Absent Fathers, Weaponising Kids and Unstable Families – Na’ima B Robert #01

salaam aleikum wa rahmatullah will catch on. Welcome to another episode of The mph podcasts one of the most irregular podcasts in history. We're joined with a very special guest. She's the author of 25 books. She specializes in many issues to do with.

Could we say, personal issues relating to women? She's actually even started a magazine, one of the first to actually have a woman's voice in the Muslim community called assistant magazine. Is that correct?

Yeah, we run it for 10 years Mashallah. So isn't anymore. But yeah, it was 10 years. And now she continues to train and mentor people and on how to write and shadow courses running, which I'm so sure you be able to see on our socials. So let's start off sister Naima, what kind of issues? Have you been kind of trying to help assist us with in the Muslim community? What have you found to be the salient issues, problematic issues for women in the in the Muslim community, such that especially male members need to pay attention to?

Oh, okay, I think I had an answer for the first part of the question. And the second part made me think maybe pause. I think what we see within our space, in terms of what sisters struggle with, is a lot of mental barriers.

I would say that many, many sisters suffer from a sort of victim hood, or some kind of imprisonment of the mind more than a lot of other things. why I say that is because lots of us don't realize really how powerful our own mindset is, in determining how we feel about our lives, how we feel about our marriages, about our children, about our prospects, a lot of that is actually what's happening in your mind, right, not necessarily what's happening on the ground. So the work that I do is geared towards helping sisters and general in people in general, understand the power of their own mindset, and taking back control of that which they can control. And, you know, we call it

women's empowerment. And we've had this conversation before where, you know, people are wondering, Well, what kind of empowerment Are you actually talking about? For me, the most potent form of power is self control, is self awareness is, you know, being able to navigate your own mind and be able to regulate yourself. And that's a skill that we don't teach children. We don't teach it to young people. We don't teach it to men or women. So that's really the work that I do is panela. What is the? What are some of those barriers that you speak of? So you mentioned some mental barriers that women in the community have, from your experience? What are some of those various

I would say, when I've spoken with sisters, and when I've worked with sisters, that predominantly women come to me because they feel that something's missing, okay?

They lack confidence in themselves, there is a sense of, you know, failure about their lives, wherever they are, whether they're single, married, when they have children, or the children have left the nest, there's this sense that they are not good enough that they're not worthy, but they're failing somehow.

And, you know, that's a really powerful lens, to to look at your life with the lens of failure. Because if you're looking at your life through the lens of failure, guess what, you're going to find failure everywhere, right? If you're looking at your life, through the lens of, you know, I'm not good enough, I'm not good, as good as so. And so that's what you're going to see replicated time and time again, and this is for men and women, you know, way that we see ourselves impacts directly our experience of life of everything that's happening around us. So you know, for, for me, empowering sisters is helping them to show up, you know, like I talked about, to show up fully for the lives

that are Lost Planet Allah has chosen for them. And every single one of us, Allah subhanaw taala has picked a path for us. And that's the path that matters. Not your sister's path, or your cousins or your sister in low anyone else. But the past that Allah Subhana Allah has put you on your responsibilities, the people who count on you, your opportunities, your challenges. The more you focus on living your life intentionally, and showing up to every one of those challenges, the more satisfying your life will be To be honest, and the more fulfilled you'll be in the life you have right now. And that for me is is is golden, because it makes everything easier. What are some of the

woman's specific issues? Because a lot of what you said there could like you've kind of alluded to, yeah, equally applied to males and females. So what are some of the woman's specific issues, which through our own paradigm, like obviously, this whole conversation, we're going to assume the Islamic paradigm here, but let's let's for the sake of argument, say through our own paradigm,

that women have concerns with that legitimate concerns, which we all need to be aware of, we all need to, to aid in helping them with and that we need to have empathy on.

I would say the topic that comes up the most in general is, and not surprisingly, is relationships is to, and specifically marriage, and then everything that kind of radiates outwards from a marriage, whether it's in laws, whether it's children, whether it's stepchildren, whether it's looking to get married, whether it's healing from a divorce, a lot of the problems that we're seeing in the community do kind of revolve around that relationship between a man and a woman.

