatch the wheel and drive off?
Almost everywhere we go, schools, clinics, malls, restaurants and even the barber shops, all we see are the mothers. Hence it is inevitable to wonder, what has happened to the fathers? The surfacing of a new disease, Autism, has made matters even worst. Inability of the parents to handle the uncontrollable fluctuation in the behaviors of the Autistic child, has made many fathers abandon their kids, laying the blame on their wife and how her tempers have changed. This poor mother has no education, most importantly she does not understand fully what autism is, how to deal with and the resources that are at her disposal. With no community support system in place and no family that lends a helping hand, she is left to suffer on her own. Thus it is perfectly normal to throw tantrums and loose patience with the husband that acts as though he is unaffected by his child’s short comings.
On the other hand, we, the women are also to blame. We have gained so much independence and liberation in the West that we seem to have forgotten the values of life and the different roles we were assigned.
Stripping a man of his role as the head of the household has disrupted our society so much so that the divorce is becoming rampant, crime rate among our youngsters is getting out of control and the number of high school dropouts is alarmingly high.
The sacredness of marriage has been ripped off its value and ridiculed to the bone. The husbands have become the new wives and the wives the new husbands. Yet they have the audacity to ask us to hop on the wagon and be “married”. Being married used to be a completion to one‘s life cycle, its now a nightmare most of us dread. Many married couples are married for the sake of marriage. Some say they were delusional when they said yes and now they are in “it” for the kids, others feel trapped for they are dependent on their spouses. And those that have liberated themselves of their spouses learnt how to manipulate the welfare system and live in section 8s.
So my friends I ask you, if you were in my shoes, coming from a community that seems to have adapted welfare and single-mother-ism as a mode of life, would you want to get married and continue the saga? Or would dwelling the world being happy and lonely do the trick?
Hibo Ibraahim
foccocia@gmail.com 
