AD ALTA
JOURNAL OF INTERDISCIPLINARY RESEARCH
identified as the most unacceptable (by 73% of the respondents).
From the point of view of citizenship, the respondents consider
the citizens from the Slovak and Czech Republic as most
acceptable. In their statements these two categories are
represented almost equally, among both men and women of all
ages and educational categories. The partners, whose origin was
in their answers collectively referred to as “European” or from
“nearby countries”, as well as citizens of particular countries,
notably Germany, Poland, England and Austria are considered
suitable. Their reasons are based mainly on their spatial and
cultural proximity:
“Because it's close enough to be in touch
with my family.”, “Mentality similar to ours.”, “Czechs,
because they are the closest to us from all the foreigners.”
Particularly the citizens of “Islamic and Arab states” are
considered unacceptable (by 43% of respondents). Mostly
women consider partners from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Tunisia, India
and Africa to be unacceptable. Men in this question mention
especially the female partners from Africa and Hungary. They
explain the rejection of these partners by cultural difference and
their inability to leave their own traditions and culture. Negative
connotations to Muslim or Arabic countries are mostly
connected with different religion, as well as bad relationship of
Islam to women.
4.3 Preferences of a partner according to ethnicity and
religiosity
Almost every third respondent, men and women equally, prefers
a partner of Slovak nationality. The second most acceptable
nationality are Czechs and partners who were labeled by
respondents as “Europeans”, “Europe”, “the EU” or “Slavs”.
In this context, respondents also mentioned the English,
Americans or Germans quite frequently. On the contrary, the
highest rate of social distance is recorded in contact with the
Roma ethnic group (more than 30% of the respondents of all
categories). Other most frequently rejected people are partners,
known as “Muslims”, “Arabs”, and “Africans”. Respondents
from all the groups expressed their negative opinion on these
categories, with secondary school students having the most
expressive opinions. The rejection of Roma partners is expressed
by the respondents in statements like these: “Everything except
for Roma.”, “a Roma man – sponging, maladjustment, nomadic
life.”, “Definitely not, I hate them.”, “A Roma woman -
physically they do not attract me because they are who they are:
a problematic social group, different thinking, unreliability,
lying.”
As far as the religious difference of the partner is concerned,
more than one third of the respondents would accept exclusively
a partner of Christian faith. Half of them referred to some or
more Christian denominations, especially to Catholics,
Evangelicals and Orthodox, or they used a general term a
Christian. 22% of the respondents of all age and educational
categories would be willing to accept exclusively members of
the Catholic church, the respondents from the mentioned group
claim to be Christians with the exception of 2 people. The
spouse of any religion would be accepted by 12 people. Nearly
60% of Christian faith respondents would prefer a partner of
“the same faith”. Majority of respondents (70%) without
religious confession would also prefer a Christian partner. The
relationship between higher age, the Christian religion of the
respondents and their preference for the Christian partner, which
we postulated, was not confirmed. Christian partner would be
preferred by approximately half of the respondents in all of the
three age groups, with a slightly higher proportion in a group of
secondary school students. A positive attitude toward a partner
of the same religion was expressed by the respondents as
follows: “I would marry a Christian, because I am a Christian”,
”I would prefer a Catholic”, “I think the religion should be the
same”, “Christian, because we would have the same values,
which is important for a functional marriage.”, ”I am a
Catholic, and I would not convert to another faith. ”About two
thirds of the respondents would not accept a partner from
another religious group, different from “ours”, “the same” or
“Christian”. Half of the respondents rejected namely Muslims.
4.4 Preferences of a partner by race
72% of the respondents have a clear preference for the
Caucasian race. A slightly higher percentage is recorded in the
group of respondents older than 50 years. We find relatively
more expressive responses to the question formulated in the
reverse order. 91% of the respondents were unwilling to accept a
partner of the Black and Asian race or at least one of these
groups. We noticed a more pronounced bias towards the
members of the Black race, which would not be accepted by
almost 40% of the respondents. This attitude was expressed
mainly by men in the age category up to 30 years. Tolerance and
impartiality to race in marital preferences were expressed by
respondents as follows: “Acceptance of a person does not
depend on colour.”, “It does not matter - he must be a
Christian.” The rejection of racially mixed marriage is
pronounced in statements like these: “Because the race is a very
visible sign, people look different.”, “Multiracial children are
not accepted by either side; The White race must be preserved so
that we do not die out.”, “It is not good to mix blood.”
4.5 Partner preference according to language difference
A relatively high degree of tolerance is expressed by respondents
to the language difference of their potential partner. The most
acceptable were partners speaking Czech (30%), German or
English (15%) and Russian (8%). A partner from any language
group would be accepted by 10% of the respondents. 16% of the
respondents would accept exclusively a Slovak-speaking partner.
This view can be observed especially among those with
elementary or secondary education, it was very rare among the
respondents with a university degree. They responded in a
negative way to a partner of the Arabic and Hungarian
languages. Arabic language would not be tolerated particularly
by an older generation with elementary or secondary education.
Other negative statements were directed to partners with the
Roma and Chinese languages, less often the Turkish language or
the languages of the “Islamic states”. It can be observed that the
respondents associate the issue of linguistic difference with the
ethnic or religious background of the partner. Approximately
10% of the respondents would reject all partners whose language
“they would not understand”, about 5% of the respondents
would be tolerant of all language groups.
The findings point to the fact that respondents under the age of
30 are more willing to accept a partner no matter what language
group they belong to, and they would also accept an English-
speaking partner. Respondents over 50 years of age are inclined
to choose Slovak or Czech partners. Respondents with university
education have not particular preference for Slovak and Czech
language and are open to the linguistic difference of the partner.
In general, respondents prefer a partner whose language they can
speak or which is similar to the Slovak language or a language
they would like to learn. Many respondents refer in this case to
the possibility of linguistic enrichment or improvement of their
language ability. “English and German - it is good for me, for
example, for children who can learn two languages “, “ Czech
language – it is similar to Slovak, I can speak the language and
there is minimal difference .”, “In any foreign language that you
do not speak perfectly, conflicts arise from different naming of
the problems, or inability to clearly express feelings and
opinions.”
4.6 Personal experience with a mixed partnership
We assumed that accepting or rejecting a mixed marriage is to a
certain extent dependent on one's own personal experience with
such a relationship. However, only 23 people, including 14
women and 9 men, confirmed their direct personal experience
with a partnership or marriage in a mixed relationship.
According to their testimonies, these were relations with partners
of different categories, some of them still existing, some of them
having ended. However, the answers of the respondents with
their personal experience with a mixed relationship do not differ
in any way from the respondents who did not report their
personal experience.
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