And certainly over the years, that's the area in which I've seen the most dysfunction in our community. That's where I've seen the most damage being caused the most pain being inflicted kind of both ways. And of course, the fallout is our children, and what they see growing up and what they either want to replicate or don't want to replicate. So I would say, if we could get our marriage is on point, so many things would change. So many issues that we're having with the children, with the youth, with mental health, with even poverty and things like that, so many of those issues would cease to be an issue if those fundamental relationships were healed, and were healthy. Because to

healthy people, you know, bringing up a family, that's the unit that we're you know, that that's the unit that we are striving to create. But when there is unrest, when there is dysfunction, when there is pain in that central relationship, and again, radiates outward to everything. So like I said, all of the issues surrounding a marriage, on the front, the beginning of it, the end of it, and in the in the in between those, those are all the issues that I see still are issues for our sisters a good 20 years later, so I've been Muslim for 20 years, over 20 years now, Mashallah. And it's still the same stuff. And sometimes upon a lot, I'm actually surprised, because I remember when I was deep in

the community, I was living in a certain community and it was rough, it was rough. The the situations that sisters were in the the kind of conditions under which they were kind of operating. It was it was tough, it was tough to witness, it was tough to try to support someone through that process, knowing that there was actually very little you could do. And it's it's kind of dismaying to me to see that we still haven't figured it out, we're still having some of those same issues, and sometimes even more now, because new issues have come up to basically attack that unit of the family. What are some of those issues in particular, that we could say, constitute patterns?

continuity is?

Like, let me let me give you one example. Let's give one example, right? And let's, let's put out there the idea of an absent father, okay. And if you have an absent father, now, you, as you say, you kind of counsel women, you speak to them, you yourself with a single mother book for completely different reasons, which you intimate in your book,

which I'm going to get

up, show up here, no show up as of which we recommend that you get is a very powerful book, just looking at the first kind of 2030 pages, you know, so emotional, well written, and it's amazing how you articulate yourself, but putting that to the side?

How you How can we? How can we frame the idea of the problems that are caused by an absent father, in the community? What have you seen, with your, with your clients, with your colleagues, with your friends? What kind of damage does that cause?

I would say that, you know, the, for me, the most shocking thing that I've observed over the years is

the seeming and again, this is anecdotal, because I'm not a social scientist. I haven't got the data. But thoughts are important to us, Naima, your anecdotes are important. Well, that's what you're gonna get as well. You're going to get your numbers obviously, your experiences are very important, especially as we know, there is a dearth or a non existence in some cases of some of this kind of data, especially within the Muslim community. So your your experience are very important. I

think, for me, I've been very vocal about this on social media, you know, my videos all over Instagram or whatever. But for me, the most shocking thing that I've seen in this area is when there is a divorce, and the father is basically he's gone, he's left. He's left the marriage. He's left the wife, and he's left the kids and I don't understand the thinking behind that.

Because I know so many sisters who, when there's a divorce, they are literally on their own. So they are not only responsible for the children on a day to day basis, but they are responsible for them economically, socially in terms of school in terms of everything the father is he's out, he's out. And I've said this before.

We really, really need to start thinking so much more carefully and being so much more intentional when we start families. Because as I have said, before, the children pay the price. And that trauma that we are that we are living through our broken homes, our children are carrying that trauma, and they will carry it into their families as well. So I can think of a particular situation where you know, the father was around he was working was a breadwinner. And the divorce was, was not amicable at all it was a very, very difficult divorce. But it was one of those where it was like this cannot continue. When he left the home, he stopped speaking to the children completely cut off from them

completely, they would ring him he wouldn't pick up, they would voice messages. To be honest, this kind of thing, Naima, sorry to chime in here. But

this kind of thing really does make me sick. Because it's, I think, if anything, it exposed the true character of that person. Like their true colors came out when that that particular man, his true colors came out when the divorce took place. Because if you're willing to sacrifice your children for something that's completely no fault of their own, that must mean at least that your love for yourself is far exceeds anything else in life. This is like the ultimate manifestation of narcissism. Like I'm going to teach everyone a lesson, I don't care what collateral damage is, just so that, you know, they know who I am and what I'm about.

