Absent Fathers, Weaponising Kids and Unstable Families - Na'ima B Robert - MH PODCAST (p1) (2021-09-23) #

0:00:02 welcome to another episode of the mh
0:00:04 podcast one of the most irregular
0:00:06 podcasts in history
0:00:08 we're joined with a very special guest
0:00:10 she's the author of 25
0:00:12 books
0:00:13 she specializes in many issues to do
0:00:15 with uh
0:00:17 could we say
0:00:18 pastoral issues relating to women she's
0:00:20 actually even started a magazine one of
0:00:23 the first to actually have a woman's
0:00:26 voice in the muslim community called the
0:00:27 sister magazine is that correct
0:00:31 yeah we run it for 10 years mashallah so
0:00:33 we're not imprint anymore but yeah yeah
0:00:35 we've
0:00:36 done it for 10 years and now she
0:00:37 continues to to train and mentor people
0:00:40 and on how to to write and she has all
0:00:42 courses running which i'm sure you'll be
0:00:45 able to see on her socials so let's
0:00:46 start off sister naima
0:00:49 what kind of issues
0:00:51 have you been kind of trying to help
0:00:53 sisters with
0:00:55 in the muslim community what have you
0:00:56 found to be the salient issues
0:00:58 problematic issues for women in the in
0:01:00 the muslim community such that
0:01:02 especially male members need to pay
0:01:04 attention to
0:01:07 oh okay i think i had an answer for the
0:01:09 first part of the question and the
0:01:10 second part made me think and made me
0:01:12 pause
0:01:13 i think what we see within our space
0:01:17 in terms of what sisters struggle with
0:01:19 is a lot of mental barriers
0:01:23 i would say that many many sisters
0:01:26 suffer from
0:01:28 a sort of victim hood
0:01:30 or some kind of
0:01:32 imprisonment of the mind more than a lot
0:01:34 of other things why i say that is
0:01:36 because lots of us don't realize really
0:01:39 how powerful our own mindset is in
0:01:43 determining how we feel about our lives
0:01:45 how we feel about our marriages about
0:01:47 our children about our prospects a lot
0:01:50 of that is actually what's happening in
0:01:52 your mind right not necessarily what's
0:01:53 happening on the ground so the work that
0:01:55 i do is geared towards helping sisters
0:01:59 and general in people in general
0:02:01 understand the power of their own
0:02:02 mindset and taking back control of that
0:02:06 which they can control
0:02:08 uh and you know we call it women's
0:02:10 empowerment and we've had this
0:02:12 conversation before where you know
0:02:13 people are wondering well what kind of
0:02:15 empowerment are you actually talking
0:02:17 about
0:02:18 for me the most potent form of power is
0:02:21 self-control
0:02:22 is self-awareness is you know being able
0:02:25 to navigate your own mind and be able to
0:02:27 regulate yourself and that's a skill
0:02:29 that we don't teach children we don't
0:02:31 teach it to young people we don't teach
0:02:33 it to men or women um so that's really
0:02:35 the work that i do subhanallah what is
0:02:37 the um what are some of those barriers
0:02:39 that you speak about you say you
0:02:40 mentioned some mental barriers that
0:02:41 women
0:02:42 in the community have
0:02:44 from your experience
0:02:46 what are some of those barriers
0:02:49 i would say
0:02:50 when i've spoken with sisters and when
0:02:52 i've worked with sisters the
0:02:54 predominantly women come to me because
0:02:56 they feel that something's missing okay
0:02:58 um they
0:03:00 lack confidence in themselves
0:03:03 there is a sense of you know failure
0:03:05 about their lives wherever they are
0:03:07 whether they're single married whether
0:03:09 they have children or the children have
0:03:10 left the nest there's this sense that
0:03:12 they are not good enough that they're
0:03:14 not worthy but they're failing somehow
0:03:16 um and you know that's a really powerful
0:03:20 lens
0:03:21 to to look at your life with the lens of
0:03:23 failure because if you're looking at
0:03:25 your life through the lens of failure
0:03:26 guess what you're going to find failure
0:03:28 everywhere right if you're looking at
0:03:30 your life through the lens of you know
0:03:33 i'm not good enough or i'm not good as
0:03:35 good as so and so that's what you're
0:03:37 going to see replicated time and time
0:03:39 again and this is for men and women you
0:03:41 know way that we see ourselves impacts
0:03:43 directly our experience of of life of
0:03:47 everything that's happening around us so
0:03:49 you know for
0:03:50 for me
0:03:51 empowering sisters is helping them to
0:03:54 show up you know like i talk about to
0:03:56 show up fully for the lives that allah
0:03:59 has chosen for them
0:04:01 and every single one of us allah has
0:04:04 picked a path for us
0:04:06 and that's the path that matters
0:04:08 not your sister's path or your cousins
0:04:11 or your sister-in-law or anyone else but
0:04:13 the path that allah has put you on your
0:04:16 responsibilities the people who count on
0:04:19 you your opportunities your challenges
0:04:22 the more you focus
0:04:23 on living your life intentionally and
0:04:26 showing up to every one of those
0:04:27 challenges the more satisfying your life
0:04:30 will be to be honest and the more
0:04:31 fulfilled you'll be in the life you have
0:04:34 right now and that for me is is golden
0:04:36 because it makes everything easier
0:04:39 what are some of the women's specific
0:04:40 issues because a lot of what you said
0:04:42 there could like you've kind of alluded
0:04:43 to yeah equally applied to males and
0:04:45 females so what are some of the women's
0:04:47 specific issues which through our own
0:04:49 paradigm like obviously
0:04:51 uh this whole conversation we're going
0:04:53 to assume the islamic paradigm here but
0:04:55 let's let's for the sake of argument say
0:04:57 through our own paradigm
0:05:00 that women have concerns with that
0:05:02 legitimate concerns
0:05:03 which we all need to be aware of we all
0:05:06 need to to to to to aid in helping them
0:05:09 with
0:05:10 and that we need to have empathy on
0:05:15 i would say the topic that comes up the
0:05:18 most uh in general is and not
0:05:21 surprisingly is relationships um
0:05:25 and specifically marriage and then
0:05:26 everything that kind of radiates
0:05:28 outwards from a marriage um whether it's
0:05:31 in laws whether it's children whether
0:05:32 it's step children whether it's looking
0:05:34 to get married whether it's healing from
0:05:36 a divorce a lot of the problems that
0:05:38 we're seeing in the community do
0:05:41 kind of revolve around that relationship
0:05:43 between a man and a woman
0:05:46 and certainly over the years that's the
0:05:48 area in which i've seen the most
0:05:51 dysfunction in our community
0:05:53 that's where i've seen the most damage
0:05:55 being caused
0:05:56 the most pain being inflicted kind of
0:05:58 both ways and of course the fallout is
0:06:00 our children
0:06:02 and what they see growing up and what
0:06:04 they either want to replicate or don't
0:06:06 want to replicate so i would say
0:06:09 if we could
0:06:11 get our marriages on point
0:06:14 so many things would change so many
0:06:16 issues that we're having with the
0:06:18 children with the youth with mental
0:06:20 health with even poverty and things like
0:06:22 that so many of those issues would cease
0:06:26 to be an issue if those fundamental
0:06:28 relationships were healed and were
0:06:29 healthy um because two healthy people
0:06:33 you know bringing up a family that's the
0:06:35 unit that we're you know that that's the
0:06:36 unit that we are striving to create but
0:06:39 when there is unrest when there is
0:06:41 dysfunction when there is pain in that
0:06:44 central relationship it again radiates
0:06:46 outward to everything so like i said all
0:06:48 of the issues surrounding a marriage
0:06:51 on the beginning of it the end of it and
0:06:53 in the but in the in between those those
0:06:55 are all the issues that i see still are
0:06:58 issues for our sisters a good 20 years
0:07:00 later so i've been muslim for 20 years
0:07:03 uh over 20 years now masha'allah and
0:07:06 it's still the same stuff and sometimes
0:07:08 upon allah i'm actually surprised
0:07:09 because i remember when i was deep in
0:07:11 the community i was living in a certain
0:07:13 community and it was rough it was rough
0:07:16 the
0:07:17 the the the situations that sisters were
0:07:20 in the the kind of conditions under
0:07:22 which they were kind of operating
0:07:25 it was it was tough it was tough to
0:07:27 witness it was tough to try to support
0:07:29 someone through that process knowing
0:07:30 that there was actually very little you
0:07:32 could do and it's it's just it's kind of
0:07:34 dismaying to me to see that we still
0:07:36 haven't figured it out we're still
0:07:38 having some of those same issues and
0:07:40 sometimes even more now because new
0:07:41 issues have come up to basically attack
0:07:44 that unit of the family
0:07:46 what are some of those issues in
0:07:47 particular
0:07:49 that
0:07:50 you could say
0:07:51 constitute patterns continuities
0:07:54 um
0:07:56 like let me let me give you one example
0:07:57 let's give one example right and let's
0:08:00 let's put it out there
0:08:02 the idea of an absent father
0:08:04 okay and i believe an absolute father
0:08:06 now
0:08:06 you
0:08:07 as you say you kind of counsel women you
0:08:10 speak to them you
0:08:12 yourself with a single motherboard for
0:08:14 completely different reasons which uh
0:08:16 you
0:08:17 intimate in your book uh
0:08:19 which i'm gonna get uh
0:08:22 show up show up here show up show up
0:08:25 which we recommend that you get it's a
0:08:27 very powerful
0:08:28 uh but just looking at the first kind of
0:08:30 20 30 pages is you know
0:08:32 so emotional it's well written and
0:08:35 it's amazing how you articulate yourself
0:08:37 but putting that aside
0:08:40 how
0:08:42 how can we
0:08:43 how can we frame the idea
0:08:46 of
0:08:46 the problems that are caused by an
0:08:48 absent father
0:08:49 in the community what have you seen
0:08:51 with your with your clients with your
0:08:53 colleagues with your friends
0:08:55 what kind of damage does that cause
0:08:59 i would say that you know the
0:09:01 for me the most shocking thing that i've
0:09:03 observed over the years is
0:09:07 the seeming and again this is anecdotal
0:09:09 because i'm not a a social scientist i
0:09:12 haven't got the data but i know you've
0:09:15 got any dots are important to us neymar
0:09:17 your anecdotes are important well that's
