michelleponders

Something was brought to my attention recently and when I did some research, I was appalled. Actually, pissed off is more like it, but I digress. Child marriage is allowed in 33 states in the United States. Yep. You read that correctly. 33. And there are 3 States that actually do not have a minimum age limit. The more I researched the more I realized that we are hypocrites as a nation. So let us go down a general rabbit hole of child marriage and why we are a hypocritical nation.

Child marriage is a person under the age of 18 who enters into a legal binding covenant of marriage. There has been a child as young as 10 years of age married in the U.S. but for the most part it is teenagers who are 16/17 years of age. In most cases, these underaged girls who get married are disadvantaged girls who have crappy home lives, if they are even still at home, and are looking for a way out. These young girls are taken advantage of by older men who, on average are 4 to 6 years older, are undermining the statutory rape laws by marrying these girls. These girls are at an increased risk of domestic violence, poverty, and mental illness issues. Between the years of 2000-2021, over 300,000 underage girls were married in the United States. I was completely floored that child brides from other countries are allowed in and married in the U.S. Men in the U.S. will seek child brides from other countries where this is allowed and federal laws do not stop these girls from being sent to U.S. as long as the proper paperwork is filed. Family law is governed and determined on the state level so it is up to States to create laws against child marriage. Most of these men who pay for mail order brides from overseas usually live in one of these 33 states. There have been 17 states who have completely banned child marriage and that has happened in just the past couple of years.

So this is how child marriage laws breakdown by states. The 17 states who have banned child marriage are Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, Additionally, Washington, D.C., along with the territories of American Samoa and the U.S. Virgin Islands, also completely outlawed marriage for anyone under 18. In Hawaii and Kansas the minimum age limit is 15 years of age. States with a minimum age of 16 are Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming. States with a minimum age of 17 are Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Ohio. There are states that do not have a minimum age but do mandate requirements such as parental consent or court intervention which are California, Mississippi, and New Mexico. I know there are states left out but I encourage you to check on your own state and go down that rabbit hole. There is a great website to begin this research, http://www.unchainedatlast.org . I highly recommend it.

Now why are we, as a country, hypocrites. We allow child marriage in this country. Why? We sit here and tell members of Islam that it is wrong for grown men to marry children. But, we are allowing grown men to marry children in the U.S. with the exception of a few states. Why? This must be ended. Laws need to be put in place at the state and federal levels to make child marriage a crime. Full stop. And do not tell me about the history of child marriage. That was a different time. People didn’t live as long. Child marriage was believed to keep a teenage girl’s honor in tact and so many other dumb reasons. Needless to say, we know that child marriage does not benefit teen girls. We are an enlightened people. And it must stop now. And if we want to make life more difficult for Islamists wanting to enforce Sharia, we must put laws in place to make child marriage illegal in the U.S. And yes, this must include child mail order brides, which is child trafficking.

It is time to protect our children. We can longer sit here and call out Islamists for their practice of child brides while the U.S. allows it. No more child marriage here at home or from abroad.