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The Private Lives of British Pakistanis

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04/07/2011

BBC Radio 4 - The Private Lives of British Pakistanis

Adil Ray explores the sometimes complicated sex lives of fellow British Pakistani Muslims.

Adil Ray explores attitudes towards relationships and sex in the British Pakistani community. He talks to ordinary Pakistanis about their sometimes secret and complicated lives.

When former Home Secretary Jack Straw suggested some men of Pakistani origin tend to see white girls as "easy meat", he was accused of stereotyping. He spoke out after two Asian men who abused white girls in Derby were given long jail sentences and said there is a specific problem which involves Pakistani men who target white girls because Pakistani girls are off limits.

Presenter Adil Ray, himself a British-born Pakistani, was also shocked by the comments at first but felt that there was a bigger problem at the heart of the debate which had yet to be aired or addressed. Many of his peers, who were born and raised here in the liberal, permissive sexual culture of the west, had little choice but to create a web of secrets and lies to live the way they wanted to live whilst also appeasing their parents - who lived by a very different sexual and moral code based their strict Islamic upbringing in Pakistan.

Adil talks to ordinary young Pakistanis who are caught up in this web about how they navigate the system and asks why that system has managed to last so long.

Producer: Mohini Patel.

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