0:09:18 what you're going to get that's what
0:09:19 you're going to
0:09:20 get honestly your experiences are very
0:09:22 important especially as we know there is
0:09:24 a death or a non-existence in some cases
0:09:26 of some of this kind of data especially
0:09:28 within the muslim community
0:09:30 so your your experience are very
0:09:31 important
0:09:34 i think for me i've been very vocal
0:09:36 about this on social media um you know
0:09:38 my videos all over instagram or whatever
0:09:39 but for me the most shocking thing that
0:09:42 i've seen in this area is
0:09:45 when there is a divorce
0:09:46 and the father is basically he's gone
0:09:50 he's left uh he's left the marriage he's
0:09:52 left the wife and he's left the kids
0:09:55 and i don't understand the thinking
0:09:59 behind that um because i know so many
0:10:02 sisters who when there's a divorce they
0:10:04 are literally on their own so they are
0:10:07 not only responsible for the children on
0:10:09 a day-to-day basis but they are
0:10:11 responsible for them economically
0:10:13 socially in terms of school in terms of
0:10:15 everything the father is he's out he's
0:10:18 out and i i've said this before um
0:10:23 we really
0:10:24 really need to start thinking so much
0:10:27 more carefully and being so much more
0:10:29 intentional when we start families
0:10:31 because as i have said before
0:10:34 the children pay the price
0:10:37 and that trauma that we are that we are
0:10:39 living through our broken homes our
0:10:41 children are carrying that trauma and
0:10:43 they will carry it into their families
0:10:45 as well so i i can think of a particular
0:10:47 situation where you know the father was
0:10:50 around he was working was a breadwinner
0:10:52 um and the divorce was was not amicable
0:10:55 at all it was a very very difficult
0:10:56 divorce but it was one of those where it
0:10:58 was like this cannot continue
0:11:01 when he left the home he stopped
0:11:03 speaking to the children completely cut
0:11:05 off from them completely they would ring
0:11:07 him he wouldn't pick up they would leave
0:11:09 voice messages
0:11:10 to be honest this kind of thing sorry to
0:11:12 chime in here but
0:11:14 this kind of thing really does make me
0:11:15 sick because it's
0:11:17 i think if anything it exposed the true
0:11:19 character of that person
0:11:21 like their true colors came out when
0:11:23 that that particular man his true colors
0:11:25 came out when the divorce took place
0:11:27 because if you're willing to sacrifice
0:11:28 your children for something that's
0:11:30 completely no fault of their own
0:11:32 that must mean at least
0:11:34 that your love for yourself
0:11:37 is far exceeds anything else in life
0:11:40 it's like the
0:11:42 ultimate manifestation of narcissism
0:11:44 like i'm going to teach everyone a
0:11:46 lesson i don't care what collateral
0:11:47 damage it is
0:11:48 just so that you know they know who i am
0:11:51 and what i'm about
0:11:53 i think that there is that
0:11:56 yeah i think these men should be exposed
0:11:57 honestly like if in these in the
0:11:59 community if a man is genuinely doing
0:12:01 that
0:12:02 to to putting the kids you know in
0:12:05 harm's way in that manner i think that
0:12:07 the community though
0:12:09 i don't know if this is a strong stance
0:12:10 in your perspective may get your
0:12:11 perspective on it but the community the
0:12:14 imams the
0:12:15 his friends should uh do anything that
0:12:18 by any means necessary to influence his
0:12:20 behavior because
0:12:21 that is for me uh despicable and
0:12:23 deplorable action and he should be
0:12:25 boycotted he should be uh
0:12:28 the heart the hard approach should be
0:12:29 used on him the kind approach but this
0:12:31 kind of person shouldn't be just allowed
0:12:33 to live in society normal he just left
0:12:35 his kids and said i don't know am i
0:12:36 having am i having an emotional reaction
0:12:38 to this or do you think i'm justified
0:12:40 no no i i think i think you're justified
0:12:42 i think we it we i i have observed this
0:12:45 over the years and you know anybody who
0:12:47 sees it differently is free to disagree
0:12:49 but what i've seen in the communities
0:12:50 that i've known is that brothers give
0:12:53 each other a pass
0:12:55 you know whatever you do in your private
0:12:56 life ahi nothing to do with me like
0:12:58 that's your family do you know what i
0:13:00 mean like i'm not gonna step into your
0:13:01 territory i'm not a family that is left
0:13:03 behind this kind of way yeah whatever's
0:13:05 happening whatever the case it could be
0:13:08 that there's injustice happening at home
0:13:10 that sister is like you know it's known
0:13:12 in the community that sister is
0:13:13 desperately unhappy or that he's taken
0:13:15 away her rights in some shape or form or
0:13:17 whatever but he's still a brother and
0:13:19 he's still welcome and he still gets
0:13:21 salaam and he still has you know his
0:13:23 place in the society because i don't
0:13:25 know whether it's like a a is a thing or
0:13:27 a thing but for us as sisters i'll be
0:13:29 honest and this is something that
0:13:30 sisters have been saying for years and
0:13:32 years it's like no one ever tells the
0:13:36 brothers anything
0:13:38 anytime that there's advice or footballs
0:13:40 or warnings it's always to the sisters
0:13:43 sisters fear allah sisters hijab sisters
0:13:46 do this sisters do that obey your
0:13:48 husbands sisters give him what he wants
0:13:50 sister sister sisters and unfortunately
0:13:53 we're human beings sisters are doing
0:13:54 wrong and brothers are doing wrong but
0:13:56 what we don't often hear or see from the
0:13:59 the elders in the community is brothers
0:14:01 actually being pulled up and said you
0:14:03 can't do this you know whether it's on a
0:14:05 sort of grassroots level
0:14:07 person to person or even from the member
0:14:10 to say brothers
0:14:12 you know this is not acceptable in our
0:14:13 deen and actually teaching our brothers
0:14:16 that
0:14:17 i'll just i just want to make this point
0:14:20 yes in our communities many many times
0:14:23 you'll find that we enable bad behavior
0:14:26 especially amongst men and boys we
0:14:29 enable it how do we enable it by making
0:14:31 excuses for it by not pulling them up on
0:14:34 it domestic violence is a great example
0:14:36 okay when there's actual violence in the
0:14:38 home yeah there's actually violence or
0:14:40 there's alcohol abuse or there's drugs
0:14:42 or anything like that the family's
0:14:45 response is typically to cover and to
0:14:47 shield right we don't want to get the
0:14:49 police involved we don't want the
0:14:51 neighbors involved we don't want the
0:14:52 community involved and if the woman has
0:14:54 the audacity to speak up she's the one
0:14:57 who's shamed she's the one who's blamed
0:15:00 how could you embarrass us like this you
0:15:02 know it's your fault he did x y and z
0:15:04 it's very easy to blame and shame the
0:15:06 woman rather than actually addressing
0:15:09 this issue with your son and saying in
0:15:11 our family this is not acceptable so we
0:15:13 become a community of enablers and okay
0:15:16 but before we move on with this
0:15:18 usually yeah sorry sorry i'm sorry to
0:15:20 show you that and before we move on
0:15:22 the issue here is when we use terms like
0:15:25 domestic violence
0:15:26 you know um
0:15:27 i told you i think before we started the
0:15:29 show that i wrote a small little
0:15:31 pamphlet book
0:15:32 uh which was really the um combination
0:15:34 combined effort of my postgraduate
0:15:36 essays that i've done
0:15:38 on gender studies um anyway one of them
0:15:40 was about domestic violence and what i
0:15:42 found was problematic there was a
0:15:44 particular woman
0:15:45 who wrote a definition for what domestic
0:15:47 violence is
0:15:48 her name was kumasi i think has
0:15:50 correctly pronouncing her name and she
0:15:53 says something to the effect of and i'm
0:15:54 paraphrasing but this is it's in my book
0:15:56 if someone wants to see
0:15:58 um that domestic violence is um
0:16:00 is defined as is defined as
0:16:03 when one spouse
0:16:05 um
0:16:06 you know
0:16:07 abuse of one spouse to another or
0:16:09 violence violence of one's past another
0:16:11 uh usually and this is exactly what she
0:16:13 said in her definition usually from a
0:16:15 man to a woman yeah
0:16:16 now
0:16:18 any any any social scientist will tell
0:16:19 you this is a problem because it it begs
0:16:22 the question in the sense it's kind of
0:16:23 assumed the answer of the question
0:16:25 before it started it so you couldn't put
0:16:27 the results
0:16:28 like the hypothesis and the conclusion
0:16:30 should be two different things
0:16:32 the issue with
0:16:33 the terms like domestic violence and
0:16:36 rape and and these kinds of terms
0:16:38 is what whose definition are we really
0:16:40 using are we using the definition
0:16:43 of kumasi who's already put her
0:16:46 conclusion in her hypothesis are we
0:16:49 using the definition of uh mckinnon who
0:16:52 defines rape as sexual intercourse any
0:16:54 sexual intercourse even with uh
0:16:56 catherine mckinnon says that it's rape
0:16:58 it's even with consent
0:17:00 so
0:17:01 the issue with using these terms and
0:17:02 especially sometimes the legal
0:17:03 definitions are so vague what are the
0:17:06 definitions of abuse
0:17:07 like for example
0:17:09 um the you can have monetary abuse
0:17:12 what does monetary abuse look like well
0:17:14 you're not giving a pocket money enough
0:17:15 pocket money what kind of pocket money
0:17:16 do you need
0:17:18 what would you do it's not really like
0:17:20 that it's more you know if a person is
0:17:22 has money in there
0:17:24 away from that money got you but naimo
0:17:26 my issue is when we have these such wide
0:17:28 definitions of these things right yeah
0:17:31 as so you say well she's been raped
0:17:33 and what he means by mckinnon's
0:17:35 definition being raped means
0:17:38 someone had sex with her but on someone
0:17:40 on the governmental definition is the
0:17:41 insurgent of the penis or whatever it
0:17:43 may be by the way rape on the uk law can
0:17:45 only be done by a man to a woman it is
0:17:47 discriminatory by really yeah there's no
0:17:50 such thing as weight
0:17:51 a woman she can sexually assault a man
0:17:53 but she cannot rape a man uk law for
0:17:55 example but anyway putting that aside
0:17:57 even though you can imagine her sorry
