Mail Order Bride Syndrome

[Handycam72]

Please tell me that mailorderhusband site is set up as some kind of joke. Looking at those things (men) on the list, it looks like a collection they got from some high security prison.
 

[Mike78]

Please tell me that mailorderhusband site is set up as some kind of joke. Looking at those things (men) on the list, it looks like a collection they got from some high security prison.
 

no, it's dead serious of course 

[Aloe]

http://www.mailorderhusbands.net/  

I've seen some unrealistic commercials but the banner from this website takes the cake!!!!! "Lose 20 pounds in 6 hours" jeepers

[Markus]

Ravens,

You seem to be a little "thin-skinned" and may need to practice ignoring the MOB terminology. If you can't ignore the term, then have some fun with it.
One of my responses has been, "I wish it would have been as easy as you make it sound." Usually that's the end of the subject. If you get somebody that
presses you even more on the subject, ask them what the MOB is. Have them tell you and then you will find out how ridiculous their definition is. Ask them
what the word "mail" has to do with the MOB process. You can really drag it out. Quiz the person and they will become uncomfortable describing something
they know very little about.

Work on your response.

The longer you're married, the less important the MOB term becomes to you.

[Jumper]

My husband read a study in the Russian press about six months ago that said 96% of such marriages end in divorce.  The Russian government does keep statistics, and has since the 1990's for nationals abroad, but only if they retain Russian citizenship.

Boethius-

Since i'm divorced from a RW..,i dont doubt the divorce rates are high !

that said ..
 
I believe less than half what i read in the US press ,
and probably less than that in the Russian press,
particularly on that subject , The FSU being some of the only industrialized nations with a dwindling populations, have very little reasons to shed marriage abroad in a favorable light.


96% over what lenght of time?
Domestic marriages taken out long enough probably get quite near that..?

And I cant imagine their data would be very accurate?
It seems the parameters would naturally be  vague ?
It applies only to those retaining russian citizenship..  but ones that specifically moved abroud to marry? , or also inclusive of married russian couples that moved "out of the country"?
Those who reported their divorce ,or those who stayed "out of country"  and simply remarried or remain married..

under the all  the given scenerios ,
 it would seem the stats should actually naturally be erroneously skewed to a greater "staying " married.(as many would simply become citizens of the other country naturally over longer marriage lenghts?and not report one way or the other.. )
 
Making a 96% rate, even more unbelievable.


So , out of a hundred  marriages to non-Russian citizens ..
4 remain  together? umm sorry i just dont buy that one. 
sounds like something on Pravda~!!

 

[BillyB]

My husband read a study in the Russian press about six months ago that said 96% of such marriages end in divorce.  The Russian government does keep statistics, and has since the 1990's for nationals abroad, but only if they retain Russian citizenship.

In a country where journalists get killed for saying the wrong thing, you're going to believe that? I've been following divorce statistics since reading this forum. Years ago Russia reported it's citizens were having a 65% divorce rate. In one year it dropped down to 40 something % divorce rate. 20% drop in one year is unrealistic. I believe you that they do keep statistics but they report what they want to report. Sounds to me Russia from that article wanted to scare their women from marrying a foreigner and keep them home since the population is dwindling.

Most happily married men and married FSU women do not participate at forums like this. They are busy living their lives. We can't judge what we see here but out of 100% of married men that post here, I think 96% will get a divorce is far from realistic at this forum.

[Boethius]

In a country where journalists get killed for saying the wrong thing, you're going to believe that? I've been following divorce statistics since reading this forum. Years ago Russia reported it's citizens were having a 65% divorce rate. In one year it dropped down to 40 something % divorce rate. 20% drop in one year is unrealistic. I believe you that they do keep statistics but they report what they want to report. Sounds to me Russia from that article wanted to scare their women from marrying a foreigner and keep them home since the population is dwindling.

Most happily married men and married FSU women do not participate at forums like this. They are busy living their lives. We can't judge what we see here but out of 100% of married men that post here, I think 96% will get a divorce is far from realistic at this forum.

I don't think that forum stats are accurate, as they are too small a sample.

There is no proof journalists have been killed by the state in Russia.  I have generally not found the European press, including the Russian press, to be inaccurate.

[BillyB]

There is no proof journalists have been killed by the state in Russia. 

