Asians Gays Marriages Of Convenience

[boxtops]

Has anyone commented on this? It was in several papers yesterday. It seems sad to me that people have to resort to this to get their parents off their backs, because of cultural expectations. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/the-sham-marriages-of-convenience-protecting-gay-asians-9749338.html

[VHG]

I am sure this goes on in every country in the world amongst all different races and religions.

It certainly used to happen years ago in the UK, and I bet there are quite a few gay men in the UK today who wont admit they are gay and have a marriage of convenience (though maybe their wives don't know it is).

[jno]

like Rock Hudson, then?

[sp1814]

Women in these relationships were known as 'beards'.

It's an intensely sad situation (for the people in the story posted), because they are signing up for a lifetime of deceit. You would be constantly be living in fear of being found out.

[Kromovaracun]

I really can't blame them. My partner is Chinese, and dependent on his family. Even when he came to the UK to study, on the other side of the world from his family, he cannot bring himself to tell any of his Chinese friends here about himself because he is so used to living how other people expect him to. A "sham" marriage might be sad, but for some people it's a very real way of coping.

[naomi24]

It’s not only Asians – I know two Englishmen who have been in this situation. Both married, but their wives hadn’t a clue that their husbands were gay. Eventually, one man after 20 years of marriage, told his wife when he left home to be with another man; the second was ‘discovered’ by his wife who looked at the browsing history on his computer and was left in no doubt. The second wife is Asian. She has never told him that she’s aware of his hidden sexuality, and she has never told her parents or his. She told him that she was unhappy living with him as ‘brother and sister’, which they had been doing for five years, and he readily agreed to a divorce. It is very sad.