0:17:59 sorry to be explicit but she can put
0:18:00 some knife in here or she can put a
0:18:02 bottle in him she can do something she
0:18:03 can she can sedate him
0:18:05 all these things are possible you know
0:18:07 it's only defined in in that way but
0:18:09 putting that all to the side the point
0:18:10 is
0:18:11 whoever gets to set the definition
0:18:14 gets to control the narrative whoever
0:18:15 gets to control the narrative
0:18:17 gets to call the shots and my issue with
0:18:20 a lot of these key terms is that if we
0:18:22 don't have it in the islamic narrative
0:18:24 and we use these terms like abuse
0:18:25 domestic violence and what's it what
0:18:27 what all these things
0:18:29 then
0:18:30 uh it can easily come in someone can
0:18:32 come in with another agenda
0:18:34 and take our community to a completely
0:18:36 different direction would you agree to
0:18:37 that or to what extent would you agree
0:18:39 to that
0:18:40 um well of course it's plausible but do
0:18:42 you think that's what's happened with
0:18:44 the community
0:18:45 do you think that we've been kind of
0:18:47 kind of coerced yeah i think there are
0:18:49 examples of one i'll give you one
0:18:50 example where i think maybe we'll both
0:18:52 agree right
0:18:53 one example where we definitely both
0:18:55 agree is that in the islamic law right
0:18:58 we believe that kin's ties of kinship
0:19:00 should not should be respected
0:19:02 yeah we talked about the case of the
0:19:04 absent father right okay but there's
0:19:06 also the courageous voluntarily absent
0:19:08 father yeah
0:19:11 yeah but what about the case also of the
0:19:13 the woman who's weaponizing the children
0:19:16 and leveraging them
0:19:17 in after a divorce in order to spite the
0:19:19 father and that happens a lot so much so
0:19:22 that is i mean organizations like
0:19:24 fathers for justice and these kind of
0:19:26 they have come up and let me give you a
0:19:28 real scenario which i think you're aware
0:19:29 of right
0:19:31 say for example a man or woman gets
0:19:32 separated for whatever reason it may be
0:19:34 yeah
0:19:35 man and women get separated the woman
0:19:37 has custody of the children she's the
0:19:39 primary
0:19:40 custodian of the children she takes care
0:19:42 of them and so on
0:19:44 now he wants to have access to his child
0:19:46 so there's they have to arbitrate they
0:19:48 have to go to court family court in the
0:19:50 uk and so on yeah in the meantime he
0:19:52 can't see his children
0:19:54 in the meantime she has
0:19:56 she she is barring him preventing him
0:19:59 stopping him from seeing the children
0:20:01 and for every second that she's stopping
0:20:03 him from seeing the children from
0:20:04 islamic perspective she's sinning not
0:20:06 even every second every millisecond and
0:20:09 she's not just
0:20:11 sinning for that
0:20:13 she's sitting for stopping the extended
0:20:14 family for example the man's
0:20:17 the grandparents of the children or the
0:20:18 aunties the uncles from seeing those
0:20:20 children again as well
0:20:23 and you you were talking about and it's
0:20:24 true and i do agree that there is this
0:20:25 kind of culture of
0:20:27 gender bias it might not be feminism or
0:20:29 red pill or whatever it may be but it
0:20:30 could be geneva like where genuinely
0:20:33 people think that you know
0:20:35 he's he's one of one of the guys and
0:20:37 whatever so i'm not going to say
0:20:38 anything but i think on the other hand
0:20:39 as well you do have gender bias from the
0:20:41 from the sisters as well like sometimes
0:20:43 she'll see
0:20:44 that her friend is preventing
0:20:47 her ex-husband from seeing the kids her
0:20:49 friend will make bogus excuses
0:20:52 yeah and he's not doing it my way he's
0:20:53 not giving me enough money whatever it
0:20:55 is and she will acquiesce to that as
0:20:57 well would you agree is that happening
0:20:59 yeah i think i i would say i agree i
0:21:01 think there's a general kind of uh
0:21:03 opinion that women back each other up
0:21:06 and it's even got a name it's called
0:21:08 girl code right out there in the world
0:21:10 um where women validate each other women
0:21:12 back each other up no matter what right
0:21:15 i would say within the muslim community
0:21:17 the sisters who don't do that are the
0:21:19 ones who are firmly rooted in deen
0:21:22 because when you love someone for the
0:21:23 sake of allah true it's not about girl
0:21:25 code it's not about yeah you're my girl
0:21:28 and yeah whatever it's sis this is haram
0:21:31 exactly you know and i have witnessed
0:21:32 those conversations before and someone
0:21:34 has said you know i have been involved
0:21:36 in those conversations say sis have you
0:21:38 checked to see whether that is okay you
0:21:40 know have you asked anybody about that
0:21:42 and with something like this yeah sorry
0:21:44 to cut you off sorry i'm i'm cutting up
0:21:46 a bit too much but
0:21:48 with something like this you don't need
0:21:49 to check like the prophet muhammad said
0:21:53 you know that someone who cuts the kins
0:21:55 of
0:21:56 kinship is not going to go to heaven
0:21:58 so yeah
0:21:59 this is such a like it's a clear thing
0:22:01 it's
0:22:03 actually if you
0:22:05 open the quran the second or third page
0:22:06 i don't know
0:22:09 um
0:22:12 the ones who cut
0:22:14 the the ties that allah wanted to be
0:22:17 maintained and then they create
0:22:19 corruption in the land
0:22:20 any tafsir will tell you that's not just
0:22:23 you know your parents and your
0:22:24 grandparents and dashie or the extended
0:22:26 family but it's even your friends and
0:22:28 your neighbors and these kind of things
0:22:29 as well so i mean imagine someone
0:22:31 stopping their children from seeing a
0:22:32 parent
0:22:33 that's stopping the child from that is
0:22:35 stopping the child from performing an
0:22:37 obligatory act that is stopping the
0:22:39 parent from performing obligatory act
0:22:41 that is um
0:22:43 that is causing emotional damage to
0:22:45 someone unjustly that is all of those
0:22:48 things are more
0:22:49 what do you think about that
0:22:51 you know as you're saying all of this
0:22:52 i'm just thinking of i'm thinking of it
0:22:55 from sort of two angles and i think my
0:22:57 my conclusion is that as as human beings
0:23:00 we just need to sort it out because just
0:23:02 as okay so there's one thing
0:23:04 this happening to men
0:23:06 because men especially muslim men up
0:23:09 until very recently have not really had
0:23:12 spaces where they have talked about
0:23:13 their lived experience
0:23:15 it's always assumed that the brother is
0:23:17 the brothers are okay the brothers are
0:23:20 cool because they have all the power
0:23:22 they have all the control they get to do
0:23:24 whatever they want and basically they're
0:23:26 never the victims women are the victims
0:23:28 sisters are always the victims right so
0:23:30 and i think that is a narrative in our
0:23:32 community that is a narrative
0:23:34 and i think it's because sisters will
0:23:36 talk about their problems sisters have
0:23:38 been much more vocal of late about the
0:23:40 issues that they go through etc so we
0:23:42 know what each other are going through
0:23:43 but brothers may not speak to each other
0:23:46 but they certainly have not up until
0:23:47 lately really been speaking honestly
0:23:50 about hey you know what
0:23:51 i'm struggling with this or this has
0:23:53 happened to me and i'm suffering because
0:23:55 of this so even in our minds the idea of
0:23:58 a muslim man suffering because of a
0:24:00 woman it's like what are you talking
0:24:01 about
0:24:02 that never
0:24:10 especially when you hear the woman like
0:24:13 you know if a person a judge or an
0:24:15 arbitrator or a third party
0:24:18 another stakeholder of some sort and
0:24:20 they literally just see and hear the
0:24:21 woman
0:24:22 like you just hear and see the woman
0:24:24 crying it's enough she has won already
0:24:26 like
0:24:27 or at least she has convinced you know
0:24:29 but if you see a big man you know a huge
0:24:32 man with dominance and especially if
0:24:34 he's an extrovert yes it's almost like
0:24:36 there's no chance he's got no chance are
0:24:38 you telling me that she's oppressing him
0:24:40 you know
0:24:42 this is something
0:24:44 this is something that i want to just
0:24:45 touch on and i hope it's not you know
0:24:47 too
0:24:47 too um open for this audience but i'll
0:24:50 give you another example i think it's
0:24:51 too open for my audience
0:24:53 okay
0:24:54 well
0:24:55 you know as i have two sons and i have i
0:24:57 have three sons and i have two daughters
0:24:59 alhamdulillah and so
0:25:01 when i'm looking at gender in general i
0:25:05 feel i have a responsibility to be as
0:25:07 balanced as possible and to be as fair
0:25:10 as possible and to be as just as
0:25:12 possible so just as you're talking about
0:25:15 men who are having their children
0:25:16 weaponized um i can't
0:25:19 i cannot say that's not happening you
0:25:21 know how we always say believe women
0:25:24 and also we've had many situations where
0:25:26 women have come forward and said this is
0:25:28 happening to us and the brothers have
0:25:29 been like no or the imam or the whoever
0:25:31 is like i know sister you must have done
0:25:33 this you must have done that
0:25:34 similarly i must extend the same grace
0:25:37 to brothers so if brothers come forward
0:25:39 and they say look i haven't seen my kids
0:25:42 for two years and i've been trying but
0:25:43 xyz we have to give them the benefit of
0:25:46 the doubt we have to think that it's
0:25:48 possible that that is true just like if
0:25:50 a sister came to me i would you know i
0:25:51 would give her the benefit of a doubt
0:25:52 and say you know what says i hear you
0:25:54 anyway no but the burden of proof like
0:25:56 can i just say something here yeah the
0:25:58 but we're not we're not the brother's
0:25:59 not coming forward and saying though the
0:26:01 woman has raped me or she has the stuff
0:26:03 the kind of things that you know require
0:26:05 a heavy burden of proof in islam is
0:26:07 she's not coming and saying that
0:26:09 that is the the burden of to establish a
0:26:12 woman is stopping a man from seeing his
0:26:13 children is fairly you can say fairly
0:26:15 simple all they have to do is test it
0:26:17 out come see them on a saturday are you
0:26:20 going to be there or not if if if not
0:26:22 why not why are you not going to bring
