Forced marriages, divorce shaming aren't ways to honour 'tradition': Yasra Rizvi

Actor Yasra Rizvi, who’s often spoken up against the stigmas surrounding love marriages, has now shared disturbing images of herself with shackles around her neck and hands, to represent visually what forced marriages in the garb of arranged marriages look like.

Dressed up in a bridal wear with smothered makeup and ruined hair, the pictures see Yasra lying down in fear or crawling across the floor while being dragged by someone else. In the caption of one of these images she writes, “Getting married or not is a personal choice. Everyone has the right to decide who they want to marry, when and how.”

The Dunk actor adds, “And if a person makes the wrong decision, given the marriage becomes overbearing, then ending it is also one’s right. This is not a western agenda but a right given by law and all religions, based of course, on common sense. Since eventually, only the individuals involved in a marriage deal with its consequences.”

Rizvi goes onto ask how can a lifetime commitment like marriage – which decides what the remaining days and nights of two people would look and feel like – be the decision of anyone but those two people involved? “How is it possible that such a commitment does not require the consent of those two individuals? There is a huge difference between giving advice and enforcing your decisions onto someone else,” she asserts.

“Forced marriages and divorce shaming aren't ways to [honour] ‘tradition’. These are blatant attacks on basic human rights and sadly the most common and accepted ones around us. This needs to STOP! Figure out what you are going to do about it,” shared the actor.

In the caption of another image, Rizvi reinstates that marriage “is a social contract which gives both parties involved their due rights and responsibilities. And to carry out that commitment like a life or death sentence is unfair.”

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