Latest news with #NidalAhmedMemon
Bloomberg
07-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Bloomberg
Those Memes of an American Woman in Pakistan? Not Funny
Every once in a while, a jaw-dropping story takes TikTok by storm and morphs into a meme. This week, it was the tale of 33-year-old New Yorker Onijah Andrew Robinson, who flew to Karachi, Pakistan to be with Nidal Ahmed Memon, a 19-year-old man she reportedly met online. It's become a viral sensation that offers an unfortunate and familiar lesson. When properly crafted, memes are one of the high forms of modern humor. When steeped in cruelty, they're a reminder that they also need guardrails. There's often a fine line between hopping on a harmless trend and exploitation. And in an era when images and soundbites can become untethered from whatever inspired them, creators and companies should prioritize meme literacy, and social media outlets should help provide more context.
Express Tribune
05-02-2025
- Express Tribune
A ‘viral' tragedy exposing society's failings in love, accountability, and gender
"You talk too much"—I've dreamt of saying this to so many men in my life, quite literally. But I, a brown girl in a repressed household, have no liberty to do so. How can I tell a man to shut up? How can I even dare to think that? But a woman with an American passport said it, and I won't lie—I enjoyed every second of it. After all, how often do we see a Pakistani man getting a shut-up call? Onijah Andrew Robinson, a 33-year-old woman, came to Pakistan to live with her partner, Nidal Ahmed Memon, an 18-year-old boy from Karachi. Reportedly, they were already married. Now, here's where everything goes wrong—not really a surprise, because when does a woman marry a Pakistani man and have everything go right for her? The guy's mother blatantly rejected her, apparently because she's not conventionally pretty—she's not fair, doesn't have blue eyes, and lacks everything a typical Pakistani mother of a son (who's just a mama's boy, probably spending all his time online playing games or chatting with foreign women in hopes of an easy ticket abroad) would approve of. So, this woman is left stranded. She's abandoned and camping in front of the man's house, and suddenly, everyone goes crazy—she's now a viral sensation. But becoming a viral sensation in Pakistan isn't that hard. All you have to do is be really rich, privileged, fair-skinned, or from a white country. So even though she's stranded, she still gets a lot of attention. Suddenly, a third-world country with every problem known to mankind forgets everything and fixates on how this woman will navigate her way forward. She becomes the subject of memes, and from her looks to her history, everything is public. She's the topic of every dinner table discussion—everyone is sharing their two cents about her while their own lives are in shambles. However, these discussions remain shallow, and no one addresses a deeply rooted cultural problem: men taking the easy way out by making a complete fool of a woman—and never being held accountable. In later news reports, it was revealed that Onijah has Bipolar Disorder, which can make people act impulsively. I mean, who in their right mind falls in love online, marries a man half their age, and then travels across continents—only to act obsessively in love and be treated like a spectacle? She's being reduced to a viral hot topic, a joke, a piece of meat for shallow conversations. And let's not forget Memon—the reason she's here and the reason she's become one massive joke—is nowhere to be seen. This guy has disappeared off the face of the earth, yet no one is asking the real question: What was an 18-year-old boy doing online, leading a woman on, making her believe in a future, and pushing her to the point where she felt confident enough to travel all this way—only for it to end in chaos? Secondly, the way her looks are being discussed publicly is yet another disgrace this society fails to recognise. It's 2025, and we're still making body-shaming and skin-shaming jokes. This only proves that no matter what a woman does, she will always be reduced to her appearance—because, after all, what is a girl if not pretty? This entire fiasco, which has been going on for a week now, leaves us with many questions. We need to take a step back and rethink the institution of marriage in this country. Last I checked, marriage was supposed to be about companionship—not just about looks or personal gain. We also need to question where our youth, especially young men, are headed. The South Asian familial system is heavily biased towards giving sons the best of both worlds while completely ignoring daughters. But despite this privilege, men aren't out there conquering the world—they're sitting behind screens, looking for an easy way out through women. So what's all the tough persona for? Just come clean. Last but not least, we as a nation need to learn that not everything is a joke. This is a matter of serious concern—how a mentally ill woman was led on by an 18-year-old boy, with no regard for her emotional state. Once she arrived here, the family felt it was okay to abandon her on the streets. A country that is already so unsafe for women—this isn't just me 'claiming' it; statistics have shown this year after year—continues to fail its women, and now we've made foreign women experience it too. So, ease up on the memes and focus on raising your sons better.
Express Tribune
30-01-2025
- Express Tribune
US woman refuses to return home after love turns sour
KARACHI: Police on Wednesday took US national Onija Andrew Robin in protective custody from outside an apartment block in Garden West where she had staged a sit-in. Onija insisted on meeting Nidal Ahmed Memon who lives there and had promised to marry her on the social media. Social media is addictive, but it makes us lonely as we prefer living in cyberspace and forsake real world relationships. This is the downside. On the upside, social media helps us stay connected with friends and family, make new friends continents apart - and even develop long distance romantic relationship. One such intercontinental love, which developed on social media, turned sour in Karachi recently. An American woman, who was enamored by a Karachi man, has been left stranded in the metropolis after her visa expired while waiting for her love. Onija Andrew Robin, a mother of two, divorced her husband, abandoned her family and landed in Karachi on Oct 11, 2024 after developing a whirlwind love affair with Nidal Ahmed Memon, a resident of Garden West, on social media. Memon, however, refused to marry her saying that his parents were against it. She spent three months in the city and her visa expired. On Wednesday morning, she was escorted to the Karachi airport by the Airport Security Force (ASF) for her scheduled departure for the US. Initially, she appeared cheerful, greeting the on-duty staff with "As-Salaam-Alaikum" and engaging in lighthearted conversation with ASF personnel and airline staff. However, her demeanor abruptly changed during immigration formalities. She refused to undergo the necessary procedures and later declined to board her flight in the international departure lounge. Robin insisted on meeting Memon and made several excuses to delay her departure. Due to security regulations, authorities could not forcibly place her on the flight. Her refusal to leave caused a 36-minute delay for Qatar Airways Flight QR 611, but eventually, the aircraft departed without her. Later, a two-member team from the US Consulate arrived at the airport to discuss the situation with local authorities. US consular officials said that Robin could not be forced onto a flight against her will, as this could lead to legal complications.