0:26:23 the kid he wants to see them on saturday
0:26:24 uh they want to see him on saturday you
0:26:26 know this is the time that is willing to
0:26:28 take them uh is that allow are you
0:26:30 allowing this or are you not allowing
0:26:31 this
0:26:31 all you have to do is basically if you
0:26:33 ask this question you will be able to
0:26:35 establish whether the person is
0:26:36 borrowing personally
0:26:38 so you don't need four witnesses for
0:26:39 this it's just an easy burden of proof
0:26:41 and so what i'm saying is
0:26:43 it's definitely happening i mean i'm
0:26:44 sorry i've um might have said the story
0:26:46 before but me and alidawah we went to uh
0:26:49 and he'll remember this he went to
0:26:50 sacramento in california and there was a
0:26:52 story that stuck with me
0:26:54 you know this man who's they were
0:26:56 telling me went to the masjid you know
0:26:58 he went to the masjid and
0:26:59 uh every day and fajr i think he they
0:27:02 were saying he was and then he had a bad
0:27:03 divorce
0:27:04 and they were telling me that uh you
0:27:07 know he had his last day with his
0:27:09 daughters he had two daughters and his
0:27:11 last day with them and he couldn't bear
0:27:13 that you know the other woman now she's
0:27:14 married another man and that the courts
0:27:17 have all been fooled in her favor so he
0:27:19 he done a monstrous act you know he went
0:27:22 to the lake and he killed both of those
0:27:24 daughters and he killed himself you know
0:27:26 and this is from the
0:27:27 un
0:27:28 involuntary i'm not even he was
0:27:30 responsible for this but this this
0:27:32 disgusting behavior or this this kind of
0:27:35 reaction took place because of an
0:27:37 initial injustice now two wrongs
0:27:38 obviously and cannot make you can never
0:27:41 ever justify something but the truth is
0:27:43 we can avoid these kind of things
0:27:44 another situation i heard just a person
0:27:46 who's been prevented from seeing the
0:27:48 children literally died from it
0:27:51 literally had panic attack seizures
0:27:53 until they died from it
0:27:55 why did that happen or because he had a
0:27:57 secret second wife or something happened
0:27:59 you went to this country and even and
0:28:01 then the woman found out and she said
0:28:02 you're never going to see your children
0:28:03 again and a few years down the line he
0:28:05 just he couldn't he his health couldn't
0:28:07 handle it and he deteriorated and died
0:28:09 because of a stroke or some some heart
0:28:11 attack or something which is related to
0:28:13 it now all i'm saying is these kind of
0:28:16 things if you're really honest about it
0:28:18 could be prevented but they we need to
0:28:20 have i don't know what tell me if i'm
0:28:21 wrong because once again i'm not a
0:28:24 pastoral
0:28:25 my specialism is not
0:28:27 pastoral counseling or something like
0:28:28 this it's more this is why i've you know
0:28:31 asked you honestly
0:28:33 do we know should we not use a really a
0:28:35 sledgehammer approach with this like
0:28:37 either if we're talking about the the
0:28:39 absent father
0:28:40 or we're talking about the weaponizing
0:28:42 mother yeah and either should we not
0:28:46 really
0:28:47 you know should we shouldn't really
0:28:48 expose these people should we not really
0:28:50 um
0:28:53 let the community know who these people
0:28:54 are so that they're unmarriable they
0:28:56 shouldn't be back because if you think
0:28:58 about it right if they're capable of not
0:29:00 seeing their children in the case of
0:29:01 absent father they're capable of leaving
0:29:03 their kids alone
0:29:04 uh or they're capable of weaponizing
0:29:07 their kids
0:29:08 that means that they're capable of
0:29:10 putting their children as humans shields
0:29:12 in this proverbial game of leverage uh
0:29:14 that means what kind of person are you
0:29:16 you're a narcissist you're a bad person
0:29:19 and you and if anyone's going to marry
0:29:21 you they're going to have a hell of a
0:29:23 life because that means you're only
0:29:24 going to be thinking about yourself if
0:29:26 you can't even think about your children
0:29:27 then you can't you will not think about
0:29:29 a partner properly you will not you will
0:29:31 not be
0:29:32 courteous and compassionate and
0:29:34 empathetic am i am i being a bit too
0:29:36 emotional with this
0:29:40 as i said before
0:29:41 the family is the unit right and our
0:29:44 families are under extreme pressure the
0:29:47 family itself is under attack at the
0:29:49 moment we know this and muslim families
0:29:51 are just
0:29:52 if not more under attack we are just as
0:29:54 as vulnerable we think we're not but we
0:29:57 are and for me sledgehammer
0:30:00 okay it's a possible approach but i am
0:30:03 more concerned about
0:30:05 us
0:30:06 preparing people for
0:30:08 properly for marriage for parenthood we
0:30:11 don't we still don't have enough
0:30:14 pre-marital counselling we don't have
0:30:16 enough therapy and counselling for
0:30:18 people oslon because that man
0:30:20 who went and killed his daughters
0:30:23 it's not just because his wife wouldn't
0:30:25 let him see and he had a divorce
0:30:26 obviously the man was hurting obviously
0:30:29 he was not okay so mental health big
0:30:32 issue counseling within the marriage
0:30:34 helping people to strengthen their
0:30:36 marriages you know to work on things
0:30:38 right to actually you know if then if
0:30:40 they can't work at it if they can't make
0:30:43 it work should i say then how can we
0:30:45 manage the separation because all i care
0:30:48 about is the children i'll be honest you
0:30:50 too you man you woman you're adults do
0:30:53 whatever you want you want to have a
0:30:54 secret marriage go ahead you want to
0:30:56 have monsieur go ahead you want to have
0:30:57 four women you want to marry
0:30:59 you know three men one after the other
0:31:01 do whatever you want but the children
0:31:04 the children they are the ones who
0:31:06 experience the fallout and so i like
0:31:09 though you tried to balance it there you
0:31:10 know you you give you give a female
0:31:12 example
0:31:14 because the reality is we can all do bad
0:31:17 muhammad that's the reality we can do
0:31:19 bad just by ourselves you know and this
0:31:22 this idea and i might get through yeah
0:31:23 but but
0:31:24 i might because the reality is the
0:31:26 reality is even if a woman for example
0:31:29 let's take let's assume that the woman
0:31:32 does not have the upper hand she has the
0:31:34 lower hand right the man is over her her
0:31:36 father is over her whatever the case may
0:31:38 be right do you think that that woman
0:31:40 does not have power to be evil
0:31:43 just because she doesn't have the upper
0:31:45 hand of course she can and i'll tell you
0:31:46 where you see it the most you're talking
0:31:48 about weaponizing your children what
0:31:49 about weaponizing intimacy that's a real
0:31:52 thing well
0:31:54 here's what here's what i'm going to say
0:31:55 look you're talking about secret second
0:31:57 wives i mean
0:31:59 if if someone's doing something like
0:32:00 that i would go and tell them to get
0:32:02 three secret second wives i mean to be
0:32:04 honest with you she's she's doing a
0:32:06 secret second one yeah i get three
0:32:08 because i i know this sounds
0:32:10 maybe harsh or something but if a woman
0:32:12 is doing something which is clearly
0:32:14 haram which is weaponizing intimacy
0:32:17 then a secret second wife which is uh he
0:32:20 means not telling the first wife which
0:32:22 is not even a shot in the nikah cannot
0:32:24 even be compared to that in the least
0:32:25 although due respect this is complete
0:32:27 they're two different uh
0:32:29 things altogether so if she's not doing
0:32:31 it and then he knows that if he's gonna
0:32:33 tell her that he's gonna be in polygamy
0:32:35 that she's gonna take his kids and go to
0:32:36 another country or or bar him
0:32:39 then maybe secret second maybe secret
0:32:40 second lives are the way to go for such
0:32:42 people i mean they're you know now yeah
0:32:45 what do you think
0:32:46 okay i i'm not gonna go down on paper
0:32:48 saying yes secret second wives are a
0:32:50 thing
0:32:52 but but i think again my really what i
0:32:55 want to say and the point i want to make
0:32:57 is that we must be careful of buying
0:33:01 into the narrative that only the
0:33:03 dominant party can be evil only the
0:33:06 dominant party can oppress only the one
0:33:08 who has a level higher can actually do
0:33:11 wrong and the person who is under is
0:33:13 always right is always a victim is
0:33:15 always you know basically not to blame
0:33:18 that's not true okay it's not the fact
0:33:20 and anyway as we said you know and the
0:33:23 thing is again it's not something we
0:33:25 talk about very often but if you if if
0:33:27 you start this is this is i'll just give
0:33:29 you a little bit of background i have
0:33:31 not spoken about these issues before
0:33:33 because up until last year i never
0:33:36 listened to men anyway right muslim men
0:33:38 didn't really talk about their own
0:33:40 personal issues and just in general in
0:33:42 the culture the culture around us is
0:33:44 very female it's very very female
0:33:47 dominated the culture i'm not talking
0:33:48 about economy i'm not talking about
0:33:49 politics i mean the culture okay and
0:33:52 it's not only very female but it's also
0:33:54 very female centric so women's stories
0:33:57 dominate women's view of the world now
0:33:59 dominate women's ways of emoting ways of
0:34:02 expressing themselves they dominate the
0:34:04 culture that we live in western culture
0:34:05 right yes so it's very easy to get a
0:34:08 feel for what women like and what women
0:34:10 don't like and how women see the world
0:34:12 that's very easy but to find out how men
0:34:15 feel and how men see the world and how
0:34:17 men experience the world actually have
0:34:19 been a lot harder up until a year or two
0:34:22 ago certainly for me so all of this even
0:34:25 weaponizing intimacy i would never have
0:34:28 thought it was an issue because i never
0:34:29 heard men talking about it and of course
0:34:31 women are not going to talk about that
0:34:33 sisters are not going to sit around
0:34:34 saying yeah it's been three months yeah
0:34:37 until i get that car or anything like
0:34:39 that it's not gonna happen okay and you
0:34:41 know and to be honest you know in
0:34:42 certain places that might even be
0:34:44 applauded it's like go get yours girl
