Hamzah Wald Maqbul – The Struggle To Know Episode 003 Youth & Spiritual Self Defence Coach Kahari Hicks
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AI: Transcript ©
Welcome back to the struggle to know.
Today, we're we have a very special guest
on.
But before we get into the introductions,
I'd like to,
as usual, thank the Cleveland Public Library for,
lending the support with the audio and video
equipment that we're using to record this podcast,
and,
let's get started.
And with you, as usual, myself,
Hamza Mahbou,
currently Imam at the Islamic Center of Cleveland
and
Musa Sikulpam,
locally in the Cleveland area, doing what I
can,
teaching classes, teaching the at the,
Darul Qasem as well as,
overseeing a number of very vital and important
activities, in the community for youth and for
people new to Islam or interested in Islam.
And we're coming, to you live, on location,
from Sheikh Musa's house. If you're wondering where
all the forest,
background went, it actually started raining, and we
don't want to,
in any way damage the library's equipment. So
we
basically are under the cover of the garage
and you can still hear the birds in
the background. We get a lot of good
feedbacks about the feedback about the birds. So
our,
special guest this week is coach Kahari Hicks.
He is
a a a a local,
teacher,
in public school.
Yeah. And he is,
one of the
most well known and well renowned, football coaches,
in,
in in Northeast Ohio, if not all of
Ohio, if not really all of the country,
to honest with you. And, inshallah, I'm we're
gonna ask you a little bit, coach, to
to say a little bit about yourself, your
background, and, your journey,
so that we can kick off the,
the discussion properly. But before that, I wanted
to maybe take a moment and,
hear from you about a very special brother,
brother Lukman Williams,
who's a common, acquaintance of, I believe, all
of us.
The first time I met him was in
Morocco when I was on my way to,
study in Mauritania,
and, he actually, kept me in his home
for a couple of days when I didn't
have a place to stay,
which is a very common,
a very common occurrence when you go out
in the path of path of Allah and
the path of knowledge. And, at times like
that, you know who who really values this
deen and who, you know, to whom, you
know, people in that situation are an annoyance.
And,
he he passed away, relatively recently. And may
Allah forgive his sins and elevate his maqam
and,
make all of the good impact that he
had on all of us.
Is Sadaq Hajariyah
for him. I'm telling you, Mokiyama.
So Insha'Allah,
coach, would you like to first first off
to share a little bit about, brother Lukman's,
impact on you? Because I know a lot
of people who are gonna listen to this
are going to
have something or another, to say about, you
know, his impact on
them.
Sidi Lukeman, may Allah have mercy upon him.
Amen. I I had the fortune of meeting
him shortly after I took my shahada in
1996
through Cleveland State, and Luke Mahon was just
always about the spiritual development and having a
plan.
And I just think that, you know, ultimately,
it's just just a it's a it's such
a blessing to have him in in in
my life
just because of what he was able to
do. He formulated the Cleveland study group, really
introduced a lot of people to traditional,
thick.
You know, Luke Miles and Malachy.
But, you know, just encourage people to follow
some somebody's thick and and follow somebody's love
hub and get on somebody's tariqa
just so you could get some spiritual development.
And Luke Mount was always about having a
program, and I think that's something that's direly
missing from a lot of Muslims now. It's
just a spiritual program,
and so he kinda really left the blue
print through a lot of the information that
he posted on Facebook
and just always focusing on,
you know, getting ready for what's to come,
and that's the grave. I just think the
most pointed thing that Luke Mahn ever said
to me
was just talking about Ramadan
and how,
you know and Lukeman was and everyone that
knows Lukeman, he always did a sports analogies
with Islam. It's one of the things I
think he was so gifted at. And so
he always talked about Ramadan being the playoffs
and how the best players, they elevate their
game in the playoffs when the stakes are
high. And he said, you can't elevate your
game in the postseason if your preparation wasn't
right. So if you're just having if you're
if you're not really praying, you're engaging all
kinds of Haram
prior to Ramadan.
There's just you're not gonna flip the proverbial
switch and just say, okay. Here I am.
I'm gonna make, you know, 20.
I'm gonna catch Leo Tokuter.
And that's just the most pointed thing to
me from Luke Miles just talking about the
benefit of just preparation,
you know, and ultimately,
you know, please keep him him in your
duas
as, you know, we will all need someone
to make duas for us after we're gone.
May Allah reward Luke Mahon immensely. Make him
give us a spacious grade, admit him to
Jenna with no accounting and no punishment. I
mean. I mean. I mean. So, coach,
shifting gears,
please,
tell us a little bit about yourself. Where
were you born?
You know, where did you go to school?
What is your journey in Islam?
And, kinda what are you currently,
currently into professionally and in terms of your
deen? Okay.
So, you know, I'm born and raised in
Cleveland, Ohio.
I went to Cleveland Heights High School, very
diverse school district. I actually had a lot
of
Muslim friends.
That was probably my first attraction to Islam
is that all the Muslim names. I said,
oh, man. His name was, like,
Muhammad
Abdul Kareem. I said, oh, I I love
that name. It sounds lovely. And so, you
know, it sounded you know, just even the
names were just, you know, Allah's attributes. You
know? Even as a non Muslim,
there was something drawing me to that already.
And so
I end up, leaving Cleveland Heights and playing
college football at a institution called Mercyhurst over
in Erie, Pennsylvania.
And I was actually roommates with a a
man a brother, very close brother of mine
named, Baham Bakar.
And he was Muslim. And during 2 a
days, when we go come back for our
2nd practice,
the adhan will always seem to go off.
So I I I I say I learned
a lot of the adhan before I became
Muslim. They had, like, the little old school
mask that would that would play the adhan.
And so they're telling I'm slapping the adhan,
try to get it to go off, but
it won't go off. So I I I
think through my whole journey, there are always
things that, you know, kinda pointed me to
Islam that that was something that was coming
for me. And so Bahim and I had
a lot of in-depth conversations, and that's always
a point of
Dua is just through behavior. And so you
think you can just beat somebody over the
head and think they're gonna accept Islam.
And I just watched him, and I studied
him because that's I'm a I I I'm
a very observant person, and he just asked
a lot of questions that, you know, I'll
never forget. We will come back from a
party, and he's getting up for fudger. I'm
like, you
know, what's making this person do that? And
he's sticking his feet in the sink. I'm
I'm like, mom, this guy is washing his
feet. Like, what's wrong with him? You know?
And it's you know?
But it was all it's like foreshadowing.
And so when I let when I was
done playing at Mercyhurst, I went to Kent,
met a couple brothers there and took Shahad,
and I Brahim was the first one I
called, and he couldn't believe it. You know,
he said, wow. You became Muslim. And he
said it just made him elevate his game.
But I graduated from Kent State, got a
degree in, education.
I went, to the Cleveland Public School System
for 3 years before I end up going
out to Painesville.
So I've been, teaching now. This will be
year number 21 in Shaw law coming up
in the fall, and I've also been a
football coach the same amount of time I've
been a school teacher. So I started coaching
at Cleveland Heights, And that journey took me
to several other schools and, you know, in
a in a circle back to Cleveland Heights.
So it's been a,
interesting ride, but, you know, just getting a
chance to interact with youth,
99% of your day, you know, just gives
you a unique perspective. So I'm an 8th
grade English teacher and a football coach.
Tell me something tell me something about,
about being a teacher.
Tell me something about Cleveland Heights, being a
teacher in Cleveland Heights. Tell me something about
the the place that you're a coach. Are
there the same schools?
Okay. I got you. So I I teach
in Painesville.
Uh-huh. And so Painesville is a very diverse
district. We're probably about 40% Hispanic and then
a mix of white, black, and just mixed
students. Mhmm.
And go ahead. Economically?
Socioeconomically,
probably about 90% of kids are on free
and reduced lunch.
So, you know, it's it's it's an interesting,
you know, dynamic.
Coaching at Cleveland Heights, it's a it's a
very mixed community in terms of socioeconomics.
You'll have section 8 in one area. Mhmm.
And you can literally drive 6 minutes later
and be at a $1,000,000 house. So it's
really, really diverse, and so our team is
like like that. We have some kids. Their
parents do really well. Some kids, their parents
do okay. Some kids, their their their family
struggle. But, you know, I think that's probably
what makes it a good situation is that
you have all kinds of kids
in my classroom in Painesville and on my
football team coming together. So I think that's
probably beneficial just for,
you know, getting to know people. And, like,
you know,
being a teacher,
I guess people don't really know or think
about that,
a lot. But, being a teacher is a
it's a struggle. It's not easy. And it's
a thankless job, not only in terms of,
you know, the paycheck, but,
the students, the parents, all this other stuff.
But at the same time, it's like this
really noble thing. Like, you know, Sheikh Musa
and I, you know, I don't wanna speak
for him. Maybe he speak for himself, but,
it was drilled into us that this is
the the, you
know, the son is.
He and I wasn't sent except for as
a as a teacher.
That there's, like, something sacred about it. The
sacrifice and what you give from your heart
to people who will never understand,
but you give for the sake of Allah.
I mean, I I
wanna know a little bit
coming from teaching the dean.
At least there is some acknowledgment of the
sacredness of that process
in, you know, amongst those who are learning,
the dean. Like, how is it how do
you struggle and cope with
just not even having acknowledgment from your students,
and having students sometimes that their their brain
is just in a different zone, whether it's
their own financial struggles or whether it's their
drunkenness from, you know, the dunya or whatever.
Like, how is it how do you keep
giving from yourself, you know, despite that?
I think, ultimately,
you know, you I've even heard you mention
this, that your heart has to be in
the right place. And if you recognize that
you're gonna die, you're gonna go in the
grave, you're gonna come before a law, then
you can't worry about
what other people said. I think and even
in the aphorisms of, like,
you know, the key to the spiritual path
is indifference to people's opinions of you. So
My heart hurts. It's it's also kind of
a situation where,
you know, you just have to have a
pure heart and understand that what you're you're
trying to give to people
and whether they give back to you is
completely irrelevant
because,
ultimately, you're gonna meet a law. So when
you deal with students
that are in great that they're not grateful
for what you do, parents,
whether it's coaching or whether it's teaching,
honestly, I think that's just part of the
trial. We all get tried in different ways,
and you'll get some very ungrateful people. There's
a person that I helped get a scholarship,
probably
covered everything, probably about a $190,000
scholarship, and he took to social media saying
how bad of a coach I was. And
so
it was actually more so a lesson for
me than it was for him because
who am I? You know, look what the
law has has blessed me and my family
with for me to even to worry about
what someone else thinks about me. So I
think that's just the biggest things that you
have to do and not expect in return
because, you know, a law provides the risk
in this life and in the next. So
when you're when you're dealing with ungrateful people,
it's actually more of a lesson for you.
