MAIL ORDER BRIDES
ANOTHER FORM OF SLAVERY?
by Synthia Esther
Standing ankle deep in a lake gleaming an all American smile, she is wearing a skimpy leopard print bikini with a waist cinched matching chiffon scarf cover up. Long light brown hair frames her youthful heart shaped face as she is seen frolicking in the water. The video tape begins to role as she recites a practiced introduction in broken English, “Hi, My name is Petrina. I wait for man who's ready with love to make happy family.”
By the end of Petrina's taped introduction she has removed her chiffon cover up which is now held between her hands raised high and floating in the wind. She is dancing with slow hip gyrating movements to an exotic musical melody heard playing in the back ground. Petrina, who lives in Russia, is not using subliminal messaging to get her point across on the Internet mail order bride site she is listed on. Patrina wants a husband outside of her demographics and plays up sex appeal to make her point loud and clear. In former Soviet countries there are many more women than men, where alcoholism is rampid and HIV is a common problem.
“The American mail-order bride industry has become a multi-million dollar business, marketing women from developing countries as potential brides to men in western nations (Lena H. Sun, The Search For Miss Right Takes A Turn Toward Russia Mail Order Brides, Of The '90'S Are Met Via Internet And On Romance Tours, Washington Post, 8 March, 1998).” In the United States, mail order bride agencies have become common with international marketing via the Internet. Demographics are a key element in the paid for bride business phenomenon.
In January 6, 2006, President George W. Bush signed the “International Marriage Broker Regulation Act of 2005 (IMBRA), as part of the H.R. 3402: Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act of 2005. The law requires that before a foreign woman's address or other contact information may be sold to a U.S. Citizen or resident by an international marriage broker:
- A man must complete a questionnaire on his criminal and marital background.
- The seller must obtain the man's record from the national sex offenders public registry database.
- The questionnaire and record must be translated to the woman's native language and provided to her.
- The woman must certify for each specific individual, that she agrees to permit communication.
In enacting IMBRA, the Congress of the United States was responding to claims by the Tahirih Justice Center (TJC), a women's advocacy group, that mail order brides were vulnerable to domestic abuse because they are unfamiliar with the laws, language and customs of their new living situation and home. Congress passed legislation that requires mail order bride agencies to give information about marriage fraud, legal residency and domestic violence to women in their agencies or risk $20,000 fines.
Most mail order brides obtain conditional resident immigration status, which enables them to remain legally in the United States provided they stay wedded to their spouse. Soon after the wedding, some wives are brutalized physically or die at the hands of their controlling American husband. While researching the mail order bride subject I read the following ad: “ Married my China Bride in 7 days, $6000, no visa issues, I feel good.” I thought to myself ... what kind of man would desire to elicit a mail order bride and feel good about it? I can think of at least one desperate man I know personally who would entertain the subject, and even plan his vacation around a romantic liaison tour of young foreign “Mrs. America Any Man” hopefuls.
The Seattle Post – Intelligencer Reporters, “Mail Order Bride's Dream Of A Better Life Ends In Death”, February 2, 2001, by Lewis Kamb and Robert L. Jamieson Jr., tells the story of Anastasia Solovieva, a beloved daughter and gifted classical pianist who traveled from Russia to marry a man she met through letters, is dead at age 20. The middle aged man she married, Indle Gifford King Jr., was almost two decades her senior. King was convicted of first degree murder in the strangling of his wife, Anastasia, of two years.
This was not the first time King thought of murdering a wife. Refusing to ever marry an American women, he first married Yekaternia Kazakoya, who was a mail order bride. He beat Yekaterina's head against a wall and threatened to kill her. She was so scared of him she obtained a protective order before getting a divorce in 1997. Kazakoya was lucky as Anastasia King paid the price of her life for King's obsession and objectification of pretty young women.
Indle King was overweight and almost bald but like the classic tale of Beauty and the Beast, he sought to imprison and control his beauty! Anastasia's death paid the ultimate price demanded by the beast. Her death is not in vain, as she brought to light a very dark and sinister sexual slavery mentality of many men who seek to buy a mail order bride. Anastasia's light will continue to shine so that others may learn and heed such obvious crime against the souls of humanity.
In September 2003, 26 year old Ukrainian engineer and mail order bride Alla Barney bled to death on the floor of her car after her American husband Lester Barney, 58, slashed her throat in front of the couples 4 year old son, Daniel. Another case involves Susan Blackwell, who met her husband Timothy Blackwell through an international marriage broker called “Asian Encounters.” Susan was physically abused by Timothy and filed a police protection order against him. Soon after, while awaiting divorce and annulment proceedings in a Seattle court room Susan, who was now pregnant by another man, and two of her friends were shot dead by Blackwell.
As long as men want to exchange money for beauty, and beauties desire a green card and money instead of real love from a man, the mail order bride business exchange will continue to thrive. Buy a bride company ads claim their foreign, young, hopeful brides were raised to respect a man, preferring to stay at home and raise a family while taking care of their man.
Ads from most mail order bride companies tout their foreign young girls desiring to be “Mrs. America Any Man,” seek down to earth men who are “ready for love and want make happy family.” Let me interpret that for you Patrina while you continue to dance to your exotic musical melody. In psychotic all American male terms that translates to, “I wait for man who's ready for love, and want make happy sex.” Like many problems in life you attract what you seek.
True love is not self seeking (1st Corinthians 13). Happy families begin and end with happy people. The lonely, over weight, bald headed man who is twice the age of his new young bride is living a life of self delusion. Getting someone to marry you in 90 days in hopes of obtaining a green card is not love. Instead of looking for a mail order bride who is young enough to be your daughter, do yourself a favor and get a good therapist. Your going to need it when she leaves you for the young pizza or Chinese food delivery guy.