0:34:46 yeah
0:34:47 have you ever heard something like that
0:34:48 not amongst sisters sisters not sisters
0:34:50 sisters you know but just within
0:34:53 with intimacy
0:34:54 not sisters is she asexual this is not
0:34:57 she doesn't she want it herself or
0:34:58 something maybe she's maybe she's
0:35:02 there's lots of different no uh brother
0:35:04 mohammed we're not going down that road
0:35:06 i mean three months
0:35:08 and come back what's going on three
0:35:10 months what's happening she doesn't want
0:35:12 herself if everyone's interest anyone's
0:35:14 interested in like knowing more about
0:35:15 this you just have to just search
0:35:17 youtube and you'll see
0:35:20 three months sorry sorry to say three
0:35:21 months is a very very it's a very big
0:35:24 example we should be talking about three
0:35:25 hours or three days like how about how
0:35:27 about two years
0:35:29 how about two weeks two years
0:35:34 my brother's laughing i'm really sorry
0:35:37 so what do you expect him to do maybe
0:35:39 you can't imagine it but maybe you can't
0:35:41 imagine it but
0:35:44 this is the lived reality for some men
0:35:46 some muslim men
0:35:49 then the secret second one you can't
0:35:50 fathom it very viable yeah you can't
0:35:52 fathom it
0:35:53 but i mean can we say it
0:35:56 no i i i think that if you know you are
0:36:00 in a situation where you know intimacy
0:36:02 is being withheld okay for whatever
0:36:05 reason right because if sharia wise and
0:36:08 in general in in in terms of you know
0:36:10 marital relationships
0:36:12 this would be seen as abuse not
0:36:13 acceptable
0:36:14 yeah yeah of course yeah i mean it is
0:36:17 domestic violence
0:36:18 the basic abuse probably is like
0:36:20 domestic violence domestic abuse but um
0:36:23 you know you'll see that
0:36:25 oh
0:36:27 can you pause mohammed yeah yeah
0:36:29 yeah just cut that please it's oh gosh
0:36:31 um
0:36:33 am i still on yes i am yeah am i still
0:36:35 here
0:36:37 it's not live it's not live by the way
0:36:38 okay cool yeah oh no because i was
0:36:40 signed out of my account okay
0:36:42 but i'm still here so that's cool okay
0:36:45 where was i um
0:36:46 we're holding intimacy let's let's go
0:36:48 back to this okay so
0:36:50 um
0:36:54 so um so that so when i say
0:36:57 uh that this is something that people
0:36:59 are going through you will see that
0:37:01 obviously
0:37:02 in there is no space in which it is
0:37:04 acceptable for either partner to
0:37:06 withhold from the other but what we're
0:37:08 seeing is you know it's like
0:37:11 it's it's a thing weaponizing intimacy
0:37:14 is a thing uh may allah guide us i mean
0:37:16 i want to say
0:37:18 um
0:37:19 i know i'm taking up a lot of your time
0:37:21 i'm not going to take too much of your
0:37:22 time i know you're very busy but
0:37:25 i wanted to ask
0:37:27 now
0:37:28 the issues that we're facing a lot with
0:37:31 with like the females i've heard you
0:37:32 speak about this before i want you to
0:37:33 kind of articulate
0:37:35 the way you've heard you said it before
0:37:37 um the
0:37:39 the issues relating to like how
0:37:42 some sisters can perceive
0:37:44 what men do as always oppressive
0:37:48 why by virtue of this feminist kind of
0:37:51 second wave narrative which is that man
0:37:53 is the oppressor by domination because
0:37:56 he is he is in power over the woman the
0:37:58 higher the managerial hierarchy that is
0:38:00 set in place by
0:38:01 allah all these concepts they are
0:38:04 themselves oppressive so if you
0:38:06 if you so much as enact them then you
0:38:08 are the agent of oppression
0:38:11 how do you combat this how do you talk
0:38:13 to talk to this
0:38:15 you know
0:38:16 subhanallah
0:38:18 for me
0:38:20 the answer for me and i could be wrong
0:38:23 but whenever these questions come up
0:38:25 i feel the answer i believe that the
0:38:27 answer is always found in the sera
0:38:30 and why i say this is because the seerah
0:38:32 was the lived example right that was the
0:38:34 lived experience of our deen that's how
0:38:37 people actually applied it right
0:38:39 so you know
0:38:42 what we know from the seerah is balance
0:38:46 however what we need to be careful uh
0:38:50 and everybody needs to be aware of the
0:38:51 fact that we live in a cultural context
0:38:54 okay and that cultural context wherever
0:38:57 you are in the world whichever era you
0:38:59 live in it impacts the way you view
0:39:02 things
0:39:03 so in the 1950s for example
0:39:07 islamic values were pretty much in line
0:39:10 with society's values traditional gender
0:39:12 roles man's the head of the household
0:39:15 you know when daddy comes home you know
0:39:16 he comes and deals with the problems he
0:39:18 goes out to work mom stays home with the
0:39:19 children
0:39:21 muslims would not have been strange at
0:39:22 that time okay because the society was
0:39:25 pretty much based on that
0:39:27 fast forward to the 70s now muslims are
0:39:29 starting to look a bit old-fashioned
0:39:31 starting to look a bit out of touch
0:39:33 fast forward to today and our sense of
0:39:36 what is balance
0:39:38 has shifted dramatically let's put it
0:39:40 that way so those of us who are
0:39:42 especially younger
0:39:44 you know we're trying to make sense of
0:39:45 everything trying to make sense of our
0:39:47 identity trying to make sense of who we
0:39:49 are as individuals what you know what
0:39:51 does our islam mean to us you know how
0:39:53 much of you know which of our identities
0:39:55 takes precedence and all of these things
0:39:56 because those are the questions that
0:39:57 young people are asking now because of
0:39:58 the society that we live in and so what
0:40:02 we may see as fair what we may see as
0:40:05 balance what we may see as just
0:40:08 may not be what allah sees as fair and
0:40:11 balanced and just
0:40:13 we we have to be aware of the fact that
0:40:15 we live in a paradigm okay we are in a
0:40:16 context and a lot of people i find
0:40:19 a lot of us think that
0:40:22 our views are our own you know they come
0:40:25 from ourselves you know people that are
0:40:26 my truth i'm speaking my truth this is
0:40:29 this is how i see things right not
0:40:31 understanding that your opinion or your
0:40:34 ideas and your feelings etc they aren't
0:40:36 they didn't they're not created in a
0:40:37 vacuum
0:40:38 they're not something that sprung up
0:40:40 from a well within it is a
0:40:42 combination of what you learnt growing
0:40:45 up what your parents taught you what you
0:40:48 learned in school what books you read
0:40:50 what films you watch what music you
0:40:52 listen to the friends you have the
0:40:53 social media you're on all of that is
0:40:55 impacting you all the time and that's
0:40:57 your paradigm so i digress
0:41:00 when we look
0:41:01 at the we call it a managerial hierarchy
0:41:04 and we look at the prophet sallam i
0:41:06 would love to go back to example the
0:41:08 prophets are selling because you know
0:41:09 we're having this conversation about
0:41:10 masculinity we're having these
0:41:12 conversations about alpha and beta and
0:41:14 dominance and all of this kind of thing
0:41:16 and
0:41:17 what we see
0:41:18 really without any bias when we look at
0:41:21 the seerah we see a man who was
0:41:24 holistically masculine because we know
0:41:26 that every one of us has got masculine
0:41:28 and feminine tendencies inside us anyway
0:41:29 right we have that we have those
0:41:30 energies when you see the prophet sallam
0:41:32 and how he was able to be strong and
0:41:35 decisive and dominant and and and have a
0:41:38 goal and go after it and fight and order
0:41:41 for people to be punished and all of
0:41:42 these alpha traits right because that's
0:41:44 what alpha is all that's how we're
0:41:46 seeing it now strong dominant etc
0:41:49 masculine
0:41:51 he also had the
0:41:53 flip side of masculinity which is the
0:41:54 ability to be humble
0:41:57 to be protective to make people feel
0:42:00 safe to make people feel like you know
0:42:02 grounded
0:42:03 because that's the beta side of the male
0:42:06 it's not an alpha good beta bad that's
0:42:08 just ridiculous it's just that
0:42:11 you have the ability to be both right
0:42:13 and the prophet saws
0:42:14 when you see him with his family he had
0:42:17 a balance of both we've got stories of
0:42:19 him laying down the law and we've got
0:42:22 stories of him completely giving up his
0:42:24 right and it didn't mean anything we we
0:42:27 i don't have to go into the stories in
0:42:28 glacier because i think we all know what
0:42:29 i'm talking about and so when we look at
0:42:33 the ideal at the ideal that we are
0:42:35 aiming for especially brothers i want to
0:42:37 speak to brothers on this point i also
0:42:39 speak to sisters because sisters you
0:42:41 want to be married to a brother
0:42:42 hopefully maybe you are married to a
0:42:43 brother and hopefully you're raising
0:42:45 future husbands
0:42:46 so being able to appreciate that a real
0:42:50 man is one who
0:42:52 is grounded in his belief in allah and
0:42:55 his sense of mission and purpose
0:42:57 he is humble before allah and his
0:43:00 actions are all for allah there's no ego
0:43:03 right there's no ego there's no my way
0:43:06 or the highway because i wanted to this
0:43:07 should not be the way that we think
0:43:09 right but that man he will have to make
0:43:11 decisions some of those decisions you
0:43:13 will not like them but that's his huck
0:43:16 to make those decisions and that man as
0:43:18 well is responsible for making you feel
0:43:20 safe and secure and loved and protected
0:43:23 and looked after so
0:43:25 i don't know i guess the the the long
0:43:28 story for me is
0:43:30 if we can go back to that model and
0:43:32 understand it and know what it will take
0:43:34 from us to be able to embody that
0:43:37 standard
0:43:38 we'll be on our way to something special
0:43:40 at the moment everyone's on ego
0:43:42 everyone's on myself what i want what i
0:43:46 like women and men right now that's why
0:43:48 we're clashing because the sisters now
0:43:50 they wanted their peace right before it
0:43:51 was the brother wanted his peace and
0:43:53 everybody had to kind of run circles
0:43:54 around him now this is like no no no i
0:43:56 also want my peace and that's partly why
0:43:58 a lot of our marriages are fracturing
0:44:00 because all of a sudden
0:44:02 you know there's this there's this power
0:44:04 shift this dynamic that's shifted but