Like, what do we take? What do we
take for granted? Like, the rain that falls.
And we have we have people dying in
Yemen every 10 minutes, and we just throw
food away. So it it it it it
that's probably been the thing that I try
to check myself with is when someone so
you never did anything from me. I'm like,
man, who are you? But then I have
to go back and check myself, like, you
know, I have a working car,
you know, and the most of the world
lives on $2 a day.
So, you know, what do I really have
to complain about?
And, ultimately, I have a lot to account
for myself in terms of what I've been
given. So you it really teaches you just
to shut up and just to really focus
on yourself.
Was education something you got into even before
you were a Muslim? That's a path you've
started,
you know, taking,
professionally
when you were studying as a university student,
or was that something you decided you wanted
to get into after you became
Muslim?
Because, again, it it does take a special
person. And as a Muslim, we can kind
of have a broader perspective and a bigger
picture and understand that we don't need everything
here. But if you don't have that type
of consciousness, it's hard to give yourself like
that. Right. So I'm just curious to know
if, like, education was something that you were
into before you were a Muslim or not.
It's funny you mentioned that because I think
this is the from the key components to
education.
I wanna be a physical therapist.
And when I went to college,
at first,
I felt like there are people who weren't
really making me believe I could do it.
And as a teacher, I wanna make sure
that my students
are they feel like they can do anything.
You know, obviously,
but
no one really
they didn't say that they supported me in
that. They did they made me feel like
I couldn't do it.
And I started looking at my dad and
my mom and, like, all my family were
educators, and I always like to work with
children anyway.
And so I took that major,
and that was, you know, a year before
I became Muslim. And so after I became
Muslim,
I just I continued on with that until
I graduated. But I think it's important to
support people in what is it that that
they wanna do. Because so many times, we
tell people, especially ethnic minorities,
well, you should do this. You know, when
I first got to campus, someone said, you
know, are you oh, you must be a
football player. I'm like,
you know, we all knew where that came
from, but, you know, I think that's part
of the issue in education is you have
to support the kids in trying to want
to reach their dreams. Right.
So you you mentioned also,
brother Brahim,
and, you know, that might be another future
discussion in itself. And, hopefully, when he's in
in town, we can can have him have
a conversation with him. But you you you
said that you became Muslim after that. Mhmm.
So so what was the,
I guess, the the final,
factor that made you accept Islam and who
was that through?
And, would you say Brahim was your primary
influence in exposure, and how did him being
African American influence your decision?
Brahim and I just we we hit it
off immediately.
You know? And there's so many stories. You
know? I didn't realize I know Muslims couldn't
couldn't even eat pork. So we were ordering
a pizza, and I said he said, what
do you wanna get? I said pepperoni. He
said, can't eat that. I'm like, okay. Sausage?
He said, can't eat that either. I said,
okay. Like, dude, what can you eat? He
said, I can eat mushrooms.
I said I said I said, bro. Like,
they say, bro. No. I said, bro. Cheese
and mushroom? He said, yes. So we always
got cheese. And to this day, yeah, that's
like the big thing on pizza is cheese
and mushroom, like, humbly lie, like the effect
that you have. And so, you know, Brahim
asked me a really simple question, you know,
and I and, I was never raised like
that that prophet
was was a law. But he just said
he said for people who say he is,
who'd he pray to. And that was the
start of my journey because at the time,
I had a girlfriend. And I asked her.
I said I said, what
do you say to this? And she got
so angry. She got irate. And I said,
That's like a major red flag right there.
And so, you know, to get that irate
over a simple question that she was, like,
tongue twisted to answer. And so once I
went on to Kent State, I'll never forget.
I'm sitting up on the 2nd floor overlooking
the commons there with my friend Fred Wheat.
And and this is why this is why
I always say, this is not you. This
is Allah. And something just came over me.
I said, I'm about to become Muslim. He
said, what? Not in a way like it
was bad. So I'm about to become Muslim.
You know? Just because I'd a friend of
mine, Morris Irvin from Cleveland Heights, he went
there, and he had become Muslim in high
school. And, you know, we just started talking.
And I said, you know, I'm talking about
maybe a month into leaving Mercyhurst, I became
Muslim. And it was a it was a
challenge. You know, you become you become Muslim
on a college campus, but Brahim, through the
things that he said
and just my observation to him, I said,
man, this is this is right because there
are certain things that never sat in my
spirit before I became Muslim.
You know, I'll never forget this. We were
in the, a guy who got inducted to
the Heights Hall of Fame. He said, the
first thing I'll do is thank my savior,
lord, and savior Jesus Christ. And it just
never sat it just never sat well with
me. Even though I was raised Christian, I
said,
you know, that doesn't
that didn't move me like another human being
taking the hit for what I did. And
those things never made sense to me. Those
are kind of things that Ibrahim and I
talked about. But, you know,
I can honestly say him being black had
nothing to do with it because
I can just relate to anybody. But the
things he said and what I watched him
do,
nothing that's as important for anybody. You know,
watch how you behave because you are an
ambassador to Islam whether you like it or
not.
I ask because when when I became Muslim,
the first real Muslim I I engaged with
was another Filipino American. Okay. And when I
saw him, I saw myself
and
brother Eugene Daytona in the Bay Area in
California. And I'll reward him. I mean, yeah.
So he was like the first exposure, and
he had been Muslim 2 years.
So there's something about just relating
on a different type of a level that
That is important. Right. Right. So,
but but that was something kind of significant
with me.
So even though you didn't become Muslim in
the company while you were in the company
with with Brahim,
you would later kind of just accept it
on your own through Allah's guidance.
Absolutely. Right. Okay.
So maybe to, switch gears a little bit,
bit. I guess the reason I was so
excited to have coach,
Kahari on the podcast
was
I mean, in general,
I I have a good opinion of him,
but,
not only is he a a practicing Muslim
who's very serious about his his Islam, his
to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. I talked about
this a little bit in the paper that
I put out a a little bit ago
about the need for people being Muslim, not
in the kind of 5 501c3
nonprofit,
you know, like tax exempt church status
consumer. Like, you know, like, you go to
Walmart and you just buy something and then,
you know, you go back when you want
to,
you know, which which is kind of a
culture of of Dean that we have over
here where a person may go to because
we don't have, like, those
deep social connections with our neighbors or with
our, you know, extended families oftentimes.
So a person can go to Jomal, like,
you know, 5 weeks in a row, 6
week.
He's not there. Maybe because he's sick. Maybe
he just didn't wanna go. Maybe he, you
know, maybe,
God knows. And, like, 7th week, he'll be
back and nobody will ask. You know? So
there's a little bit of, like, a flimsiness
of commitment.
And,
one of the things that that that that
made me want to,
call someone like coach is that on top
of his
extensive work with the youth, and on top
of the fact that I see that,
his heart is really invested in their well-being
and that, like, we regularly even before I
came to Cleveland, we we we have communication
with each other that he'd have a question
about, about Dean or about, you know, FIP
or something like that,
in connection with what with some young person
that he's trying to help through a crisis
in his life.
And, so, so not only is he connected
with the the youth in a way that
can really tell us about
their issues,
in a way that, you know,
we grew up and become old and become
lame and forget about what it's like to
be, to be in those situations really quickly.
But on top of that, he's a salic.
You know? He's somebody who is a a
a dedicated person on traveling the path to
Allah,
not on this flimsy basis, not on this
wishy washy basis, but I see him time
and time again,
making himself present in all of those places
where a Muslim needs to be,
in order to in order to traverse that
path to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
So I I wanted to kick it off
by asking you this, that you are in
a unique position. You know the challenges that
young people go through,
in general, in this country, and in specific,
those of our African American brothers and sisters
who are oftentimes ignored in the Muslim community,
and whose needs kinda fall through the cracks
and are not addressed the way that they
need to be addressed. And we're not saying
this to, like, necessarily say bad to anybody
or to, like, you know, take a pot
shot at nobody.
But in order to, like, you know, maybe
share some awareness so that people people who
mean well but just didn't know any better,
you know, can can start to make those
decisions that they need to in order to,
you know, struggle to know, in order to
in order to start making those decisions that
will facilitate,
you know, those services for those young people.
And in particular, I wanted to know about
the African American Muslim youth in the Cleveland
area, but youth in general or African American
youth in general or Muslim youth in general,
or, you know, issues, you know, in general
in the Cleveland area. You know? Like, I
wanna hear about those things. Like, what is
it that you want now that you have
this platform? The, you know, the people who
listen to this podcast, what is it that
they need to know in order to make
better decisions?
Being a teacher
in the public school system,
you you see a lot.
And so
there has to be a space
for these young people to come together
because if there if there's not, they're gonna
destroy each other. I just you're gonna take
some harm
going to our public school system. I don't
care what anybody says that, you know, if
you haven't, the law has really,
really blessed you. I I I second that.
I literally wake up with the trauma and
go to sleep with it at night. So
I you know?
So from that standpoint
and I you know,
one thing I like about you and and
Sheik Musa, brother Trish, it's about action. Action.
And there has to be some type of
plan that comes in place
just talking like, one thing that I know
just talking to a lot of different young
Muslims. Right? We had one that played on
our football team, and his Adan app would
go off. And he would be so embarrassed
because it's you know? Now me, you know
me. I just don't care.
I'll be addressing the team, and my Adon
app will go up, and I won't even
I will not hit the button. I'll let
the whole Adon go through while talking because
it but for me, you know, that's just
me. I'm comfortable with my own skin, but
a lot of these young young people,
they are not. And so he would always
come and pray with me, but I always
make sure we pray in public so you
get used to not being afraid of what
other people think. And it's a natural thing.