Tell that to the left over journalists. Many of the journalists who were killed just happen to write an unpleasant article against a high powered figure usually who's working in government. It doesn't take a journalist to be a rocket scientist to understand that they need to watch what they say against government officials.

I have generally not found the Russian press, to be inaccurate

 State controlled media not inaccurate? How do you verify what you read? While you are sucking up what you read as truth, many Russians read with skepticism and read articles as lies. Most Russian citizens understand what State controlled media means and to take what they read and hear with a grain of salt. If Bush or Obama controlled the media, we'd be in an uproar of course depending on if we don't like one or both of them. Those who like Putin and company currently have nothing against State controlled media.

[Boethius]

And many of the journalists killed were not writing about high powered government officials.  It is simplest to assume the state was involved.

Not all media in Russia is state controlled.  Print media, in particular, is not.  One of the largest newspapers in Russia is US owned.  Television is primarily state owned in Russia.

[Chicagoguy]

There sure haven't been many arrests or convictions of the people who kill journalists. For those that go to London and kill those they don't like they get to serve in the Duma.

[kievstar]

Media is very inaccurate including stats they publish.  

Divorce rates fluctuate a lot as many times they base it only on what happens in that year.  Also, many marriages are never registered in Ukraine so they never count as marriages or divorces.  Registration has increased recently but you would be surprised how many never were properly done.  

BillyB, Boethius is a lawyer and tends to believe what is published and has her own ideas.  Best to take what she says as a grain of salt as her impressions of Ukraine in the 1970's through 1990's is very different than people who actually lived in Ukraine.  Is she wrong - no.  She is just speaking what she believes is true and based on her experiences.  Just like I know many people in USA who lied about being Jewish to get into the USA - Boethius says this is not true and impossible.  I physically know people who did this. You will find with Boethius she is set on what she thinks.  

Russia does control the radio and what is published whether they own it or not.  Nothing wrong with killing liberal journalists who do not follow the rules.  At least that is what happens in Russia.

[Boethius]

There sure haven't been many arrests or convictions of the people who kill journalists. For those that go to London and kill those they don't like they get to serve in the Duma.

There is no credible evidence linking Litvinenko's death to the Russian state.  

BillyB, Boethius is a lawyer and tends to believe what is published and has her own ideas.  Best to take what she says as a grain of salt as her impressions of Ukraine in the 1970's through 1990's is very different than people who actually lived in Ukraine.  Is she wrong - no.  She is just speaking what she believes is true and based on her experiences.  Just like I know many people in USA who lied about being Jewish to get into the USA - Boethius says this is not true and impossible.  I physically know people who did this. You will find with Boethius she is set on what she thinks.  

Russia does control the radio and what is published whether they own it or not.  Nothing wrong with killing liberal journalists who do not follow the rules.  At least that is what happens in Russia.

First, don't make assumptions about me, kiev because you don't know what I believe and what I don't.  I never stated I "believed" the statistics.  I put the fact out there.  

I never believed a word about WMD, which was the mantra in all the US press.

Second, Russia is not Ukraine, and Russia does not keep statistics on Ukrainian nationals.

Third, I did not live in Ukraine in the 1970's.  I was in elementary/jr high school in the 1970's.  I did live there in the 1980's, for a much longer period than you did, and in 1990, and I do go back, though only on business now, and only for short periods.  I also have relatives living throughout Ukraine, from the far West to Donbas, and speak to them frequently (a half hour call costs $3.00).  My Grandmother had always sent a lot of aid to her relatives, so when I went to study, I had a lot of family to rely on.  My husband, who never had any desire to return, went back to Kyiv last summer (2009).  His conclusion was nothing had changed, except now the former commies, all third rate minds, were calling themselves "businessmen".  At least in Soviet times, he said, they were restrained in their avarice because of blocks put on them by the party.  Now, they have no such shackles.  He knows many of those so called "elites" personally.  So, it's the same old/same old, even if you wish to believe otherwise. 