I think honestly, it's his family. I think these men should be exposed honestly, like it is in the community. If a man is genuinely doing that, to putting the kids, you know, in harm's way in that manner, I think that the community is I don't know if this is a strong stance in your perspective may get your perspective on it. But the community that imams the his friends should do anything that by any means necessary to influence his behavior, because that is for me, despicable and deplorable action. And he should be boycotted, he should be the heart, the heart approach should be using him to kind of push, but this kind of person should shouldn't be just allowed to live in society normal,

just left his kids having a I have an emotional reaction to this. I'm justified. No, no, I think I think you're justified. I think we we I have observed this over the years. And you know, anybody who sees it differently is free to disagree. But what I've seen in the communities that I've known is that brothers give each other a pass. You know, whatever you do in your private life, actually, nothing to do with me, like that's your family. Do you know what I mean? Like, I'm not going to step into your territory.

Right away. Yeah, whatever is happening, whatever the case, it could be that there's injustice happening at home, that sister is like, you know, it's known in the community that sisters desperately unhappy, or that he's taken away her rights in some shape, or form or whatever. But he's still a brother. And he's still welcome. And he still gets Salaam and he still has, you know, his place in the society because I don't know whether it's like a is a thing or a rare thing. But for us as sisters, I'll be honest, and this is something that I've been saying for years and years. It's like no one ever tells the brothers anything. That anytime that there's advice or hot bugs or

warnings, it's always to the sisters, sisters fear Allah, sisters wear hijab, sisters, do this sisters do that obey your husband's sisters give him what he wants his sister, sister sisters. And unfortunately, we're human beings, sisters are doing wrong and brothers are doing wrong. But what we don't often hear or see from the elders in the community is brothers actually been pulled up and said, You can't do this. You know, whether it's on a sort of grassroots level, B person to person or even from the member to say, brothers in the Ola, you know, this is not acceptable in our DNA and actually teaching our brothers that. I'll just just want to make this point. Yes. In our communities

many, many times, you'll find that we enable bad behavior, especially amongst men and boys. We enable it, how do we enable it by making excuses for it by not pulling them up on it? domestic violence is a great example. Okay, when there's actual violence in the home, yeah, there's actually violence, or there's alcohol abuse, or there's drugs or anything like that. The family's response is typically to cover and to shield, right? We don't want to get the police involved. We don't want the neighbors involved. We don't want the community involved. And if the woman has the audacity to speak up, she's the one who's shamed. She's the one who's been

named How could you embarrass us like this? You know, it's your fault. He did x, y and Zed, it's very easy to blame and shame the woman, rather than actually addressing this issue with your son and saying, in our family, this is not acceptable. So we become a community of enablers. And before we move on with this, usually, yeah, sorry, sorry, naman. So to chime in, before we move on. The issue here is when we use terms like domestic violence, you know,

I told you, I think before we started the show that I wrote a small little pamphlet book, which was really the combination to combine the four of my postgraduate essays that are done on gender studies. Anyway, one of them was about domestic violence. And what I found was problematic. There was a particular woman who wrote a definition for what domestic violence is, her name was Kuma say, I think it's correctly spelled pronouncing her name. And she says something to the effect of an paraphrasing, but this is in my book, if someone wants to see that domestic violence is,

is defined as is defined as when one spouse,

you know, abuse of one spouse to another, or violence, violence of one spouse to another. Usually, and this is exactly what she said and her definition usually from a man to a woman. Yeah. Now, any any any social scientists will tell you this is a problem because it begs the question, since it's kind of assumed the answer of the question before it started. So you couldn't put the results, like the hypothesis and the conclusion should be two different things. The issue with the terms like domestic violence and rape and these kinds of terms, is what whose definition Are we really using? Are we using the definition of Kumasi? Who's already put her conclusion in her hypothesis? Are we

using the definition of McKinnon, who finds rapists sexual intercourse? any sexual intercourse, even with CATHERINE MCKENNA says that his rape is even with consent. So the issue with using these terms, and especially sometimes the legal definitions are so vague, what is the definition of abuse? Like for example,

you can have monetary abuse? What does monitor abuse look like? Well, you know, giving a pocket money and of pocket money, what kind of pocket money do you need?