You know, you you know, some people are
so hardcore. You should fear no one by
the law. I said, okay, man. You know?
You you know? And and so they put
a a rock on your chest like they
did Bilal then just crumble. You know?
So,
Excuse
me. So
we we have to provide some spaces for
them to be able to connect and talk
to each other
because there are a lot of influences pointing
them a lot of different ways. I was
talking to a former student. She said that
they used to throw pepperonis at her.
And, you know,
it's we're we're doing with 2 different generation
now. You're dealing with the the ones in
their twenties now.
When 911 came along, it was always hard
for them.
And now you're dealing with a different set.
They have a lot of different issues, and
it's this it's this device right here.
It's it's causing irreparable damage,
and we have to start finding ways to
get them together
so they can, you know, be amongst each
other because they're amongst a lot of people
that don't have their same agenda.
1 of my students told me about, you
know, the LGBTQ
thing is huge.
And if you
speak against it,
then they make it seem like you're like
you're like you're like some you're like a.
That's, that that that's how they make you
feel. Antichrist. Right? Right. An antichrist. And so,
you know, my my daughter, you know, she's
she came home and said, dad, they asked
me about, you know, do I believe in
the in the, LG I can't say all
these letters. But do you believe in that?
I said I said, what do you tell
them? I said, no. I don't believe in
that. And so but it's always it's a
constant combat with them. And then, you know,
you're being hit on different angles with the
fornication,
the adultery,
the music, and I just, you know, I
I I had I think as parents,
one thing parents need to know, you've got
to be a step ahead of your children.
You have to be. I think that's the
story of football coaching becomes where you have
to be a step ahead of your opponent.
You know, you have to always be on
the lookout. And I I'm sitting here, you
know, as I'm going through here, and I
I heard this song
and I looked up the lyrics, and it's
it's it's horrible. I I can't even repeat
this stuff
on on the air, but it it's a
call a song called savage. You look up
the lyrics by Megan Thee Stallion.
And some some of some of the lyrics
in here, just the degradation of women. And
this is a woman talking about
herself. And this is what our young Muslims
are listening to. And they're doing all the
dances and all these things. I think as
parents, we really have to start being connected
into what they are plugging
into, what they're watching on TV. You know,
like, a lot of these kids, they like
to watch the stuff on CW, whether it's
The Flash, Arrow,
Black Lightning,
Riverdale. I mean CW? It's a it's a
it's a TV network. Channel. Yeah. And so
but there's a hue every single show
has some type of
gay or lesbian relationship in it that adds
nothing to the show.
And so this is what our kids are
are watching. This is the music that they're
listening to. They're watching people shake their behinds
on camera,
and you're not gonna talk about that stuff
if you're around other Muslims. I just don't
believe you will. Even these young kids, they
won't talk about all these dances and stuff.
I think they have to have a safe
place
to be together, to talk. Well, that means
bring all the young Muslim brothers and let
them play ping pong.
Let them play basketball in the Masjid. Let
the sisters do those kind of things as
well because,
you know, it's kind of like
it it it's you versus
everybody, and you're the oddball. You know, I'm
talking to one of my friends. He said
that he said a guy a a a
a player that, plays at college now. He
said, coach, it was hard
for me to just sit there and pray
and stop one. He said, because you're so
embarrassed.
And that's one of the things that our
kids are being are being combated with. You
know? And this is all youth. It's just,
you know, our Muslim youth. Is what are
is they they feel so isolated.
And a lot of the sisters, they feel
ashamed to wear the hijab.
The brothers feel ashamed to wear a kufi
to school. And so, you know, then they
you know, the one one sister, she said,
you know, they called me a terrorist and
and things like that. They would make they
they would they would make fun of the
way we say.
They would just make fun of it and
they and make fun of a law's name.
And and so which is damaging to them
on a on a different on the person
who's saying on a different level. But for
our kids, I I we have to have
a safe space, you know, because now they
vent they go to social media, and they're
trying to vent. And this is, like, not
a therapeutic environment. No. You know? And so
I guess to summarize, I get that they
they need that. That there has to be
a way for all these Muslim youth to
to connect
at the masjid,
at a YMCA,
somewhere where they could just be amongst other
Muslims and just be able to interact and
feel comfortable,
Allahu Akbar.
Feel comfortable doing that. Feel comfortable wearing your
hijab.
I guess, you know, I guess that'll be
a starting point for me.
If I may chime in,
so,
thank you so much for sharing all this
information because,
I think it's
this this topic is so important, and it
is not spoken,
spoken to enough.
I also,
have been in a position where
I am working with the youth,
for many years,
within the Muslim community and outside the Muslim
community.
Again, I work at the Cleveland Public Library,
and libraries are the stop
between the school and home. Mhmm. So a
lot of the same students that are in
the schools, they stop at the library,
and they spend some time there before they
go home. You know, we have,
food bank programs and all kinds of activities
and stuff for the youth. And so I
totally
understand exactly what you're talking about because it's
a lot of the same things that happened
in the libraries.
And,
unfortunately,
at times, it's
a little crazier because library workers don't have
the authority,
that teachers kind of have. We don't have
that connection to the home. We don't have
that connection to the parents. And so they
act the youth can act a little more,
you know, wild. And so we we do
we do deal with that, and
what's important for us is building a relationship
with the youth to
kind of, you know,
hopefully inspire them to do better for themselves
and things like that.
But,
as I started to say also in the
Muslim community, one thing that I have tried
to talk about for years, and I still
believe that this is very true,
a lot of brothers and sisters who convert
to Islam,
we have a lot in common with the
youth.
I was 25 when I made my Shahada,
and
immediately, I found myself
dealing with the youth more frequently because we
were kinda coming from a similar world, so
to speak. What they're dealing within schools and
what they're dealing with,
on the streets and stuff like that,
we could relate.
It was a little bit different because, you
know, for myself and I think a lot
of people who convert to Islam, we're kinda
going away from that, and we're going towards
the Deen, and we want more of that.
Whereas for a lot of our youth,
they're kind of dealing with,
like, a duality.
The attraction of the attraction of the building.
You know, there's a part of the the
deen that's at home and in the masjid,
but then, you know, there's the whole element
of not being in either one of those
places. And so
some of the youth
would come to me and ask questions about,
like, why I became Muslim. And so that
conversation really opened up a lot of things,
whether it was certain issues that they were
going through that they didn't feel comfortable comfortable
talking to about with other people and things
like that. So,
I mean, I say all of this to
to say, the youth in general, Muslim or
not, they do need they need, guidance. They
need they need assistance, and they need a
lot from us,
our generation of people.
And and I'll kinda just end on this
note because I don't wanna, like, speak too
much here. But,
working with the youth frequently at the library,
one thing that I found
over the past 2 years or so is
my interaction with the youth.
It's upon a lot. Like, over time,
some of them came to me and and
said things like, we appreciate or we're happy
about the fact that you seem to care
about us just because they're so accustomed to
no one really paying attention to them, no
one actually talking to them about what's important
to them. So I think you're a 100%
right. We do need to build, like, safe
spaces,
that are not and I say this,
just being really directed by it, that safe
spaces that are not corny. You know?
Because the youth, they they're not gonna come
to something just because we built something that's
like, oh, you know, this is a cool
thing, you know, you should come to it.
Absolutely. You know what I mean? And
just to piggy piggyback off of that,
this whole, like, hey, dude, Islam. Good lord.
Protestantism
tried that in America, and that's why their
churches are empty. They
basically, parasitically
took the attendance from mainline
serious protestant,
churches
to this whole, like, you know, like, rock
band Jesus.
Like, you know, like, weird, like, you know,
like, type of setup, which filled, you know,
it filled the it filled the,
the the, you know, put bombs on seats,
to put the show business,
analogy to work.
But it's so empty that, like, when people
realize it's empty, then they just check out
from Dean altogether. Yeah. You know? Yeah. They're
gone. And so, I mean,
there's so much, coach.
I mean, along that line. Okay. One of
the things that I we were talking about
before we started
filming was what
The strange parallels between your,
as a as a Muslim, between
a a person's
spiritual development
and how it's more like the experience of
being coached on a sports team than being
taught in a classroom.
Like, a person has intellectual
development that's more like a analogous
analogous to the classroom.
And then you have, you know, like, your
spiritual development, though, it's not like that. It's
not like, you know, turning your homework by
by Friday. It's more like, you know, I
need more hustle, you know,
a move on it, you know, drop down,
give me 20 push ups because you didn't
do this right or whatever, you know. And
so how is it, like, you know, instead
of being on the back foot, like, oh,
look. The world is, like, gonna sack the
Islam of, like, every young person because
to be honest, you know, mobile phones and,
like, alphabet soup is, like, a very scary
thing to be up against. But to kind
of be on the front foot and, like,
proactive,
being respectable human beings as well.
How is it that we can employ those
those techniques as a coach that you that
that you're
adept at using in order to bring those
things out of your players for the sake
of our, youth and their team?
I think the the first thing is that,
like you said, you can't water down Islam
because we do that then,
you know, you you you have to
you have to be smart about how you
do it, but you can never water down
the Dean. But I think, ultimately, these kids,
just like just like a player, they want
to be challenged.
And so
the players who challenge you the mo the
the players who are challenged the most
respect you the most.
And so, you know, we have a guy
that's at Ohio State right now,
and he was always challenged.
And he respected that, but we have to
challenge the youth
and just be straight up upfront and honest
with them. I told one person. I said
I was talking to a a former student.
I said, what's the first thing asked about
on Yamakayama?
She said the prayer. I said Sure. I
said, Allah's giving you the first answer to
the quiz.
Now I'm I'm not saying
I'm not saying that I'm not I I
said, so how can you know that the
first question is a lot and you don't
pray?
You just have to be direct and honest.
I said, no. I'm not talking about
the quality of your prayer.
Whether, you know, the whore comes in at
what like, so sometimes they need to Brother,
we wanna have a movie night in the
mustard.
Yeah. And and and you know you know
what? And and that's fine. Just find the
right movie to show. Yeah. You know, how
how however that may be. I'm not even
that's that's above my pay grade. But if
so if Zohar comes in at 137
and you played it prayed at 3, that's
one thing, but just not praying at all.