Anyone who tells you they got out of the USSR as a Jew and was not Jewish, or connected to someone Jewish, is lying.  Anyone who tells you they came out on false papers is lying and playing you for a fool, as this was impossible.  Anyone who emigrated as a Jew had some connection to someone Jewish, such as being being married to a Jew, or having a Jewish parent/grandparent.  Those controls were very strong, and they were not controlled at a republic level.  What those people will not tell you is that being Jewish was not exactly something one bragged about in the USSR.  A lot of people hid it.  You are likely meeting economic refugees, not people for whom having any Jewish heritage meant something.  A lot of Soviet Jews who settled in my city, for example, were rejected by the Jewish community because they knew nothing of Jewish religion or culture.  If you choose to believe them, so be it.  But it is not accurate.

Lawyers are not exactly known for believing everything they read.  I can, and usually do, see two sides of things, but if someone wishes to "convince" me of something, I need to see demonstrable evidence or rational debate.  

There are newspapers in Russia that advocate a return to communism, a return to monarchism, that criticize the government.  If all media were controlled by the state, these papers would not exist.

[BillyB]

Anyone who tells you they got out of the USSR as a Jew and was not Jewish is lying.  

How can you speak for everyone?

Reagan made a deal with Gorbachev to take the USSR's religious persecuted. I can't speak for Jews, but I speak to a lot of Ukrainian Baptists that live in my area and they tell me a lot of Athiests all of a sudden found God at that time. That meant the real Ukrainian Baptists knew a lot of people lied to get here. There was a limit on how much we could take and many who did have a right to come to America did not because someone took their spot by lying.

[BillyB]

There sure haven't been many arrests or convictions of the people who kill journalists.

Hmmmm... Is it that Russia's police force and intelligence agency is incompetent, not motivated, or were not directed to solve the murders by the government? I think they got very smart people working in law enforcement and can catch most criminals if they want. I guess murders of journalists are the hardest cases to solve?  

[apple47]

 

           Your first problem was giving out more information than was needed for the situation.    This guy didn't need to know where your wife had gone.  It's none of his business. Why did you feel the need to give him this information?     All that needed to be said was that she was unavailable til "whenever".

             I can only guess (as I don't know you)that my wife at 49 yo is a bit older than your wife and has a bit more of a Soviet attitude about some things.    One of her attitudes is that you don't tell anyone any more than they have a right to know at a particular time.   One of the hardest things for her to get used to was the ability of Americans to talk to most anyone about most any part of their life.     Loose lips sink ships.    One of the hardest things for me was to not be so open to those outside my immediate family,but,I'm getting better.        How lose are your lips?     Has your wife ever warned you about things not to talk about with others?       I'm not looking for  answers to these questions, just offering you something to consider.

               One of my wife's other attitudes is optimism and perpetual cheerfulness. She considers the MOB reference as funny and even calls herself a MOB (always with a chuckle).  Does the MOB reference bother your wife or just you?   I'll agree with the others that said the implied insult was directed to you and not your wife.

                Life is affected by the choices we make.   What we are pizzed off about is a choice.  We decide that something pizzes us off.  Doesn't matter that it has absolutely nothing to do with our quality of life,we will be pizzed about any particular thing because we want to be pizzed off about it.
                Granted, the guy was a jerk,you gave him the information he needed to prove it.  You got macho about it over the phone (big deal), and you got pizzed enough about the encounter to report it to a public forum.
                 What was the result?    After hanging up the phone,he got a laugh at the idiot that had to go to Ukraine to marry his lame ass.  And the macho attitude was just more confirmation of his opinion that he was dealing with a lame ass,macho chithead ,idiot that couldn't handle an American woman. He,later, probably thought of other things he should have said and give you a real piece of his mind.    But,you ( nonetheless) provided him, his chuckle for the day.        You on the other hand gave out information you didn't need to and you are pizzed.  You are pizzed because you chose to be pizzed.  Being pizzed causes stress.   You chose to be pizzed ,you ,therefore chose to be stressed.     Why would you CHOOSE to be stressed?
               Because a thought enters your brain doesn't mean it needs to come out your mouth.   More thought on your part before you open your mouth will result in NOT giving out information to those that don't have a right to know and will reduce your stress by not giving ammunition to those that may say things that you might chose to be pizzed about.   No offense meant, just a thought ,take it as you like.


                                                                   ...Larry
                                                             

         

[Boethius]

How can you speak for everyone?

