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Ending childhood early, and forced marriage in Pakistan: How are community leaders addressing the root causes of the issue?

One day, 13-year-old Zarmina came home from school and received surprising news: her wedding to a 28-year-old man was scheduled for the very next day. Once she was married, Zarmina was expected to do all the household chores. Her husband beat her violently, and the slightest mistake meant being starved for a week or more.

In the Fundamental Pakistan Episode, “Rights Not Roses,” we hear directly from Zarmina, her family, and a network of community activists fighting to end the scourge of early and forced marriage in Pakistan, where 21% of girls are married before the age of 18. These include Rukhshana Naz, a human rights attorney and long-time gender rights leader who is fighting in Pakistan’s courts to extricate girls like Zarmina from early and forced marriages, and whose passionate advocate for ending child marriage is formed by her family’s own experiences with the issue.

ABOUT SERIES:
Feminist movements have the power to disrupt the status quo and radically alter the course of history for women and girls—and ALL historically marginalized people and communities globally. But what does it really look like to be a feminist leader today?

At a time of unprecedented political uprisings around the globe, from Haiti to Chile to Hong Kong to Sudan to Lebanon and beyond, Fundamental invites global audiences to engage directly with grassroots movements and community leaders who are standing up for our fundamental human rights. The series profiles a distinct set of remarkable grassroots leaders working on issues from ending child marriage in Pakistan to pursuing LGBTQI liberation in Georgia. These incredible leaders are at the front lines of fighting for gender justice, and mobilizing to write new futures for themselves, their societies, and the world.

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Global Fund for Women envisions a world in which movements for gender justice have transformed power and privilege for a few into equity and equality for all. As a feminist fund, we offer flexible support to a diverse group of partners—more than 5,000 groups across 175 countries so far—to create meaningful change that will last beyond our lifetimes. To learn more about our work, visit www.globalfundforwomen.org or follow us on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.

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0:00 Intro
0:45 Human Rights In Pakistan
2:43 Girls School
5:22 Extremism
8:43 My Home
12:26 Domestic Violence
14:29 Looking Forward
Transcript
00:04People expect me to stay at home, to be nice, to give up my space. Freedom is a sense of
00:11autonomy, but I do come from a very patriarchal world. They see my differences first. It was
00:17difficult to not have to be seen as a man or a woman. I don't want to apologize for being
00:23angry
00:23anymore. Does that make sense? I'm not afraid to say that I do believe in something great.
00:30And I'm not going to give up. Fundamental. Again, they're justice. No exceptions.
00:54Thank you very much.
01:16And especially in Pakistan, if you look at traditional families, it's a very different outlook.
01:34Our mother, she had a whole day with her children.
01:39She looked at her in her life.
01:43We saw that it was a very powerful image of my father.
01:48And the role of my mother was a submissive.
01:54With that, there was a difference between age and age.
01:59And when we were growing, we realized that my mother was married.
02:06And when she was married, she was married in 13 years.
02:10And at that time, it was an acceptable norm.
02:13And today, there were many traditional families.
02:15And when she was married, she was married in 13 years, 14 years.
02:17.
10:45It was a very difficult time for me to be able to live with my husband.
10:53My husband and my husband were married in 18 years.
10:57He was the youngest.
10:58Without my mother, I didn't spend two minutes.
11:02I came from school, and it was the time of the evening.
11:08My family was a lot of people.
11:10I felt like I was happy to play with my sisters.
11:12I'll play with them, and I'll go with them to play with them.
11:15So I said,
11:17I won't go to school tomorrow, because tomorrow it's married.
11:20I'll get new clothes,
11:22I'll get this,
11:22I'll get a great room,
11:24I'll get everything you have.
11:34I'll get my kids and I'll get them all finished.
11:36And so,
11:37when I was at home,
11:40And then at that time,
11:41I had heard for the age,
11:43that I was happy,
11:45that I was just getting everything I could get in,
11:47so,
11:48I was getting married.
11:51I was my son.
11:51I don't have to worry about these people.
11:57I married my little age.
11:59I married my little sister.
12:01I married my little sister.
12:04In our society, marriage is so glamourized.
12:08And in the children, internally, fear they have.
12:13If it's not married, then what will happen?
12:17Then, the guilt of that child,
12:20It was that I have to kill the house, not to work.
12:27I never killed my life.
12:31I was lying on the back of my bed, on my feet.
12:37I didn't eat food, 7-7-8 days.
12:43.
13:10Why didn't you come in your heart?
13:13Why didn't you come in?
13:15I wasn't happy.
13:17I was living in my life.
13:21I didn't see his house too.
13:24It was far away.
13:26If you couldn't go alone, why would you send me to me?
13:35What's wrong with me?
13:41I had a lot of love for you.
13:47My heart blew out.
14:11I don't know.
14:20I just want to say that whatever things I have in my life
14:24was not good before, so it will be good.
14:30When dealing with all the issues,
14:35I have a lot of hope.
14:48There was a trend in the past few years
14:51that people are happy to say that my daughter has taken a number of exams
14:56or that my daughter has become something.
15:00As people have studied in studies, we see a change from that.
15:12As-salamu alaykum, children.
15:14Assalamu alaykum as-salam.
15:16What do you think when should a child be married?
15:21Three years.
15:23Three years? Why did you say that you said that?
15:26How long have you been doing?
15:29What do you mean?
15:31A job of teaching.
15:34They want to make something,
15:35their dreams, their dreams,
15:37they want to make them complete.
15:40They don't leave their dreams in their hearts.
15:43I want to become a scientist.
15:45I want to become a doctor.
15:47I want to go to the police.
15:49I want to become a singer.
15:53I don't think that I can do something else.
15:59I want to go to my associates,
16:01I want to become a doctor,
16:02other than that.
16:06I want to become a doctor.
16:26And when he does a female,
16:54Our motto is, our community is our campaign.
16:58So we are fighting every issue that's impacting our community.
17:02Why is it important that we fight for queer justice, gender justice, and against racism?
17:08Because you cannot fight for one without fighting for the other.
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