Yeah. You know? And then your your your
your focus in slot, that's something totally different.
But the fact that you know that the
if you can tell me out your own
mouth that the prayer is the first thing
on the day of judgment and you don't
pray,
mind blown.
And you just have to be direct with
and I was direct with a a former
student at and she said, you know what?
That makes a lot of sense, mister Hicks.
I said, that's all I'm saying. I'm not
saying about,
you know, if you're praying it at its
at its at its recommended time versus praying
at the end. I'm just saying praying in
general. Pray the 5 daily prayers
because that's far. There's no negotiating that. Me
me and my daughter had a conversation about
that. There are certain things. There's no negotiating.
You have to make the 5 prayers. You
have to be direct with them. Mhmm. You
know?
And but like like the prophet, he's all
about balance, not taking the stick and beating
it over their head because then at that
point, they got so many like, they've got
so many other things they can turn to.
Yeah. I can go to the movies with
with with and and go and go hang
out with this boy that I think is
really cute or this girl that I really
like. I can do that. But if we're
just gentle with them, but we're direct and
we're honest and we're upfront,
and we try to bring the dean to
them in a way that they understand.
And I'm and I'm not saying water it
down.
That is your gentleman's pay grade. You all
understand the dean. You're wet you're a 100%
more qualified to teach you than me, but
putting it in a way that they understand,
putting situations
in their life that they understand.
You've said someone you've had someone make racial
racial comments to you, bring up the story
of Bilal and, Ray La Juan. And then
you talk about you you talk about the
Sahaba's promised paradise. There's lessons in every one
of those, situation that can apply to us,
and, obviously, the prophet sallallahu alaihi salam. Salaam
alaihi salam. But, you know, you've got it,
you know, you've got to get to the
kids when they're young, get them a foundation
because that's what you said. You said at
some point,
the,
default setting kicked in because that's what happened
to me. It just it just hit me.
And I think we have to be honest
with these kids, but we also have to
give them an opportunity to to be
kids. And that's why I said, let them
play basketball in the masjid.
The you know, and and someone can correct
me. I don't think there's anything wrong with
playing basketball.
Go in there and have some fun. Whether
that's the brothers playing by themselves, the sisters
play play them by themselves. If you like
to play some type of board game,
play it. Get them together and talk. Dean,
give them both because these young kids I'm
sorry. We're not sitting here. I mean, most
of these kids are not in a madrissa
learning learning Quran. They're just not. And that's
just the reality of things.
But
these kids right here, they need to have
Dean, and they need to be able to
just
connect and not feel pushed off by the
Dean because there's so many of us that
we just push people away. Oh, yeah. So
so one thing I'd like to add to
that,
I think you're 100% right,
but dealing with the youth, one thing that
I've noticed, and I'm kind of asking the
question here more than making a statement because
I also don't know. But,
the youth and the and the message that
I have dealt with over the years, one
of the things that I noticed as a
common,
thread
amongst them
is, it's a a lack of sense of,
a lack of the sense of belonging.
And so,
before we started,
you 2 were talking about the the analogy
of using sports,
and teaching things about the dean.
And the first thing that, came to my
mind was, you know, with sports teams, there's
a sense of belonging. You belong to something,
and so you that that sense of, belonging
is almost like a sense of ownership. So
you feel like
I'm contributing to something. Mhmm. And with a
lot of the youth,
what I've noticed is
they lack that. They they don't feel like
they're a part of anything. They kinda feel
like outcast to a certain degree, and so
they kinda just get in where they fit
in.
And that is
something that I just wonder,
are we doing a good job of? And
so
I I kind of pass this on to
people who know more than I do, but,
how can we
what can we do about that, like, when
it comes to that sense of belonging? Because
just telling the youth to
practice the dean,
when they kind of know it. You know?
Like you said, you asked her sister that
question, and she knows the answer to it
because she's she's been taught that, but she's
not living it. It's not a reality
for her or for the young men that
might be in that boat.
Like, what can we do to strengthen that
element of
a sense of belonging to something and with
something?
And before they answer, she didn't know.
Oh. And that's a problem in of itself.
She didn't know? No. She did not. She
did not know. And that's a problem, you
know, with which a separate conversation.
I
mean,
one of the nice things about being a
coach is you can be straight up. You
can be straightforward.
Right?
And,
that's why sheikh Hamza mentions there's a strong
parallel between
sports and coaching,
a stronger parallel between coaching and sports than,
you know, and being a Muslim trying to
tread the path
than there is with, like, a classroom setting.
Right? Because
you can't always sugarcoat the truth. You have
to be very upfront. Right. However,
when you coach
a particular
athlete,
they're usually there because they wanna be there.
So they're willing to listen to you.
Mhmm. Especially in football. Football coaches are the
most straight up straightforward.
Right? They they're not gonna sugarcoat anything. Right?
They will scream down your neck
and and and make sure that you understand.
And why will they take it?
Because they love football,
and they wanna be on the field, and
they don't wanna get benched. And they were
raised, like, watching in the NFL and seeing,
you know,
these athletes
excel.
So they
they want to be there, so you can
tell them what they wanna hear.
It's hard sometimes to be that straight up
and that straightforward to Muslim youth, especially if
they're not feeling their deen, and they haven't
understood their faith, and they're not appreciating that.
Because now you're just trying to tell it.
Now it's more of the classroom.
We're trying to get them to, like, do
their geometry homework, and they don't want to.
Right? So that's another challenge in itself.
But
we have to find a way to, like,
make sure the dean from a young age
is beloved to our kids and to the
youth because it's hard to fix it once
they're already at a point
that they're resenting the dean.
So the person,
people in your life, it's important that they
meet the right people in their life, the
people who can kinda get across to them
and get through to them.
Otherwise, it's hard to get it's hard to
get around that. You can't just be straightforward
to anybody. Alonzo's best. And I I think
also too is that you'll receive a message
from a coach that you respect and you
care about that you know has invested in
you. So if you invest in these kids
and you listen to them, like, think about
what you just said. They don't feel included.
How many times in my show do we
ever even include any kid in the decision
making?
You know? And and and our ego, our
knots get so tied up in it.
I'm the adult.
You're the kid.
The law says you're supposed to obey your
parents. It didn't even say that in the
Quran. It didn't even say it. Correct me
if I'm wrong. It doesn't say you have
to you have to obey your parents. You
have to treat them well. Right?
Well, I mean You know what I mean?
In the sense of in the sense of
yeah. Like, it's not a master slave Right.
Relationship. And this is one thing, you know,
along the lines of what you're saying.
If anybody had the right from amongst God's
creation to be obeyed,
without hesitation, it was the prophet, and
he does have that he does have that
right from us.
That that Allah ta'ala,
Allah ta'ala mentions this as like part of
the and part of the mercy and the
kindness of the prophet is the reason we
love him, sallallahu alaihi wa sallam, is that
he used to ask opinions from people. And
so if he's gonna ask opinion from somebody,
it's no, you know, it's no,
decrease or discount on anyone's respect to ask
for the opinion of anybody.
Even if you don't end up following it,
sometimes it's just like somebody cares that you're
there. And this is one of the reasons,
you know, I I feel like,
I I I I was compelled to,
you know, have this discussion with you also,
Shaykh, is that one of the things our
elders told us, you know, is that when
you're calling people to toward the deen, if
you don't love them
and if you don't see them as worthy
of being uplifted by Islam, if you don't
see if you don't wish inside of your
heart good for them,
you know, you you will never make dua,
to them in any useful way, shape, or
form. If you see yourself as better than
them or you're, you know, bringing, like, you
know, some sort of, like, you know, like
gift of your charity to, like, an ignorant
savage or whatever, you will never you will
never,
touch their heart. And I think part of
that is, like, you know,
maybe the balance between what Sheikh Musa and,
what what coach and I maybe were saying
before
is that you have to bring that powerful
spiritual game.
Not that it's a game, but you have
to bring that power you have to bring
that spiritual power when you tell somebody about
the salat. You have to bring that spirit
and that that comes through what? It comes
to Ikhlas.
It comes through making a person feel,
you know, you don't have to pump their
ego up, but you have to make them
feel like you're important to them, you know,
that you mean something to them, that you're
not just like a, like a, like a
notch in someone's belt. You know, some people
do that. They they dole out shahadas, and
then afterward, like, the next day someone calls
them and asks them about something. No. No.
You're now you're in the bag, so we're
gonna move on to the next, you know,
victim or whatever.
You know, you got to, you know, the
like, the spaces, you know, you were talking
about.
And that ties in with what we were
talking about from before that 501c3optional
Islam, you know.
Nobody feels like they belong. When you're an
adult and you're like, well, I gotta get
stuff done at work, and I'm gonna come
to Jummah, like, at the
last moment, and I'm gonna, you know, miss
2 Jummah's and then go to the 3rd
one, because I heard there's a hadith that,
like, says that, you know, like, it's really
bad if you miss 3 in a row
or whatever. You know, that's that's in some
some rat race sense, there's a convenience in
it. Right? You can't grow up on that
though. You know, you can't grow up on
that. You can't grow up in, like, you
know, like, you see your own your own
folks are not praying on time. You see
that they're not taking the deen seriously. They're
not taking the ulama seriously. They're not taking
the elm seriously. They're not taking the the
the obligation to make progress in the spiritual
path seriously.
But then afterward, they're like,
my son's gay.
You know, my daughter has a a cat
for boyfriend.
I, you know, my my my my boy
is smoking weed or, like, drinking alcohol or
whatever. Like
like, you
at that point, why is you know, like,
why what universe is that, you know, gonna
any of that gonna make sense in for
anyone?
I
just think the relationship piece is so important,
though, Sheikh. You
prophet.
But if we wanna get the youth to
listen to us, there has to be some
investment on our end because, you know, we're
trying to help them just like other people
have been trying to help us. And so
like Sheikh Musa was just was was elaborating
on earlier, you know, you you have to
make them feel comfortable,
you know, when when they come in. And
if they like you, they're gonna listen to
you. And that doesn't mean you're trying to
be like you say something, the the cool
person and the rock and roll type stuff.