What we take not really like that it's more, you know, if a person is has money in a way from that money, not you, but my issue is when we have these such wide definitions of these things, right? Yeah. So you say, Well, she's been raped. And what he means by McKinnon's definition being raped means someone has sex with her. But on some on the governmental definition is the insertion of the penis, or whatever it may be, by the way, rape from the UK law can only be done by a man to a woman is discriminatory by really, there's no such thing as Wait a woman, it can, she can sexually assault a man, but she cannot recommend UK law, for example, by putting that to the side, even though you

can imagine how sorry, it's supposed to be explicit, but she can put some knife in him, or she can put a bottle in him, she can do something she can, she can sedate him. All these things are possible, you know, it's only defined in that way. But putting that off to the side, the point is, whoever gets to set the definition, gets to control the narrative. Whoever gets to control the narrative gets to call the shots. And my issue with a lot of these key terms is that if we don't have it in the Islamic narrative, and we use these terms, like abuse, domestic violence, and was what all these things, then it can easily come in, someone can come in with another agenda, and take

our community to a completely different direction. Would you agree to that auto accident? Would you agree to that?

Um, well, of course, it's plausible. But do you think that's what's happened with the community? Do you think we've been kind of kind of coerced? I think there are examples of, I'll give you one example where I think maybe we both agreed, right? one example where we definitely both agree is that in the Islamic law, right? We believe that kins ties of kinship should not should be respected. We talked about the case of the absent father, right. But there's also the case it's voluntarily absent father. Yeah.

Donna Donna? Yeah, but what about the case also of the the woman who is weaponizing the child children and leveraging them in after a divorce in order to spite the Father. And that happens a lot, so much. So that is, I mean, organizations like fathers for justice, and these kind of, they have come up. And let me give you a real scenario, which I think you're aware of, right? So for example, a man or woman gets separated for whatever reason, it may be, yeah. Man or woman gets separated. The woman has custody of the children. She's the primary custodial custodian of the children. She takes care of them and so on. Now, he wants to have access to his child. So this they

have to arbitrate, they have to go to court, Family Court in the UK and so on. In the meantime, he can't see his children. In the meantime, she has she she is barring him preventing him stopping him from

Seeing the children and for every second, that she's stopping him from seeing the children from the sound perspective, she's sitting, not even every second every millisecond, if she's not just singing for that. She's sitting for stopping the extended family, for example, the man's the grandparents of the children are the aunties, the uncles from seeing those children again, as well. And you are talking about uninsured. I do agree that there is this kind of culture of gender bias. It might not be feminism or red pill or whatever it may be, but it could be gentlemen. Like, where you genuinely people think that you know, he's he's one of these one of the guys and whatever, so I'm not gonna

say anything. Well, I think on the other hand, as well, you do have gender bias from the, from the sisters as well, like sometimes she'll see that her friend is preventing her ex husband from seeing the kids. Her friend will make bogus excuses. Yeah, and he's not doing it my way. He's not giving me enough money, whatever it is, and she will acquiesce to that as well. Would you agree? is that happening? Yeah, I think I would say I agree. I think there's a general kind of opinion that women back each other up. It's even got a name. It's called girl code right out there in the world. where women validate each other women back each other up no matter what, right? I would say within the