0:44:07 sometimes the original power dynamic was
0:44:09 not the healthiest dynamic and it wasn't
0:44:11 on sunnah it was something else
0:44:13 something cultural something whatever
0:44:15 i was going to say i was going to say um
0:44:17 that's really well put
0:44:18 the only thing i would just kind of like
0:44:21 talk about here well i want to i want to
0:44:22 kind of clarify it because
0:44:24 i mean you know the whole red pool
0:44:25 movement we've spoken about me and
0:44:27 alidah made a video about the mgtows and
0:44:28 the red pill and whatever they call
0:44:30 themselves you know
0:44:31 and these terms
0:44:32 are not the same thing but anyway yeah
0:44:35 they have very similar ideas you know
0:44:37 but red pool have their ideas mgtow have
0:44:39 their ideas a lot of it is is a reaction
0:44:42 to feminism in my view but anyway
0:44:45 you know
0:44:46 whatever it may be
0:44:47 the the terms alpha and beta the reason
0:44:49 why i personally don't use them or don't
0:44:51 subscribe to them
0:44:52 is because so what they because there is
0:44:55 a connotation just like with the
0:44:56 patriarchy you know i don't accept the
0:44:58 term patriarchy the the reason why i
0:45:00 don't accept the term patriarchy like
0:45:02 some men use the term in a positive
0:45:04 sense they're trying to re-own the word
0:45:05 or something like that
0:45:06 the word patriarchy has historically and
0:45:09 in the literature always
0:45:10 connoted at least if not sometimes even
0:45:13 they've been defined as a systematic
0:45:16 oppression of woman by men or through
0:45:19 domination or power structures
0:45:21 yeah now if i'm if i'm affirming
0:45:22 something which is
0:45:24 known in the in the culture to be
0:45:25 oppressive then i'm not doing a favor to
0:45:28 the model of islam which i'm trying to
0:45:29 to espouse likewise the word beta here
0:45:33 it has we're not reclaiming the word
0:45:35 beta no no no i don't want to reclaim
0:45:37 any because it's already been it's
0:45:38 already been
0:45:40 distorted by the commandments yeah
0:45:42 beta is
0:45:43 even though they don't maybe define it
0:45:45 they don't have any books or
0:45:47 very limited academic works on these
0:45:48 kind of things it's all wasn't on social
0:45:50 media now it's kind of like a social
0:45:52 media thing
0:45:53 uh it's being used in a pejorative sense
0:45:55 it's being used in a week so he's
0:45:57 killed this this is a bit the going the
0:45:59 joe rogan experience with the bml and
0:46:01 laughing at him yeah yeah sure no that's
0:46:03 true do you know what i mean so why what
0:46:05 it is is that the way it's okay so can i
0:46:07 just say sorry just before we go further
0:46:10 yeah just for anybody who who is
0:46:12 listening to this and watching it please
0:46:14 do not go and tell people sister naima
0:46:16 called the prophet muhammad sallam a
0:46:17 beta male okay
0:46:21 i know that you i know that you if you
0:46:24 were very careful uh in your
0:46:26 articulation and definitely she didn't
0:46:28 say that
0:46:29 that would be lying about you anyway
0:46:31 don't worry you didn't say that but what
0:46:32 i was going to say was
0:46:34 um the qualities that are like
0:46:36 compassion for example compassion
0:46:38 compassion is associated with what maybe
0:46:40 beta but this is something which is for
0:46:42 us for seeing as allah is
0:46:43 what is here
0:46:47 as an insult
0:46:49 you're using the beta as an insult yeah
0:46:51 yeah that is the problem
0:46:55 another one is as leadership
0:46:57 and this whole thing of alpha alpha one
0:46:59 of the things that i'm always seeing on
0:47:00 these social media things that alpha
0:47:02 male is a leader
0:47:03 our religion doesn't tell us to go and
0:47:05 opt to be leaders
0:47:06 honestly it does not tell us to go and
0:47:08 want to be leaders our religion places
0:47:10 more emphasis on obedience than anything
0:47:12 else not just for women but for men as
0:47:13 well
0:47:14 and not obedience to not obedience to
0:47:17 just
0:47:20 that there's no obedience to the
0:47:22 creation and the disobedience of the
0:47:23 creator but also obedience to the
0:47:25 creation there's very harsh hadiths
0:47:30 you have to be strong with the
0:47:31 you have to uh obey the will
0:47:35 and um yeah
0:47:36 so what is it telling us there's only
0:47:38 one ayah in the quran only one that i
0:47:40 can think of which is the dua to be a
0:47:42 leader which is
0:47:45 the one verse number one time
0:47:48 we are
0:47:49 kind of incentivized if at all
0:47:51 incentivized to be leaders is what allah
0:47:53 is pushing us to make a dua where we
0:47:54 don't get it from our own life because
0:47:56 being a leader is being arrogant is what
0:47:58 you want to be a leader why so you can
0:48:00 assert yourself you can be dominant who
0:48:02 you want to be dominant
0:48:04 we're trying to imp like we're trying to
0:48:06 do a lot of kalimata we're trying to
0:48:09 make allah's kalam dominance not
0:48:11 ourselves dominant
0:48:12 so in fact
0:48:15 whoever humbles himself to allah allah
0:48:17 raises him so this idea of
0:48:19 leaders and this and that
0:48:21 usually those people who are most hungry
0:48:23 to be leaders are the worst leaders
0:48:24 anyway
0:48:25 you know the ones who are good leaders
0:48:27 they never think of themselves as good
0:48:29 leaders they people push them to that
0:48:31 position they never opt for that
0:48:32 position themselves so the this idea of
0:48:35 what's alpha is connected with the
0:48:37 leader this is an islamic actually oh
0:48:40 hold on i'm going to push back on that
0:48:41 i'm going to push back you should not
0:48:43 let me let me let me clear up you
0:48:44 clarify before you can reflect what i
0:48:46 mean is you should not desire leadership
0:48:49 you can be a good leader but you don't
0:48:51 need to desire it desiring it is
0:48:53 problematic because it is a form of i
0:48:56 want to impose myself on other people
0:48:58 but yeah our deen is not about power
0:49:00 like that our deal is about we just okay
0:49:03 that's that's the yeah that's the point
0:49:04 that i want to get to because i think
0:49:06 that you know even in you know certain
0:49:09 discourses right the issue of of um you
0:49:12 know male dominance etc
0:49:15 so everything is about power right
0:49:18 and
0:49:19 when we look at leadership
0:49:22 in the dean
0:49:23 looking at the shepherd for example
0:49:25 every one of you is a shepherd of their
0:49:26 flock and you'll be questioned about
0:49:27 them what does that mean it's not
0:49:29 leading to dominate it's leading to take
0:49:32 responsibility
0:49:33 so every man is the emir of his
0:49:35 household he leads the household because
0:49:38 he takes responsibility
0:49:40 as well
0:49:42 exactly
0:49:44 you know everyone has every one of us is
0:49:46 a shepherd right so i mean i i i
0:49:49 personally i would love to see more of
0:49:52 our brothers developing themselves to be
0:49:54 the very best that they can be
0:49:57 and leading their families because even
0:50:00 though we have a big
0:50:02 you know very loud maybe minority
0:50:04 complaining about toxic masculinity we
0:50:07 have also a very vocal i would even say
0:50:09 majority of sister saying where are the
0:50:11 men
0:50:12 where are the men who know how to be men
0:50:16 what does that mean as far as they're
0:50:17 concerned who can take care of the
0:50:19 household who can lead us who can
0:50:21 protect us who will bust his his
0:50:24 backside to make sure that we have what
0:50:26 we need because sisters are overworked
0:50:28 right now and sisters have been
0:50:30 overworked for a while and again again
0:50:32 it's all anecdotal
0:50:34 but when you hear about sisters whose
0:50:36 husbands he could even be present but
0:50:39 she's she's doing everything she's you
0:50:41 know getting money for the kids is her
0:50:43 house she's working as well you know the
0:50:45 money is coming from the government and
0:50:47 he's not really kind of bringing
0:50:48 anything to the table etc these issues a
0:50:51 lot of those sisters that i said i just
0:50:52 wish he would grow up i just wish that
0:50:54 he would man up and i know it's it's not
0:50:57 like it's not politically correct to
0:50:58 tell a man to man up but this is this is
0:51:01 what women need we do need men who see
0:51:04 themselves in that role as i'm
0:51:06 responsible for this flock and it's my
0:51:09 responsibility to myself to optimize
0:51:11 myself in every way that i can so that i
0:51:14 can do right by these this manner that
0:51:16 allah has given me so i think if you
0:51:18 were to see more brothers stepping up
0:51:20 and deciding to work on themselves dean
0:51:23 emotionally getting you know and mental
0:51:25 health issues out of the way physically
0:51:27 you know getting healthy you know
0:51:29 finding ways to kind of maximize their
0:51:31 income and the impact they have in the
0:51:32 community you would find a lot more
0:51:35 sisters who are happy to let them lead
0:51:37 and happy to relax into their feminine
0:51:39 role and it wouldn't be this type of
0:51:41 fight but i could be wrong no no i
0:51:43 appreciate all of that and i think
0:51:44 you've articulated it very well but i
0:51:46 think there's one thing which is
0:51:48 conspicuously missing in the
0:51:49 articulation
0:51:50 which is that we you've mentioned health
0:51:52 you mentioned mental health and you
0:51:53 mentioned uh
0:51:55 you you've mentioned finances but that
0:51:57 the one thing which is that the dean
0:51:59 actually hierarchizes
0:52:01 is not any of those things but it's
0:52:03 i did mention spiritually at the
0:52:05 beginning it was the first thing i said
0:52:06 actually i did but okay let me be more
0:52:08 clear about this right so allah he
0:52:11 mentions
0:52:12 he mentions
0:52:23 he raises amongst you those who have
0:52:25 believed among you and those who have
0:52:26 been given
0:52:28 knowledge
0:52:30 this knowledge islamic knowledge
0:52:36 as you know the hadith very famous
0:52:38 whoever wants good allah who wants good
0:52:40 for them allah he gives them knowledge
0:52:42 of the religion or understanding of the
0:52:43 religion even yeah
0:52:44 now the thing is like when men are
0:52:47 looking for women to get married to or
0:52:49 women are looking to men this whole red
0:52:50 pill community what do they favor oh
0:52:52 she's gotta look like this she's gotta
0:52:54 be like eight out of ten not saying that
0:52:56 a good-looking woman is not important