No. It's just that it's like Maslow's hierarchy
of needs.
Like, you know, you know, food's at the
basement of the pyramid.
But when there's also part of that belonging
piece that if there's not if they don't
belong to something, they're gonna go to something
else. So if there's something missing,
they might chase drugs. They might chase a
gang.
Some join the sports team because they give
them a sense of belonging. So if they
are drawn to
specific individuals, then the message that comes out
of their mouth, they'll listen to. Now that
could be for a good or for bad
thing. They could be drawn to me because,
like, hey, man.
You know? Like, you know, I know people.
And this happens all the time in school,
especially these young ladies. You look really nice
today. Your hair is really pretty. And that's
the first good comment they've heard all day.
Next thing you know, they they they're ready
to, you know, commit fornication because someone said
I care. And so for our standpoint, then
that this is real. And I'd say, the
parents, if you wanna know that this is
what happens in the classroom. There's a guy
sitting next to your daughter shooting his shot
as they say now. That's the thing. When
I was in school like they had to
spit your game, now it's like they shoot
their shot. And these guys, they shoot their
shot every single day. Right. It happens every
day. And if you don't believe that it
happens,
I'm here to tell you it happens every
day. I hear locker room talk. I have
to correct it. I see things in the
hallway. I'm like, oh my goodness.
And they're shooting their shot. And every day,
your daughter is getting a shot shot at
her. Your son is getting a different type
of shot shot at him. And so if
we don't, as parents, start off with that
relationship
and build that foundation and and and anybody
that's trying work with these, if we don't
have a relationship with them,
it doesn't matter what we say. And so
we know that this dean can save you
if we don't build the relationship, and that's
the coaching piece. Right. You know, the best
coaches are the best communicator, not tyrants.
They're the best communicators. And if we
make these youth understand, like, you know, let's
sit down and talk.
What matters to you? Right.
And then, you know, once I know what
matters to you, I know what makes you
tick because the prophet,
he didn't go at everybody the same way.
Right. You know, he he would you know,
I know there's one person there. I think
he he made the person's the the person's
the cow's
or the thing's milk turn, and the person
took Shahada that way. And so this the
prophet saw something. He reached people in different
ways. And so we just have to find
out what makes these youth tick. And so,
I'm so we'd have to be
I'm not saying that we have to
all be on social media like that, but
we need to understand what are they listening
to? What type of music do they listen
to? What type of TV do I'm not
saying you have to go and watch what
they watch, but you had better have a
general idea of what's going on inside their
head because you'll never be able to reach
them. And it's it's a constant battle. I
know that about you because
just at the beginning of the podcast, you
looked up you looked up a song just
to hear just so you're aware of what
the lyrics are. Oh, man. My my my
brain is fried. I mean, right? It's horrible.
Right. We we I can't believe they're listening
to this kind of stuff. But my dad
said this anything about it. Be all just,
you know, well, I don't listen to music.
And, you know, if you really wanna connect
and read certain people, you might actually have
to look up those lyrics. You don't have
to listen to the song, but you might
wanna know what's being said. Right. Right. And,
and that's the coaching you, and that and
that's the coach and the communication to be
able to reach people. Because,
even my most impactful coach,
he wasn't the strictest coach I ever had
and the loudest coach I ever had too.
And whenever he came
very
loud at me, it was it was always
well received because I know it came out
of love. He used to say that,
you know, after being called dad,
the best thing I I think to be
called is is coach. The thing that I
enjoy being called is coach.
And little things like that, he communicated that.
He, like, let us actually know that he
cared. Right? And he was open about us
about, you know, with with that, with those
feelings that he had. And,
you talk about parents and relationship with their
kids.
I don't know if we're in a time
where you can just simply expect your kids
to just obey you and listen to you,
and you come in and you're, like, expecting
to straighten up just by looking at you
by your presence. There needs to be some
type of an interaction,
especially if they're in the public school system
and especially if they're engaging with these people,
who have a very, very different lifestyle because
they're being socialized a particular way. And you
learn sometimes,
you know, more just from socialization than you
ever will at, you know, in a classroom.
They're spending more time out of the house
than they are in the house, so
having that is is definitely important for sure.
Along the lines of,
what we were or what you were, mentioning
about belonging as well. And one of the
problems I think is that,
oftentimes in the Masjid space
or in religious spaces,
you know, as as an adult or as
a person who's an authority,
we have to be a little bit conscious
about the choices we make,
if we don't give that same encouragement to,
the children of
different backgrounds. If we if the African American
student,
or a young person in the youth group
or whatever
is not greeted with the same enthusiasm,
or if we see that they're out of
place and we don't give them, you know,
that, affirmation
proactively,
those kids grow up and then they real
they, you know, they they remember those things
and they carry the the the the the
pain, the anguish of it with them. And
people say, well, I didn't mean it that
way. And you don't you know? Okay. You
didn't mean it that way. Great. You know?
Like, we'll give you the Nobel Prize. You
know? You're not gonna go no one's gonna
pray for you to go to Jahannam if
you actually didn't mean it that way. But,
there is, you know, intentions are intentions
are important, but they're not the whole thing.
We have to also, like, learn, you know,
like, how to
how to do things the right way. And
the Rasulullah
Sallallahu Alaihi wa Salam, he had he had
this,
you know, these beautiful habits. You know? He
he would say something like,
you know,
affirming the piety
of what? Of rubbing your hand on the
head of an orphan child. Right? Orphan being
an orphan is like the superlative
estrangement. You know? You don't you literally don't
have any parents, you know?
And so the prophet, sallallahu alaihi wa sallam,
he he mentioned that this is, you know,
this is from the great acts of piety,
from those things that soften the heart is
what you find that that child who's estranged.
Whether it be through a disability, whether it
be for racial, ethnic reasons, whether it be
for socioeconomic reasons, whether it be through some
trauma that they went through,
whatever it is, and do that. You know,
just something like, you know, sit them next
to you in the in the youth group
or give make sure that they eat first
when the food is being distributed or when
whatever. Like, you know, we have, like, whatever.
We give out snicker bars at our youth
halaqa. Allah
bring it back soon,
from from lockdown.
You know,
what what what is it? You know, what
are those practical things that you can share
with somebody who's in that position
that they can they can try to mitigate
the first of all, see the see what
the signs of estrangement is
are are and how can they mitigate those
that those feelings of estrangement from those people
who are are maybe don't feel as welcome,
you know, at first,
in in the group?
Are you asking me? Yeah. I think Well,
everyone but yeah. I think our I think
our kids are I think our Muslim children
and our youth in general, they're estranged from
our dean.
You know? And
whatever
are the causes to that
are things where we just we have to
take a a a deep
a a deep look. And I just I'd
I'd I'd honestly said, like, even when I
first met you, the first thing we we
just started communicating immediately.
And that's so important is that we have
to talk to these kids.
And we as parents, they have to bring
their kid to the Masjid.
You know, even their daughters. Bring your daughters.
Bring your daughters and let them
sit with the older women. Let them and
some people, like I said, they have a
problem with, like, a little 2 year old
running around in the back of the Masjid.
They have a problem with that, but,
like you said, that stuff that gets ingrained
in your mind. You remember that stuff. That
stuff come out you would like, you enjoy
going to the Masjid. And I I I
could tell you for any parent, please make
sure that your experience in the Masjid is
a good one because, you know, we we
dreaded coming to church.
2 and a half
hours. No one listened to you, you know,
and it was a it was a drag.
You know? And so,
when you're making your * buzz,
make them engaging.
You know? Like, you know, because, you know,
if you if we wanna draw these youth
in, there has to be, you know, constant
communication. I I keep saying that. And I
guess from my from my standpoint, we we
like you said, your youth programming.
We have to have this youth programming. And
if parents aren't gonna bring their kids to
the Masjid,
they shouldn't be surprised when you said, oh,
my son's gay. And now all of a
sudden,
now
you're on a totally different
thing that you're trying to fight or my
daughter's pregnant.
You know? The the the the and these
these things happen.
And we,
I tried to talk to teachers from Maslow's
Pyramid.
You know? If you sit down and eat
with those students, you're gonna find out everything.
You know? And and they tell you stuff.
You're
like, man. Sometimes it tells you that you
just have to downright report. And for our
youth, the biggest problem right now is parenting.
They're not being parented. This is non Muslim
youth and Muslim youth. Yeah.
You know? And and until we get a
handle on that,
and and that's the part that's very disheartening
as a teacher, you get a lot of
conversations and hear a lot of things. You're
like, man, this is this is borderline and
this is borderline.
I take that back. It is child abuse.
And we have to we have to sit
down and have conversation. Like you said, bring
that if you're a brother, bring that brother
next to you. How are you doing? How
are things? If you're the sister, bring a
sister in. Talk to them because,
the the sisters have a different set of
issues, and, people are that hijab is under
attack. I I'm glad you brought that up.
Can we hone in on that? Because, you
know, you I know you are very positive
and impactful in the lives of
both your male and female students.
What are some of the unique issues that
that that the the the male students,
are experienced? What are some of the unique
issues that the female students are issuing? Because
or or are experiencing. Because, unfortunately,
we don't have that same,
that same level of facilitation for,
girls in the Masjid space and in the
Muslim spaces.
We very rarely break even with the with
the boys and even what we're doing for
the boys is is insufficient. And like that
thing that you mentioned, you know, like it's
one of those things in our culture for
whatever messed up reason. And when I say
culture, I mean,
they see culture, Arab culture, or whatever. It's
not universally there, but there is some lingering
Jahiliyyah from, you know, in people's thing. They
don't they just don't celebrate their daughters like
they should. And it's like, dude, you gotta
tell your your your baby girl I love
you. You gotta tell her she's beautiful. Otherwise,
she's gonna listen to it. She needs to
hear it from someone.
And if he if she doesn't hear it
from from you or from her brother, you
know,
from her husband,
for those of you who are married, you
know, from if you if you if you
ain't telling your wife how beautiful she is,
how pretty she is, how much she means
to you, she needs to hear it from
somebody. She's gonna hear it from the wrong
person. And at that point, you know, you
can kick and scream, say, haram, you know,
how could you do this? But like
so what are some of those things coming
back to the question? Specific issues for the
boys, specific issues for the girls. Girls. For
the boys,
it's
lack
of modeling of what a man should be.
