Do you people realise that puberty is the point at which the human body begins to change into that of an adult and is not actually that of an adult. It is possible for an 11 year old girl to get pregnant - ask any doctor the damage pregnancy and giving birth will do to a child of that age.
Child marriage is not a joke. You need to be mature to get married. Maturity is not having a period or getting a voluntary erection. This includes the physical and mental capacity of an adult, awareness and acceptance of responsibilities and the knowledge of all matters related to marriage - including how to raise a child, not just how to breed one.
I propose a novel solution.
1. Raise the marriage age to 18.
2. Malaysia has a pre marriage course. We should also introduce one. Anyone under 21 who wants to get married should be obliged to attend one AND pass an exam.
3. Anyone over 21 who wants to get married should only have to attend the course (its 2 days in Malaysia).
This was the concerns around physical and mental maturity are addressed.
What you just wrote doesn't comply with nature.
A girl's hip bone isn't wide enough to give birth right after puberty and causes complications. But usually becomes so after few years, say aged 12-13. Sometimes even later or earlier.
Its different from person to person and there are no set ages for that to happen.
Thats the reason why Islam does not bar marriage before certain age and only standard is puberty.
The rest of the things you wrote are the responsibility f the parents. To observe and decide whether their daughter or son is need of a marriage or not?
Sometimes urges are too strong in the adolescent boy and girl or there ma be other reasons , and they have to be married just after puberty.
Otherwise we end up n the mess Europeans created.They banned marriage before a certain age but couldn't ban rampant sex their teens engage into.
Being a Pakistani-British, i regularly see teeny teens doing things they shouldn't be doing as "Legally a child". And 13-14 year old girls getting pregnant is not very uncommon here, and 16-17 year old is very common and we see moms with prams of that age. But they cannot marry at that age because they are legally barred. The down side of not having a legally,morally and culturally binding contract of marriage with the boy is that the young teen moms come under immense pressure and most of their kids are brought up by grand parents not own parents.
Thats why Islam has the logical thing. Allowed to marry at puberty, but not mandatory.
Puberty is the beginning of sexual capabilities.
The girl who has just attained puberty is not fit to bear a child- even if you're talking just about the physical aspects. Such young girls suffer from a very high incidence of maternal and infant mortality.
Muslims are called "Pedophiles" and what not for our religion allowing but not making it mandatory the marriage of anyone entering puberty, but also look at USA laws.
Most US states have no minimum age for marriage, they don't even have puberty as criteria. Read their marriage law. They only say that a child can marry with parental consent. In some states the minimum age is 12.