0:52:58 i'm not saying a a a rich husband is not
0:53:01 it's not good to have but what i'm
0:53:03 saying is that when the prophet muhammad
0:53:05 said
0:53:08 that the woman is married for four
0:53:09 things
0:53:26 but be successful with the one who is
0:53:29 religious now why is this important
0:53:31 because you know and now we he mentions
0:53:34 in
0:53:34 this hadith
0:53:36 he says it when when the prophet
0:53:38 muhammad said
0:53:47 he's not saying you should marry a woman
0:53:49 for four things
0:53:50 he's saying that these are the four
0:53:52 things ah these are the four things that
0:53:53 women are married for but and the
0:53:55 prophet said okay these are important he
0:53:58 didn't say like you know go for the one
0:53:59 who's most beautiful who's eight out of
0:54:00 ten or nine or ten he didn't say go with
0:54:02 the one who's got the most money he says
0:54:04 go with the one who's most religious
0:54:06 now the same thing applies for the woman
0:54:08 like you can have someone who doesn't
0:54:10 have as much money who might be in a
0:54:12 council property who might be whatever
0:54:14 but he's he's a man of piety he's known
0:54:17 in the community you know i'm trying to
0:54:18 say he's memorized the quran he's done
0:54:20 this he's done that
0:54:22 that person
0:54:23 okay is higher if if his class is in
0:54:26 place
0:54:27 in the hierarchy that allah has put for
0:54:29 him
0:54:32 so
0:54:33 i think a lot of these disciples get
0:54:34 colored with
0:54:36 a capitalistic lens and we have to
0:54:37 really be careful because this is not
0:54:39 ours it's like feminism it creeps in but
0:54:41 we have to remember what is the
0:54:43 hierarchy the prophet muhammad hadith
0:54:46 um he mentioned
0:54:56 that the whole dunya is cursed and
0:54:58 everything inside of it is cursed except
0:55:00 for the remembrance of allah and someone
0:55:02 who is a teacher who knows and he was a
0:55:04 teacher and someone who's learning so
0:55:07 there's three there's three things you
0:55:08 want in your life
0:55:09 of allah
0:55:10 and you want
0:55:12 to teach the deen which is the most
0:55:14 important thing even though other
0:55:16 knowledges are important as well because
0:55:17 the prophet salallahu
0:55:28 but you know so this is a thing that
0:55:29 sometimes in these discords we're
0:55:30 talking about men need to be men
0:55:33 what do do we mean that they need to
0:55:34 start studying the religion by that do
0:55:36 we mean that they need to start going to
0:55:37 pray to pray five times a day by that
0:55:39 wake up for fajr by that do we mean that
0:55:41 when the quran says
0:55:44 you know and then
0:55:46 from the the the the mutmans are rijal
0:55:50 uh oh sorry the other area which talks
0:55:55 which refers which which links
0:55:57 masculinity with with cleanliness what's
0:55:59 what's that link
0:56:00 what's that got to do with alpha and
0:56:02 beta sorry nothing's it if you go on the
0:56:04 quran just forget about the sorry to say
0:56:06 but just go to the quran
0:56:08 and look at what there's 23 or 24
0:56:10 instances with where the radical rajulan
0:56:11 is mentioned
0:56:13 i mentioned anytime
0:56:15 the word man is mentioned look at what
0:56:17 it's connected to it's connected to iman
0:56:19 it's connected to
0:56:21 cleanliness
0:56:23 it's connected to
0:56:25 uh
0:56:26 protection
0:56:27 and maintenance like what you've said
0:56:29 but what we what we do
0:56:31 sometimes we just focus on that one
0:56:32 thing which is
0:56:34 we forget about all the rest
0:56:36 you know what can i just say i i hear
0:56:38 you and i and i agree with you given you
0:56:40 know expanded my thinking on it as well
0:56:42 mashaallah but i i think
0:56:45 i don't know what it's like now because
0:56:47 i think that the
0:56:48 the landscape has changed so much from
0:56:51 when we were kind of coming up because
0:56:54 when we were coming up it was very clear
0:56:57 who was on dean and who wasn't
0:56:59 sisters got hijab
0:57:01 you were safe to make certain making
0:57:03 yourself out to be like a older woman
0:57:05 sister like what you're wondering yes i
0:57:07 am no no no i told you i'm an otg i'm an
0:57:10 auntie
0:57:18 it was safe to make certain assumptions
0:57:20 about her lifestyle about her values
0:57:22 about the kind of marriage she was
0:57:24 looking for similarly if her brother had
0:57:26 a beard and a soap and he went to pray
0:57:28 at the masjid it was safe to make
0:57:30 certain assumptions about what he
0:57:32 expected in a marriage the role he was
0:57:34 going to play his lifestyle etc my
0:57:37 friend those days are gone those days
0:57:40 are gone
0:57:41 those days are gone because
0:57:44 we are such a mix of the elements right
0:57:47 now you've got sisters in hijab in the
0:57:50 club
0:57:51 you've got brothers in
0:57:53 selling drugs you know
0:57:55 you've got you know this one here with
0:57:57 the pornography addiction you've got
0:57:59 that one over there who's kind of you
0:58:00 know messing about with girls
0:58:02 it's it's completely
0:58:04 it's no longer black and white so and i
0:58:07 think as well
0:58:08 people experienced this idea of marrying
0:58:11 only for dean and let's be fair it's the
0:58:14 appearance isn't it of dean and that's
0:58:16 the danger because a lot of people did
0:58:18 have the appearance of dean
0:58:20 meanwhile they've got mental health
0:58:22 issues meanwhile they've got anger
0:58:24 management issues meanwhile she she's
0:58:26 you know she's angry with the kids and
0:58:27 she beats them when she doesn't look
0:58:28 after the house nice
0:58:30 stuff happening yeah so
0:58:32 i agree with you the dean should be a
0:58:35 priority however
0:58:37 there is a danger of us becoming
0:58:40 kind of
0:58:41 fooled by people's exteriors it's not
0:58:44 that simple anymore because as i said
0:58:46 even though the muslims that you see now
0:58:48 if you bring a whole group of practicing
0:58:49 muslims together who are don't all go to
0:58:51 the same places you'll find that their
0:58:53 virgin their views on things are
0:58:55 different their lifestyles are different
0:58:57 they're certain things they consider to
0:58:58 be just fine certain things that i want
0:59:00 to marry like this on a marriage like
0:59:01 that so it's not so simple anymore um
0:59:04 and i think that people need to be
0:59:05 really honest with themselves and
0:59:07 realize that the appearance of dean on
0:59:09 somebody's external is not all there is
0:59:12 to know about that person you do need to
0:59:14 do your due diligence you need to peel
0:59:15 back the layers and we need to be honest
0:59:17 with ourselves
0:59:19 that's that's what we need to do we have
0:59:20 to have the dean as a standard yes
0:59:23 all i'm saying is we're not in a place
0:59:25 anymore where you can say she looks
0:59:26 religious i'll marry her oh no
0:59:29 you can't do that he looks religious
0:59:30 mashallah i've you know how many times
0:59:32 i've heard head sisters marrying
0:59:34 brothers who have mental health issues
0:59:37 yeah bipolar schizophrenia anger
0:59:40 management whatever but what did they
0:59:42 say at the masjid mashallah is a good
0:59:43 brother mashallah is a good brother he's
0:59:45 always in the masjid praying what does
0:59:47 that mean
0:59:49 what does that mean
0:59:51 if you don't know him beyond he sits in
0:59:53 the dark
0:59:54 i'm sorry i can't accept just that as a
0:59:56 witness i i have to get a bit more
0:59:58 information than that you know and same
0:59:59 with the sister the sisters are crazy
1:00:01 out there sisters who literally have
1:00:04 mental health issues and they mashallah
1:00:06 wrap up really nicely covered in hijab
1:00:09 everything mashallah sister
1:00:10 salaamwalekum everything everything you
1:00:12 marry that sister you find that she's
1:00:13 actually crazy so
1:00:16 that's all i'm saying it's it's not as
1:00:17 simple as that anymore
1:00:19 stuff out there that's why i said
1:00:21 protecting the family unit
1:00:23 by making sure that we are all healing
1:00:26 firstly and that's that's big
1:00:28 because so many of us are carrying
1:00:30 traumas and and it's not like our
1:00:32 parents generation you know i had this
1:00:34 conversation with fatima about katala in
1:00:36 our ilm feed podcast and i talked about
1:00:37 our parents and our grandparents
1:00:40 their lives were much harder than ours
1:00:42 right much harder i'm sure your
1:00:43 grandparents had had you know they may
1:00:45 have gone through some wars you know the
1:00:48 immigration the racism the you know
1:00:50 poverty living on the streets all this
1:00:52 kind of thing but when you ask them
1:00:54 about it it's a long gone memory they
1:00:56 don't even remember it and they
1:00:57 certainly don't say i was scarred for
1:01:00 life like i i've never gotten over it
1:01:03 it's like it was life that's what
1:01:05 happened i think you know what it is
1:01:07 neymar on this point
1:01:08 do you know do you know like a lot of
1:01:10 today's conversations to cut you off
1:01:11 please remember where you stopped yeah
1:01:13 a lot of what you said today you
1:01:15 mentioned like key term we talked about
1:01:17 the patriarchy and how it can be
1:01:18 misappropriated or it can be misused and
1:01:21 or if it is used it has some negative
1:01:24 connotation we talked about alpha beta
1:01:25 on the other flip side but this this
1:01:28 term trauma which has become almost a
1:01:29 buzzword now as well i feel like that
1:01:32 itself can be
1:01:33 it can reinforce the bad memory like oh
1:01:35 i have traumas
1:01:37 like the lexicon has changed to the
1:01:39 extent where the lexicon has changed
1:01:41 yeah there's trauma there's triggered
1:01:44 yeah triggers like a trauma yeah exactly
1:01:47 and what that does is it just it's kind
1:01:48 of like
1:01:49 if anything sometimes it can have a
1:01:51 negative it can have it can have an
1:01:52 adverse effect because it's just it's
1:01:54 like like you said
1:01:57 all my all my grandparents are gone now
1:01:59 but when i was when i was speaking to
1:02:00 them when they were alive or even my
1:02:03 parents you know
1:02:04 they don't speak in that language that
1:02:06 language is unusual that is unusual
1:02:08 language because
1:02:09 the presupposition is almost that we
1:02:12 shouldn't be it's like we're entitled to
1:02:14 a life without trial that's the
1:02:15 presupposed world problems yeah yeah
1:02:19 but even first world problems like the
1:02:21 people in the first world think that