And this is crossing all lines. I've talked
to one person.
He's Arab,
very good football player, has no father in
his life.
And this Is he an orphan, or is
it just that his father just father ain't
ain't getting it done?
More bounce to the out, shake, bounce.
You know? And this and this and this
is and this is just and it's a
mother
trying to raise a young man on her
own. And this is a common thing amongst
our youth is that with the boys,
it's it's what is projected as what being
manly means. Right. And excuse my language, but
in the in the songs,
money hoes and clothes. This is what's being
put out there to the this is what
being a man means. You got money. You
got girls. You have Doonia possessions.
And all the music
I mean, all the music is what's projected
out there. It's what's projected in the media.
And this is what it means to be
a man. Sleep with as many girls as
you can. Treat them however you want. You
know? And and you're and, you know, and
you're this hard body that has no emotions.
But then you get those boys alone and
you start to talk to them, then they
just they they break down into tears because
there are so many
it's like the ship, and it's got 18
different holes. You're trying to plug each hole,
and that ship is gonna sink. But for
the boys, they need proper male modeling.
How do you talk to women? Because this
is a
a serious issue. How do you treat women
for and I'm sorry. Now Muslims and Muslims
alike,
that that that's the biggest test for men
is women.
How do you treat
them? Because everything that these boys are seeing,
they're being inundated in just Hadith, by the
way. You know? I mean, that's not just
coach the coach is dropping Hikma for sure,
but that's a the Rasulullah as I mentioned.
Salulullah aslam. Yeah. And so it's they're being
inundated with it every single day. And in
the classroom
and in on the football field, we have
constant conversations.
This is how you treat women.
You don't walk around looking at this woman
as some object to get in bed with
and then impregnate. I and and that's it.
You're like a rooster
that just goes around the hen house just
impregnating it. I said because I I had
to check one because I said I said
You're like the rooster, but you just don't
get it for fredger. Right. Yeah. Yeah. I'm
like the rooster. Yeah.
That's a good one. But, yeah, I I
said I said, you know, you talk about
these girls and call them all kinds of
names. I said, dude, where's your where's your
dad?
Said he gone. I said, so what do
you think he did to your mom? He
said he got up and prayed and he
bounced.
I said, so you're gonna repeat the cycle?
I said, do you want your I said,
do you want your son to feel the
way you do? And and you get him
in closed space. That's why the safe space.
You get they're gonna cry.
They're gonna break down, and they're gonna talk
about all the issues at play because they're
being poisoned
with this thing, this toxic and then you
got a toxic masculinity,
you know, which is a totally different issue.
But that's the biggest thing with these boys
is
no one's teaching them how to be men
because so many men, they're they're they're they're
just bouncing
and and feel no responsibility.
And so then the young ladies, they allow
themselves to be disrespected,
and the guys feel like it's okay. And
it's just you're not. So you're and you're
you know? And
and and you just end up with this
vicious cycle. For the girls,
it's
it's the lack and I guess the same
thing. It's the lack of the father. So
many of these girls, they don't have a
father and somehow for different reasons. Well, my
former student, their dad was murdered
by Israelis.
They shot they they shot and killed him.
And she says, I still see in my
dreams
him being shot and killed. That's psychological
trauma
that we don't even wanna talk about. This
is the PTSD
that we don't want to address. And so
these girls,
they don't have a lot of male positive
male influences. And you've gotta and you have
to imagine to put this from a girl
standpoint. I see my mom
every day
every 3rd day, she has a different guy
in the house. So different person is sleeping
with her and leaving. It's just like taking
and going. And and so you see that
stuff enough. You start to think that's what
your value is.
And then so a a student said to
me one I'll never forget this. I said,
mister Hicks,
she got a on the side. Oh my
god. You love me. I said, how do
I how's me giving you earning a a
equate to me loving you?
And
that's because they don't have anyone telling them.
And so from that standpoint, they're being inundated.
This is how you dress. You wear these
booty type shorts. You walk around. You put
your body out there, and and and, you
know, and and, you know, you go around
looking for a suitor. And and and it's
and and it's like it's like, literally, it's
caveman type stuff where you just beat the
woman over the head, drag her back. It's
like, this is what they're being conditioned, and
it's the music. I'm rad I'm telling you.
I'm ratchet. I'm bougie. I'm a b I
t c h. Like, this is what they're
listening to.
And these are their models. This is these
are their advisers. That is their role model.
These are their role models because their mom
their mom's not
home. Their mom's not modeling.
And so someone has to teach them their
self worth. Like, you just can't just get
in bed with someone because they say, I
like you.
And and and so, I mean, from that
standpoint, that's the area where these girls
are different from the guys. The guys
is about this this bravado tough guy stuff
and teaching them how to be a man.
With a woman, it's the self respect.
And it's it's it's a it's a vicious
cycle because the girls want the love. The
guys wanna be the,
the the the big the big guy, all
the girls, and it's just it's back and
forth and back and forth. And, you know,
yeah.
And and now you're start you you have
girls that are psychologically
damaged
because they've been they've been in bed with
so many different guys.
And and and then you've got the guys,
they don't understand what love is and because
they've been abandoned, and this is abandonment on
both sides. And the thing is society doesn't
think of it this way, but in we
all oftentimes put the stigma of that damage
on the women,
and those guys are damaged. They're damaged. They're
damaged. And, you know, I I just like
to add to this, you know, what makes
it even more complicated going back to the
parenting piece
is that the parents are also a product
of the same environment. They're damaged too. It's
the it's the same music that the parents
are listening to, and they're trying to live
that lifestyle because,
you know, I'm 37, and I know that
many other people my age
are on on the same note. They're on
the same thing. They're listening to the same
music, and that's the lifestyle that they wanna
live. And so,
you know, you hear the statement, you know,
babies raising babies. That's something that I've heard
many times, like, in our community. And so,
in mid and late thirties,
going to your forties, you're not a baby
anymore. But if you still have that mentality,
and you're raising those children that were born
around 911,
you know,
You never had a chance to live your
life. Yeah. It's it's it it it it
Now you're now you're living with the expense
of your kid. It becomes a really big
issue. Not to mention the domestic shake and
shake. That's another issue. Well, I've got I've
got female students. They're getting knocked upside their
head at at a very young age. And
then the guys,
they're doing it, but where are they getting
it from? The TV.
You know, put your hands on them. You
know, this is the kind of stuff that,
you know, this
it it that those those are the issues.
Teaching the men how to be men. Right.
Teaching the women
to love themselves.
But like you said, you've got severely damaged
men Mhmm. That are completely
incapable
of functioning a relationship.
And you've got women
that that they're damaged in a way that
they turn men away. So when when when
you get old enough to when you can
really be in a marriage marital situation,
all the default sayings have been programmed, they
just surface. Right. You know? And then it
it just it it it completes complete and
total dysfunction. But like you said, when you
meet the parents,
you kinda see it. It's it's it's interesting
in the immigrant community as well. I think
a lot of the
the expectation is, like, well, we don't deal
with those things because we didn't deal with
them from where we came from, and it's
just gonna stay that way. And I got
a mortgage to pay, so mother work, father
work. You know? Mother work overtime,
you know, bring home the halal bacon. Father
work overtime, bring home the bacon.
And, you know, as long as you keep
doing good in school, you'll get money. And
since our problem when we were kids was
poverty,
and we solve it through money, as long
as you do good in school, you'll solve
your problems through money as well.
And, oftentimes,
even some of the most accomplished professionals, their
children come out
basically victim to the same cycle which is
common
through public schools and through the phones and
media and things like that. It's common to
immigrant and
native and,
native and indigenous,
Muslim children.
They are subjected to it,
as well. Why? Because the parents
thought
that if they could give a little less
time and give a little bit more money,
they'll solve the problems,
where money is not gonna solve the problem
that's not there with time. And this is,
I think, a good segue to something
which is which also needs to be discussed.
And I I, you know, sheikh Tamim,
he he compiled the book about Futua, about
the chivalrous character of a man of a
man,
according to the teachings of Islam.
Sheikh Abdul Kareem Yahia
in Detroit, Imam Dawood will lead. They actually
have a Futua program, you know.
For training the young men to be upright
men. And one of the problems is we
don't
you know, the the age that we live
in,
it
sees patriarchy as a negative thing. The word
patriarchy has come to have a a a
negative connotation. And yes, there is such a
thing as toxic masculinity. But if you are
not giving a space like coach was saying,
where you
allow boys to aspire to be a man
if you don't respect men, if you don't
respect husbands, if you don't respect fathers. This
is one of the things that annoys the
the the smack out of me. Whenever there's
a a a marriage
and someone gets up and gives a talk
at a marriage, there's always a joke. It's
always at the expense of the husband.
And it doesn't annoy me. Why? Because my
ego is bruised. I mean, sometimes the jokes
are funny as well, you know, like whatever.
We can all laugh at it. The thing
is there's an institution just like you don't
want kids to take their parents as a
joke. You don't want students to take their
parent their teachers as a joke. You don't
want young people to take elders as a
joke. You know, they can have a free
relationship with
them in which, there's a little bit of
lightness
but there's a bedrock of foundation of what
that you respect this person in order to,
you know, get something out of it. We've
we we have completely
made being a man into a joke.
And,
if you don't respect a man for behaving
like a man because what does the shim
you know, what is the shimatur
The
the the cardinal virtue of being a man
is that you give.
I mean, both in a biologically literal sense,
but then in a spiritual sense, you embody
that in in in in in everything that
you do that you're the one who gives
from yourself.
You're the one that everybody you're you know,
you if you're a real man, you if
only 1 person in the group should be
hungry, 1 person in the family should be
hungry, it's you. Everyone else should eat. If
one person should be tired, it should be
you. Everybody else should be rested. If one
person should you know, like, you give.
But if you don't you know, if you
make that into a joke, who's gonna wanna
do that? And if a man isn't a
man, it's not only gonna screw up our
boys, it's gonna screw up our girls. It's
not only gonna screw up things at school,
it's gonna screw up our families, It's gonna
screw up our masjid.