Because I know how the passport system worked.  I also know how the exit visa system worked and how OVIR worked, having dealt with them for 7 years.  The OVIR officer who was a private the first time I walked into the office was a colonel the last time I was in the OVIR office in late 1990.  kiev claimed citizens paid bribes to get false passports.  Internal passports were issued at the local level.  But archives were kept, centuries back, in Moscow.  International passports were issued locally, but only after approval from Moscow.  

My husband knew many Jews who claimed they were "Russian", but were Jewish.  To change your surname was easy, took a month, and cost 3 rubles.  My husband knew dozens of Jewish families who changed their surnames then, when they decided to emigrate, changed their names back.  There was even a joke about having a surname that was "too Russian to be Russian" (examples such as Ivanov, Dykhovny, Tumanov, Ryaznov, Sakharov, Serebnikov, or, the most famous name changer, Primakov).  A lot of Ukrainians, particularly after WWII, were forced to Russify their names.  He also knew a guy who went to military school, came from a family of Soviet officers, and right before graduation, he was told he would not be given a position because he was Jewish (this was in the mid 1980's, when a lot of "official" jobs/university positions, etc. were closed to Jews because of emigration concerns).  The guy was stunned.  He didn' know he was Jewish, but his parents confirmed it.

Bottom line, one had to prove a Jewish lineage to emigrate as a Jew.  

Reagan made a deal with Gorbachev to take the USSR's religious persecuted. I can't speak for Jews, but I speak to a lot of Ukrainian Baptists that live in my area and they tell me a lot of Athiests all of a sudden found God at that time. That meant the real Ukrainian Baptists knew a lot of people lied to get here. There was a limit on how much we could take and many who did have a right to come to America did not because someone took their spot by lying.

There were thousands of underground Baptists.  They had always faced persecution, even in Tsarist times.  Part of my husband's family were Baptists, so he knows a lot of the persecution of Baptists.  There were whole villages in Ukraine, even in Soviet times, that were Baptist, though it was largely underground until the mid 1980's.  But, they didn't emigrate en masse until after the collapse.   Same with Soviet Mennonites.

ETA - Larry, it was fortuitous for Ravens to know this before he wasted time looking at the apartment.  Who wants to rent an apartment from such a jerk?

[BillyB]

 citizens paid bribes to get false passports.  

 To change your surname was easy, took a month, and cost 3 rubles.  

Bottom line, one had to prove a Jewish lineage to emigrate as a Jew.  

If people one can pay bribes for fake passports and changing surnames, one can pay bribes to prove Jewish lineage. With enough money some Jewish family or government official will vouch for a person and create the necessary documents. Who knows, maybe USSR created new identities for their spies and sent them over here this way.

[Boethius]

They weren't paying bribes for fake passports.  They weren't paying bribes to change their names.  It was perfectly legal, and cheap, for anyone to change his/her name.  A passport was issued in the new, legal name.  

All records of the ethnic origin of citizens were held solely in Moscow, so they couldn't be changed.  This information was often used as a sword against citizens.  My husband, for example, did not know that much of his family were Baltic Germans, or that he was a direct descendant of a very famous Cossack, whose surname he bears.  And no, it is not Mazepa.  Every commie hack from Yushchenko to Anna Politkovskaya claims/claimed to be a descendant of Mazepa, but Mazepa has no direct descendants.  When my husband learned of his ancestry (searching online genealogy sources about his family), he thought back to all the comments informants made to him over the years, and some things began to make sense.

There was no one single person who could issue a passport or an exit visa.  OVIR was part of the KGB.  Internal passports were issued locally, but went through several levels of bureaucracy.  International passports and exit visas needed approval from Moscow, which an individual, particularly locally, couldn't control, and all were handled by OVIR locally.

In the 1980's, in particular, Gorbachev had started a campaign against corruption.  Party members were afraid of losing their positions for bribery at that time.  If a word of corruption was known in Moscow, the apparatchik was gone.  Losing a party position was huge there - you potentially lost your good apartment, access to special stores, to better education for your children, foreign travel, etc.

[Vaughn]

Your first problem was giving out more information than was needed for the situation....       More thought on your part before you open your mouth will result in NOT giving out information to those that don't have a right to know and will reduce your stress by not giving ammunition to those that may say things that you might chose to be pizzed about.   No offense meant, just a thought ,take it as you like.                                               
     

Larry, thank you, really ~ for authoring a post that speaks the brutal truth.....  when it comes to volunteering personal
information to virtual strangers, the "need to know" litmus test is held dear in our marriage. Whatever Raven's motive was
in announcing his beloved's whereabouts is truly beside the point, yet the revelation invites the predictable negative
comments. And as you know, given time - many couples will grow insensitive to such thoughtless discourse.