1:02:22 they shouldn't be trialed like
1:02:24 this
1:02:27 the quran says people think that they'll
1:02:28 just be left alone to say we believe and
1:02:30 they will not be trialed
1:02:32 you know and the reality is like that
1:02:34 you know the trials of this life are for
1:02:36 everyone you know every one of us not
1:02:38 just the believers disbelievers muslim
1:02:40 men women young old everybody everyone's
1:02:43 going to get a piece of life says in his
1:02:45 book
1:02:46 um it's a very good book some of it has
1:02:48 been translated
1:02:50 it's one of the best books you can
1:02:51 probably read on these matters and he
1:02:53 was talking about like
1:02:55 um
1:02:56 the trials and stuff and he was it was
1:02:57 he was basically describing the dunya as
1:02:59 a combination of heaven and hell
1:03:01 basically if you uh he's not that he
1:03:04 didn't put it in that language like i am
1:03:06 paraphrasing okay but if you put
1:03:08 evidence together you have done if you
1:03:09 want to put it you know it's i like that
1:03:11 that that make that yeah i like that you
1:03:13 know what i mean is there's a reason why
1:03:16 there's a reason why there's a bit of
1:03:18 hell in the bit of heaven in this dunya
1:03:20 it's like allah didn't give us either or
1:03:22 gave us both because
1:03:24 it's it's the place it's the testing
1:03:26 ground
1:03:27 for the graduation to take place and it
1:03:29 will test it we'll see you the true
1:03:30 colors we were talking about certain
1:03:32 things happen which expose people's true
1:03:34 colors
1:03:35 yeah this dunya is the is the biggest
1:03:37 thing that happens which expose all of
1:03:39 our spiritual true colors
1:03:41 of judgment is what's going to put us
1:03:42 it's where the results of of
1:03:45 that is going to be manifest
1:03:47 100 i mean i think you know this uh this
1:03:49 issue of and again this is why i keep
1:03:51 talking about the cultural context that
1:03:53 we live in because it does affect us you
1:03:55 know we can't none of us can say
1:03:57 very few of us and i think only those
1:03:59 few are the ones who are steeped in
1:04:02 islamic knowledge and that's a tiny
1:04:04 minority of us majority of us yeah just
1:04:06 me and my friends actually now
1:04:07 [Laughter]
1:04:09 you heard it here
1:04:12 um
1:04:13 steeped in islamic knowledge
1:04:15 and the your islamic knowledge informs
1:04:19 your thinking it your islamic knowledge
1:04:21 is actually the thing that is your
1:04:23 thinking is rooted in that
1:04:25 it's a tiny handful of people in the
1:04:27 world yeah because because you read
1:04:29 quran doesn't mean that your thinking is
1:04:31 like rooted in islam it's not the case
1:04:33 yeah but what my point is that
1:04:36 even you know and i i've been
1:04:37 transparent about this you know at the
1:04:39 end of the day i'm not a scholar i'm
1:04:40 just a person
1:04:42 um
1:04:43 and you know for example hierarchies i
1:04:45 always talk about maslow's hierarchy of
1:04:47 me yeah yeah
1:04:49 honey we're just trying our best but
1:04:50 maslow's hierarchy of needs i find is
1:04:52 very very um very instructive and i know
1:04:56 because people have said that's not our
1:04:58 hierarchy of needs we have a different
1:05:00 hierarchy just to explain to the viewers
1:05:02 just because this might be something
1:05:04 they don't know it's basically a
1:05:06 triangular structure at the bottom of
1:05:08 which is like you know you have your
1:05:09 basic needs like shelter
1:05:12 whatever and at the top of the pinnacle
1:05:14 of this triangular structure is
1:05:15 something called self-actualization and
1:05:17 according to maslow people like einstein
1:05:19 would have
1:05:19 have achieved this self-actualization
1:05:21 people like i don't know choose whoever
1:05:23 you want fill in the blank you know
1:05:25 successful so-called successful goats
1:05:27 basically the goats
1:05:29 the goats and whatever but it's good
1:05:30 it's good like you said it is i think
1:05:32 that's a good way to put it is
1:05:33 definitely instructive because
1:05:35 it gives us something to
1:05:37 to opt for the islam sorry the quran is
1:05:39 in the hadith where the prophet muhammad
1:05:41 has his own triangular
1:05:43 structure which is
1:05:45 islam and then the five pillars
1:05:47 and then the six pillars then yeah
1:05:55 you know we've got our own one but
1:05:56 certainly i think is destructive as well
1:05:59 yeah
1:05:59 keep going that's interesting to me so
1:06:01 what's interesting to me with this
1:06:03 hierarchy of needs um at the bottom is
1:06:06 basic needs food shelter uh you know
1:06:09 food drink shelter i think it is um i
1:06:11 think intimacy is in there
1:06:13 yeah next up from that is emotional
1:06:16 needs i believe uh and then it's sort of
1:06:19 uh i think it's not professional but
1:06:21 it's like mission and then self actually
1:06:23 social structures
1:06:27 guys go and google it please it's there
1:06:29 for everyone to see but my point is this
1:06:32 is that
1:06:33 my observation is that when the lower
1:06:36 people are on the hierarchy of needs as
1:06:39 in if you're still at basic needs level
1:06:42 it's very easy to be satisfied because
1:06:44 all you need is your basic needs to be
1:06:46 met
1:06:47 once you have transcended basic needs
1:06:49 and you start to go into higher pursuits
1:06:52 the higher you go
1:06:54 and the higher you aim on that triangle
1:06:57 the more likely you are to be frustrated
1:07:00 and disappointed because not everybody
1:07:02 reaches the top of that triangle some
1:07:04 people stay on the basic level some
1:07:06 people will go up to having their
1:07:07 emotional needs met but there are
1:07:08 children even today who don't get their
1:07:10 emotional needs met we know this okay
1:07:12 maybe they have a home maybe their
1:07:14 parents feed them they make sure they go
1:07:16 to school but their emotional needs are
1:07:17 not being met maybe the parents don't
1:07:19 know how to do it maybe the parents
1:07:20 themselves never had the emotional needs
1:07:22 met whatever the case may be anyway i
1:07:23 digress
1:07:25 my point is
1:07:26 we need to be careful because we're
1:07:28 living in a world where that bottom is
1:07:31 done first world problems means that
1:07:33 we're always looking at
1:07:35 self-actualization we're looking at you
1:07:36 know me you know kind of finding myself
1:07:39 and and becoming the better version of
1:07:41 myself and and
1:07:42 and and and usually not in a religious
1:07:44 way but in other ways right
1:07:46 i think my concern for my community
1:07:50 is that we aim so high
1:07:52 that we
1:07:53 firstly neglect to be grateful for what
1:07:55 we have
1:07:57 and we also are not able to be satisfied
1:08:00 so we are constantly chasing the dragon
1:08:03 and that means that we're always in this
1:08:06 perpetual state of chasing after the
1:08:08 dunya because that's what it is it's
1:08:10 chasing dunya and that dunya could be
1:08:13 the relationship
1:08:14 it could be money it could be uh you
1:08:17 know a certain lifestyle it could be
1:08:19 academic pursuits whatever it is right
1:08:22 but
1:08:22 i just want us to be
1:08:25 circumspect i think and try to have a
1:08:27 balanced approach to it because even in
1:08:29 relationships we're seeing it you know
1:08:31 people expect more from their
1:08:32 relationships now than they did 20 years
1:08:34 ago even muslims and i think that is one
1:08:37 of the other reasons that is driving
1:08:38 high divorce rates in the community
1:08:40 because one partner has a higher
1:08:42 expectation for the relationship than
1:08:44 the other and the other one is perfectly
1:08:47 satisfied listen
1:08:49 we're together
1:08:51 you cook for me
1:08:53 i've got wonderful kids
1:08:55 i'm happy i'm good
1:08:57 she's like we don't do date nights
1:09:00 you never listen to me
1:09:01 you don't really see me i feel like you
1:09:03 don't appreciate me i want more
1:09:06 i want a best friend i want a companion
1:09:09 i want all new things yeah these are new
1:09:11 things because when they first got
1:09:13 together this was not the conversation
1:09:14 when they first got together it was
1:09:16 bismillah for the sake of allah you're
1:09:18 going to give me your rights you're
1:09:19 going to give me my rights i'm going to
1:09:20 give you your rights it's easy yeah
1:09:22 because remember back in the day that's
1:09:23 what everybody thought a successful
1:09:25 marriage is what two people get married
1:09:27 for the sake of allah they fulfill each
1:09:28 other's rights happily ever after that's
1:09:30 what people thought
1:09:31 but the more we want and the more we
1:09:33 demand from our partners and i'm going
1:09:35 to switch this because i don't want to
1:09:36 be accused of bias
1:09:38 let me switch it
1:09:40 say it say it say we want to hear that
1:09:42 we want to hit a few more problems as
1:09:43 well yeah i'm going to say so the sister
1:09:45 is no this is not this is the husband's
1:09:47 problem because the sister's problem a
1:09:48 lot of the time is
1:09:50 you know she has a vision for her life
1:09:52 and a vision for her relationship but
1:09:54 her husband doesn't meet her there
1:09:56 anymore like maybe her vision was here
1:09:58 before once she starts to elevate that
1:10:00 vision he's not following her he's like
1:10:03 what are you doing all that for like
1:10:04 you're doing too much just relax we're
1:10:05 good and she's like but i want this but
1:10:07 i need that and her needs are changing
1:10:09 she's she's evolving she's becoming a
1:10:11 different person so that has caused a
1:10:13 lot of friction and i've seen this more
1:10:15 and more in the community right so
1:10:17 that's that
1:10:18 flip side
1:10:20 sisters like alhamdulillah i've got my
1:10:22 husband i've got my kids you know we
1:10:24 don't have all the money in the world
1:10:25 but we're happy yeah and i'm i'm happy
1:10:27 with where we're at meanwhile the
1:10:29 husband's like you put on weight
1:10:32 you know yeah and he's thinking of you
1:10:34 know like
1:10:35 how could my life maybe he likes that
1:10:36 maybe maybe no no then we're flipping it
1:10:39 we're flipping it remember so for him
1:10:41 he's thinking i i'm this person i should
1:10:43 have this type of wife a lot of our
1:10:45 brothers unfortunately are you know
1:10:47 not a lot no i'm gonna say a lot of our
1:10:50 brothers porn addiction is a thing
1:10:53 my wife doesn't do what those women do
1:10:55 this is a problem for me