You know, if there nobody is nobody we
don't and this is so hardship. Musa is
so hard to find people. You know, even
it affects us, it affects people, like imams,
it affects
like leaders. There's nobody who wants to give
anymore. Everyone wants to take, take, take, take,
take, take.
And, this manly virtue, it's so hard to
find anybody with it anymore if we don't
have, you know, spaces where we get together
and we, at least respect the fact that
like, you know, a man is someone to
be respected, you know. A man is some
someone valuable. A man is somebody that we,
you know, that we love. As as as
men and as women, as children's, teachers, students,
wives, husbands, you know, like if you tell
a woman, respect your husband, people automatically think,
oh, you're enabling abuse. No. I'm not saying
that you should like, you know, throw him
a party because he beat you, you know.
If that's happening, call the police. You know
what I mean? That's excellent. Call call call
the police. But if he's if he's I
mean, he's if he's if he's putting food
on the table and he takes out the
trash and he and all that stuff, you
know, like, he's he's your man. You should
you know, that's the pride of your family.
You should you should respect him. And those
of you of us who are, like, lucky
to have, you know, that dynamic in our
houses, you know,
maybe, you know, that that's that's a rare
and rare,
gift Allah has given us. But,
I think part of the solution to this,
you know, lies with this, like, very underlying
fault that what is it. Right? The the
the whole thing about, like, you know, someone
said, oh, look, shit. You're very passionate against
black lives matter. I said, stop, Philip. Why
would you say that? So you wrote that
paper. I go, no. I'm very passionate for
black lives matter, but why is it that
like, you know, verbiage like we're here to
disrupt
cisgender,
family patriarchal dynamics, and we're, you know, here
to,
you know, basically,
gender confusion like Imam Dawood says, That just
muddle the line between a man and a
woman. If if you don't empower men to
act like men, then then what is it?
You're just gonna completely like rot the the
entire thing from the from from from its
foundation. It's not like look, you know, people
look at me so, oh, look at turban
and beer, this guy's a psycho.
I don't lose sleep at night because someone's
gay.
If that's the test Allah that I gave
you, if that's what you do behind closed
doors, people commit their sins, I don't approve
of it, but like, you know what I
mean? It's a thing that happens amongst a
number of other things that happen.
But when we use that in order to
undermine,
to undermine
the the the entire foundation of of the
family, to undermine,
masculinity,
healthy masculinity and healthy manhood, it's not just
gonna screw up our boys.
So trickle down effects. Go get to get
to the girls because there's no family structure.
Right. Right.
But I I think that's part of the
thing, though, is,
like you said, but we have to teach
these boys how to be men and teach
the women how to be women, but there's
some and that's a societal issue we're battling.
Like, if you say that, you know, you
know, obey your husband, that's looking at it
like, oh my god. Oh, that that you're
his servant. No. That that's that's not what
was said because the prophet,
he was always in the service of his
family. So he served his family. Mhmm. You
know? And I think that's that that's the
biggest thing, though, is, like,
when you watch these young girls and young
boys, they're in the minor leagues of dysfunction.
Mhmm. And so by the time they're ready
for the major leagues, they're completely totally dysfunctional,
completely incapable of of maintaining any kind of
quality relationship. They have no social skills. They
have no interpersonal skills. And
it's it's, you know, it's creating it's creating
dysfunctional families. You have men that have no
desire to get married. You have women
who
and let let me backtrack. You have men
who have no desire to get married, nor
would they make a suitable
spouse anyway. Then you have women who wanna
get married, but they're so flawed and damaged
that
a decent man won't want them. And and
and it's just it's a it's a it's
a bat. You bounce the ball, comes right
back up. And it it's a it's a
continuing thing. We have to find a way
to, like, deflate the ball so this thing
doesn't keep bouncing back and forth. But I
I I think it still comes back to,
you know, getting getting with these youth
and talking them
and getting them into the masher, getting in
front of people of knowledge so then you
all can do your work. Because
I have my work to
do. You've got your work to do, but,
communally,
you know, and I used to talk about,
like, the African American. They have even more
difficult situation because they're taking this hip hop
culture to situation because
they're taking this hip hop culture to the
like,
you know, white kids and Arab kids and
Asian kids, they'll listen to this hip hop,
but they're not internalizing it. Our black kids
are taking this and running like this is
gospel. Like, this is just you know, one
of the worst things that ever happened to
hip hop was NWA.
One of the worst things to ever ever
happen because if you study the roots of
it and I I keep going back to
music
because parents better pay attention. Your kids listen
to hip hop.
Trust me. Brothers, Milan and Saab know what
the NWA is. Don't don't don't don't don't.
Your kid is not gonna your kid is
not gonna get by. If you don't know
what it is, knows what it so you
know what it is?
You know, you guys may not even wanna
place a lot behind us after after knowing
what that means. But, know, when they look
at it, that that changed the whole game.
The the the the the hip hop music
before was all about
empowerment and knowledge and uplift. Right. And then
once the NWA hit, that whole thing shifted.
And to now, I can't even explain
what this is. I mean, this is just
this is just
Shaitan playing the role of, like, Geppetto
and and and just and just and just
pulling this I mean, and just leading you
to, I mean,
leading you to Jahannam. I remember I remember
a a brother with overactive imagination. He once
told me about a lot a long conspiracy
theory about how, like, the CIA had it
in for Eazy E and they gave him
aids.
And, I'm like, dude, have you ever heard
the guy's music before? Like
but people like that, you don't need no
CIA, brother. But but and that's another that's
another thing, Sheikh, that has to be addressed
too. The the the we have a lot
of our Muslim youth. They're committing fornication,
and these STDs are out here. They're out
there. Yeah. I I I heard one of
the most heartbreaking stories about a a and
there's a married man who got who got
HPV from his wife because she's having an
affair. Now these things that you can't get
rid of, and this is you know, you
but, you know, you if we don't bring
these youth in and get them
to love Allah and his messenger and the
Masjid and the Muslims,
salaw Islam,
they're going to fill that need with something
else. And, you know, like I said, you
get herpes, you're not getting rid of that.
And then you might reform.
You might one night, you might mess up,
and then you say, you know what? I
wanna do this and this and this. And
now next thing you know, you've gotta tell
this prospective spouse, look. I've got this STD,
and you can't even fault someone for saying,
you know,
I'm a pass. And these are the other
things that are out there. Like, yo, you
got a lot of STDs out here, and
this fornication is running rampant.
Yeah. You know? And and and it's it's
another issue that has to be addressed, like,
you know, this and that's one, I guess,
where I'm just I'm hard line on it
where I you know? No. No. You can't
go to prom.
No. You can't go to homecoming.
And that's just one area where You know
you know, I I actually,
I had to go to prom
because my older sister wanted to go with
her friends
so bad.
And so she, like, like, clashed the titans,
you know, like, because the eldest the eldest
daughter is, like, the little junior matriarch in
the house. So her and my mom, like,
you know and, so my mom's like, okay.
You can go. You have to take hamza
with you. And it was one of, like,
the most decrepit experiences of my life. And
that's why I have to second,
I have to second, this,
this sentiment. That's that's one area where I'm
hard on. You know, like, we're that's just
not who who we are. That's not what
we do. And the thing is, you can
say no to your kids that, oh, you're
not going to prom. If you are not
replacing with something else, you are problem to
problem. Okay? You tell your children we're gonna
go to Umrah instead. You know, we're gonna
go to Turkey. We're gonna go to Morocco.
You know what I mean?
We're gonna we're gonna we're gonna take them
off for some hallow pizza then. Or or
bring bring all the Muslim sisters together. Let
them go on a masjid and dress up
and prom night. Yeah. Let them all come
together and just be together. Like, they're they're
gonna forget about it even with the brothers.
You don't have to go to the party.
My my my my my wife told me
she called me. She said, because, you know,
our kids, they know, like, you know, we're
fun though, man. We weren't like that. I
stuff I used to dress up for every
Halloween, but, like, because we know those things
so, you know, our kids are, you know,
we're like, yeah, we don't celebrate no Halloween.
And so they know. So they told the
they told the teachers like, yeah, we're not
gonna, you know, we're gonna my mom's gonna
come pick us up and we're not gonna
participate in the Halloween party at school.
And,
and so my wife called me on Halloween.
She said that, and I was at work.
I was, you know and she said that,
you know,
one of our children
cried.
Not necessarily because they didn't know that, like,
it's haram or that they wanted to be
part of it, but there's something about,
again, estrangement and deprivation, that feeling. Nobody likes
it. I don't like it. You know? Nobody
likes it. I have I I recall those
feelings as a kid. You know, everyone goes
through them. It's a human thing. Right? And
so I was just thinking about my baby
crying about, like, you know,
about a a a suffering that that that
they had for the sake of Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala,
and, my wife let me know. And so
on my way home from work, I went
to I went to the store. I went
to Pete's Fresh Market,
which is a really nice grocery store that
we Chicago has a good grocery store game.
And,
I went to the free the the the
bakery, to the candy section, to the freezer
section. I remember buying all those ice creams
that my mother my mother, like, would, like,
smack us just for looking at. You know,
* if we were ever gonna buy them,
you know? I bought every single thing. I
went home, I stashed the freezer, I stashed
the cakes, cookies, everything.
And then I I I came home, and
I I I you know, they didn't know
they didn't know that any of this happened.
And I asked my kids, I go, I
heard that, one of you, one of you,
like, because you couldn't go to the
Halloween party, you cried.
And,
they're they're, like, you know, embarrassed, you know,
and because they know it's wrong, so they
shouldn't even want it. They're embarrassed to admit
it. I said, it's okay. It's okay. You
don't have to whatever. You know? If it
happened, you don't feel bad about it. I
said this day this day, go look in
the in the fridge, go look in the
freezer, go look in the kitchen. So they
looked and their eyes like
lit up and, you know And they forgot
about Halloween immediately. I said I said this
day I said this day, no. Nobody gives
up anything for the sake of Allah ta'ala
except for Allah
gives them something better
and you'll get something even bigger. It will
make your eyes open up even more than
this. But you but you said something so
so powerful shape, and this is what I've
just been trying to say, but you said
so much better. You better find something to
replace
it because
and that's what one of my former students
so she said, mister Hicks has always felt
like the oddball.