It's really a worthy point for a man to consider should he be caught up in the "novelty" of having a FSU fiancee or bride.

[Misha]

the revelation invites the predictable negative comments. And as you know, given time - many couples will grow insensitive to such thoughtless discourse.

It is not worth it getting worked up over it. As the saying goes, if you can't stand the heat, don't go into the kitchen. If you are going to marry a woman form the FSU, you must be willing to put up with the occasional MOB snide comment.

[kievstar]

Boethius, why would people in the USA lie about not being Jewish?  Being a lawyer you are clueless on how things get done.  You need to put the book down and start thinking like someone who will bend the rules or take bribes.  Corruption generally takes more than 3 people. 

[Boethius]

It is you who is clueless in this instance.  Unlike you, I saw how the bribery system in the USSR actually worked.  Most people knew how "far" they could go before they'd get in trouble, whether on the giving or the receiving end.   Those that didn't ended up in jail.

With a very few exceptions, only those of Jewish ancestry were permitted to leave the USSR.  So, assume one person has one Russian parent and one Jewish parent, is married to a Russian, and their children's passports state they are Russian.  All could emigrate on the basis of that one tenuous tie to a Jewish grandparent.  They may not have ever viewed themselves as in "any way" Jewish.  But, someone, somewhere, in the family, was Jewish.  When they emigrate, they tell others they are Russian.  That is how they self identify.  Same with all the Jewish people my husband knew who changed their names to very Russian surnames, some of them, 100% Jewish.  They viewed themselves as Russians.  Even today, one of the most ardent Ukrainian nationalists is Jewish.

Now, if people were "bribing", officials to "become" Jewish, they would have needed to bribe the individuals at the local passport office.  They would further have needed to bribe officials at the MVD (Министрство внутренних дел), which is at the republic level.  Then, they would have had to have bribed the OVIR officer who was going to process the exit visa, plus the staff at the OVIR office, and the OVIR officer who would sign off on the application.   They would have had to have bribed officials in Moscow who reviewed the internal passport and authorized the issuance of an international passport and the exit visa.  And all of this would have happened in a country were about half the population was informing on the other half, and where all those bureaucrats, in particular, held their lofty positions because they were among the very first to squeal on classmates and colleagues to prove fealty to the system.  The number of people who would have had to have been bribed, at a very conservative estimate, would have been no less than 20.  And all of those people would have had to have kept their mouths shut.  Each and every person receiving a cut of the pie would have had to have trusted every other person in the chain, believing none of those people would inform authorities of the bribe.  The consequences of being on the wrong end of the informant were far more serious than anything in the West, and it affected not only that individual, but his/her family.  Plus, the person paying the bribe was subject to a criminal code offence (violation of the passport regime).

If you knew anything about how the USSR worked, you'd know this scenario was absolutely impossible.  My husband, who at 15, was taken on a cross country tour of the USSR by his father, and had to negotiate all the bribes along the way (a lesson to learn how to survive to manhood in the country he lived in) actually laughed out loud at your scenario.  I can assure you, the individuals who told you this fairy tale believe you are a Western sucker.  

People who grew up there generally won't talk about these things in detail, or who they (or their families) "were" then, because they were all part of the "system".  

[CanadaMan]

I've seen some unrealistic commercials but the banner from this website takes the cake!!!!! "Lose 20 pounds in 6 hours" jeepers

 That's nothing. I've lost 3500 lbs in just ten minutes!
I couldn't remember where I parked my car.

[tfcrew]

I thought MOB definition was that you order a woman out of catalogue and they deliver it to your door. Not that you actually go overseas and etc

They did have that.
Guys from the hills up in the northwest..prospectors for gold..blacksmiths..saloon keepers..entrepreneurs from every craft wrote to women telling them to come out west if they wanted a 'real man'.
There's ads today..."Wanted, a women who can sew, cook, clean house and also clean fish.. and it would be a big + if they had a boat. Write back and send picture of boat."

[Mir]

Looks like those experts who never lived in the USSR need to put the book down and listen to someone who has.