FREEFORUM

The legislature passed the Abduction for Marriage Act yesterday: 5 to 10 years in prison, up to 12 if she is under 18, and registry offices may not register a marriage that began with an abduction. The Ak Jooluk women watched the vote from the gallery.

My family is from Kara-Buura, where the case that started all this happened. I would like to hear from people in the villages and the valleys, not only from us in Toronto and Talas. What actually changes? Please keep it respectful.

An important thread. Note in advance: no names of anyone involved in any case, including the famous one. Speak about your villages, not your neighbours. Read the rules.

I have volunteered with Ak Jooluk since the Kyzyl-Adyr verdict. A fine. For taking a girl. A fine. That is what we were fighting.

The lawyer said it yesterday: a law is a beginning. A law is not a prosecutor. Now we watch the prosecutors.

For those who say this is "tradition": the Synod's 2014 pastoral letter On the Free Consent of Spouses calls bride kidnapping "a sin against the sacrament and against the dignity of women". Consent is what makes the marriage. Without it the crowning is a costume. A few village priests crowned such couples anyway, to keep the peace. That has to end too.

I am new and I post from the pasture, so slowly.

The act does not apply on our side of the line. The clan councils differ on whether a woman who was taken and stays is married. In my uruk the elders say a girl who says no goes home and kun is paid to her family. Some old men say ala kachuu was mostly staged elopement anyway. For some couples that is true. But I have sisters, and I know that "mostly" is a word men use.

Talas made a law and wants applause. Up here, what changes is when the grandmothers stop saying "she will get used to it". That is changing. Slowly. Not because of Talas.

A horse caught by force throws its rider for years. People are not less than horses.

Five years on. The TSU / St. Luka survey report is out: in the surveyed Talas Alatau and Karatau areas, 13% of married women under 50 began their marriage by abduction, about half of them unwillingly. Under 2% in the cities. Small sample, refused access, under-reporting, they say so themselves.
Prosecutions under the act: rare. We keep watching.

The Act is a great achievement of the DPI legislature. Have a nice day.

It is an achievement of the women who sat in the gallery. Have a nice day.

The IAC called the survey biased. Maybe it is. This spring a girl in our valley refused, and the elders sent her home with the kun paid. Five years ago that would have been a scandal. This year it was a conversation. I do not need a survey to see that.

half my dorm is from karatau. we talk about this at night sometimes. nobody i know would "get used to it". that's what changed