I didn't date.
I didn't have a boyfriend.
I did you know? And so it's always
and then it makes
Islam look like the restriction. Oh,
you can't go to this party.
Oh, you can't do this Valentine's Day dance.
Oh, you can't do this Christmas party.
And but we're not replacing it with anything.
Mhmm. So like you said, have have bring
all the Muslim sisters together
and let them just go be in the
Masjid and just sit down and talk and
eat. And you think they're gonna care about
prom when there are 100 sisters in hijab
looking nice and the sisters come in,
you look so beautiful,
or or you get the brothers together.
I mean, we don't have a fair well,
get get in touch with, you know, let
them go let them go wrestle and and
and and shoot and and shoot hoops and
play soccer.
Give them a healthy alternative where they can
sit there and say, you know what, man?
That that primes for the birds because my
student told me. She said after after graduation,
mister Hicks, I finally understood that this stuff
was pointless.
But it it it took her to understand
to see it from a different perspective because
she had nothing to replace it with. She
just she's isolated,
and so she's estranged.
He's estranged. They're they're they're the one person
in that classroom,
and now you got you know, and and
and now you you feel like,
as doctor King said it, like, an exile
in your own land.
You know, Nabi Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam described this
date.
He said that the deen started
strange and it will become strange again one
day. So glad tidings to the stranger. Anyone
who remembers this, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala accept
it from you. Tell me. And on the
flip side, if I I you know, I
feel like if there's a message anyone who
listens, if I could give to them, you
know, if, you know, if you wanna serve
the deen, if you're not a half of
the Quran that can, like, deliver, like, an
award winning or,
like, you know,
you're, not,
you know, qualified to give the jermakhotaba
or, like, you know, you can't donate, like,
$1,000,000
for the new, like, masa taqwa, like, you
know, chandelier or whatever.
That's fine.
If you if you can do this,
there's children out there whose parents they they
should know better and they just don't or
whose parents aren't there. Allah took them, you
know, back or from circumstances they bounced or
whatever.
If you first for your own children and
then for the children of the Ummah, the
prophet,
all of them are children. Whatever their color
is, whatever the race is, whatever land they're
in, whatever. You know, if it doesn't touch
your heart knowing that a child is going
through suffering, you know, like, you gotta check
your iman. And I'm not saying that judgmentally
because we all go through those things. We
have check our own imam sometimes about those
things.
But,
if you, you know, if you wanna do
something for the ummah,
you go and see those brokenhearted,
you know, those little broken hearts, and you
do something like coach said, like, you know,
arrange for that, you know, sisters get together.
You know, arrange for that the the that
brothers get together. You know, say a good
word or give an alternative to, you know,
someone's kids whose parents may even be there,
but they're just knuckleheads and they're not paying
attention,
in order to in order to, like, soothe
that that that heart, you know. Allah
forgive you all of your sins and give
you jannah, you know, like the one time
that you whatever
ate a Chick Fil A sandwich and Shaym
Musa told you it was haram.
Overlook all of those things for the, you
know, that have passed, you know, for the
one who does that for the sake of
the the children of this.
Coach, is there anything else you wanted to,
you know, get out there?
You wanted to say? I just think that
just from my experience,
we just we have to be able to
put
and and this is like, it comes from
Luke Mine. This doesn't come from me. We
have to have some type of program,
or you're gonna stagnate as a coach. When
we get ready to start the season, we
have a program set up. We're gonna do
this, this, this on this day, this, this,
and this on this day. So come game
day, this does not look like some type
of raggedy, uncoached, undisciplined team. And as Muslims,
we have to have a program together or
we're gonna produce raggedy
or we're gonna be ourselves raggedy, you know,
and and then our kids are gonna be
raggedy as well. So I'll just understand that
there are a lot of things going on
within this in the school system.
Our kids are seeing a lot.
You know, please make sure you're looking at
your, you you know,
I guess I'm just about that invasion of
privacy. Maybe I'll be corrected, but you need
to know what your kids are doing.
Please
do some monitoring with those phones at night.
You know, I said because that's when the
that's when most of the damage is done.
At night in the seclusion when no one's
around, you know,
take take the computers, you know,
from that standpoint, be be be cognizant of
your children,
build a relationship with them. So when they
if they love if they love you as
the parent,
in turn, when you try to tell them
about Dean, they'll they'll receive the Dean from
you. And then that, we have to put
stuff in place for our youth. We have
to get I mean, obviously, with COVID, it's
hard to get people together. But when the
restrictions are lifted, we need to bring these
young men together in their safe space.
We need to bring the women together in
their safe space so they can just
not feel ashamed to wear the kufi,
to wear the throw. Because I can tell
you, there are a lot of young men
out here. They like to throw, but they're
ashamed to wear
it. You know? And we and we have
to be very conscious because this is coming
straight out of people's mouths. I'm listening to
young people talk about it. So just from
that standpoint,
you know, I don't think I've brought anything
earth shattering to the table outside of the
fact that just I'm I'm at the ground
level. I see what goes on every day.
So if we don't provide
alternative to substitute
fun
for these youth, they're gonna find
the haram fun that's gonna just take them
down a path that we don't want them
to go to.
And may Allah bless you and reward you
for that insight because
you have a unique perspective because you're seeing
it from both sides. You have you and
now as a parent, how many kids you
have? 4. Allah bless and protect them all.
I mean. So this is new territory.
Right? So,
you can tell that your own parents did
a good job putting some values in you,
but it's a whole different ball game when
you're trying to raise most of your kids
now. So It's hard. You know?
We know what it's like kinda coming from
a particular lifestyle and
kinda been given that freedom on the, you
know, to kinda reign free. Mhmm.
And they're now trying to, like, figure out
how to harness that.
So
that's
some, definitely appreciated insight to a lot of
the parents who maybe don't understand what's happening
in our schools and in our societies
and that
they need to be hip to the game.
They need to be involved, and they need
to be hands on when it comes to
raising our kids. So we want to help
protect all of our youngsters, all of our
kids Amen. Because
we have to identify these issues when they're
young. It's hard to undo when they're older,
and you can't now, like, run to the
sheikh or run to the imam to, like,
help my son or help my daughter when
they're already at the point of no return.
It becomes much more difficult at that point.
So I'll ask you.
So, coach, you mentioned the, the program.
Shay Musa
runs literally regular classes.
You can go to dot
org
and look at the Cleveland branch for those
of you in town.
Obviously, there's the Chicago branch and a number
of other branches. Where do where are we
up to? We up to, like, what? Knoxville,
Tennessee, Bay Area. There's a couple of places.
I think Sheikh Amin mentioned to me that
there's one, under development in Shalimar, North Carolina.
Correct. And there are other there are other
places, there are other masha'ikh, there are other
olema
of
who are running these things. We mentioned Darul
Rahma, Sheikh Abdul Karim,
and and Imam Dawood in in Detroit. Detroit.
But you you gotta get yourself with the
program.
And, if you want your kids to be
with the program, the number way that you
number one way of saying that is not
to grab their ear saying that you better
be in a program. You yourself show them
that this is important to you. And if
they see their father, the, you know, the
boys and girls, they see their father,
is
religiously dedicated to the program like a man.
It will affect them. And that's the thing
too is sometimes
when you announce and inform the community about
an Islamic school or classes, like, oh, that's
wonderful. I'll tell my kids about it.
It's like, alright. I'll have my kids go.
Yeah. Hold on now. You can't just send
your kid and expect them to get it
fixed. Right? So sheikh Duzakaluha for pointing that
out is it starts with our own example
because what we do speaks much louder than
what we say, and when they see the
importance of the dean in our own lives,
that's the first step.
And, they do have online options for the
people who don't
have, like, a Darul Qasem or other type
of facility
in their cities. Darul Qasem does have, like,
Islamic essentials online now.
We have high school classes. And
by,
as as as a philosophy and as a
program, Dar Al Qasem doesn't offer anything
before high school. But there was such a
demand for that in this community here that
we actually,
as an exception,
started middle school classes for, you know, classes
for middle school age kids, I should say.
Mhmm. And has been a pretty good response
to that. We do have things like open
gym. ICC has done their best to make
you know, to renovate the gym and make
it available. Mhmm. And we had that twice
a week before the lockdown. And, hopefully, it
will start up again afterwards.
And there there are brothers who come to
that that you might not ever see at
the masjid.
For those 2 nights, they'll come, and they'll
be at the masjid, catch a prayer, you
know, and and and connect with other brothers.
So,
we definitely need a game plan, and we
need to be strategic. Otherwise,
you can tell when the team hasn't been
coached.
You know when they have been coached, and
talent will will only get you so far.
So we have the most beautiful dean, but
if it's not, you know, packaged correctly, and
we can't game plan and and and and
and actually
put a strategy together to help our kids
and help ourselves practice it and adopt it,
then we're gonna be struggling.
Help us now.
For that. That is so much needed.
For, listening with us. Allah
make our gathering,
for his sake and forgive us for any
lack of sincerity that we may have had.
Allah
whatever words that were said of benefit, may
Allah make them enter into the hearts and
change people in order to rectify the thing
that's broken in the Ummah of the prophet
no matter, who and where,
Allah
accepts from
us.
You Allah, forgive us for all of our
sins. You Allah, make this gathering of ours,
Insha Allah, a gathering in which
in which
the the
markers and the the the the the exits
and the junctions that people
cross in their lives,
it gives them the impetus and the motivation
to take the right path, to get off
the path that's gonna lead to destruction, to
get off the path that's just going to
lead to pointlessness and meaninglessness
and allows us to get on to that
that path that leads to you and to
your love and to realization
and to enlightenment
and to your jannah and to your pleasure
in this world and the hereafter. You Allah,
if we said anything that you're not pleased
with, you Allah, show us the error of
our ways and give us a tilthiyib of
of repentance.
If there's anything that you were pleased with
that any of us said, accept it from
all of us, both the speaker and the
listeners,
and and vouchsafe it to us, protect it
for us, that we should be able to
benefit from its nur on the day of
judgment. We should be able to benefit it
from from it in from its nur in
our grace, and that we don't any do
anything to jeopardize it or screw it up
before that time.