Muslim community, the sisters who don't do that are the ones who are firmly rooted in Deen because when you love someone for the sake of Allah, it's not about girl code. It's not about Yeah, you're my girl. And yeah, whatever. It's Sis, this is haraam. What exactly and I have witnessed those conversations before and someone has said you know, I have been involved in those conversations say says have you checked to see whether that is okay. You know, have you asked anybody about that I was something like this. Yeah, sorry to cut you off. Sorry, I'm cutting off a bit too much. But with something like this, you don't need to check like the Prophet Muhammad wa sallam said, lay its full

agenda fall down. You know that someone who cuts the kins of tiptoed kinship is not going to go to heaven. So yeah, this is such a like it's a clear thing smell Amina Dima Dora actually opened the Quran the second or third page I don't know. Alessia Katana Amara lobi I used to do a lot is that the ones who cut the ties that Allah subhanaw taala wanted to be maintained and then they create corruption in the land. And interfere will tell you that's not just you know, your parents and your grandparents and dashi are the extended family, but it's even your friends and your neighbors and these kinds of things. There's also I mean, imagine someone stopping their children from seeing a

parent that's stopping the child from stopping the child from performing the obligatory act that is stopping the parent from performing obligatory acts. That is

that is causing emotional damage to someone unjustly that is all of those things. What do you think about you know, as you're saying all of this, I'm just thinking of, I'm thinking of it from so two angles, and I think my conclusion is that as as human beings we just need to sort it out. Because just as Okay, so there's one thing this happening to men because men, especially Muslim men, up until very recently have not really had spaces where they have talked about their lived experience. It's always assumed that the brothers the brothers are okay the brothers are cool because they have all the power they have all the control they get to do whatever they want and basically they're

never the victims women are the victims sisters are always the victims right? So I think that is a narrative in our community that is a narrative and I think it's because sisters will talk about their problems sisters have been much more vocal of late about the issues that they go through etc. So we know what each other are going through. But brothers may not speak to each other but they certainly have not up until lately we've been speaking honestly about hey, you know what, I'm struggling with this or this has happened to me and I'm suffering because of this. So even in our minds the idea of a Muslim man suffering because of a woman it's like what are you talking about?

This never happens exactly the Muslim woman is suffering because I'm listening exactly it's the * it's the chivalry so that is the chivalry effect, especially when you hear the woman like you know if a person a judge or an arbitrator or a third party or another stakeholder of some sorts and they literally just see and hear the woman like you just hear and see the woman crying It's enough she has one already like or at least she has convinced you know, but if you see a big man you know a huge man with dominance and especially if he's an extrovert Yes, it's almost like there's no child he's got no chance. Are you telling me that she's pressing him? You know how this is something? This

is something that I want to just touch on and I hope it's not you know, too, too open for this audience. But I'll give you another exhausting is to open for my audience.

Okay, yeah. Well, you know, as I have two sons, and I have I have three sons and I have two daughters. hamdulillah

So when I'm looking at gender, in general, I feel I have a responsibility to be as balanced as possible, and to be as fair as possible and to be as just as possible. So just as you're talking about men who are having their children weaponized, I can't, I cannot say that's not happening. You know, how we always say believe women. And also we've had many situations where women have come forward and said, this is happening to us and the brothers have been like, no, or the Imam or whoever is like, I noticed that you must have done this, you must have done that. Similarly, I must extend the same grace to brothers. So if brothers come forward, and they say, look, I haven't seen

my kids for two years, and I've been trying, but x y, Zed, we have to give them the benefit of the doubt, we have to think that it's possible that that is true. Just like if a sister came to me, I would, you know, I would give her the benefit of the doubt and say, you know, what, says, I hear you anyway? No, but the burden of proof like can I just say something? Yeah, yeah, the but we're not we're not the brother is not coming forward and saying the woman has raped me, or she has the the kind of things that you know, require a heavy burden of proof in Islam is She's not coming and saying that is that is the the burden of proof to establish a woman is stopping a man from seeing

his children is fairly, you can say fairly simple. All they have to do is test out, come see them on a Saturday, are you going to be there or not? If not, why not? Why you're not going to be the key he wants to see them on Saturday. They want to see him on Saturday, you know, this is the time that is willing to take them is that allow you will learn this or you're not alone this, all you have to do is basically if you ask this question, you will be able to establish whether the person is borrowing. So you don't need four witnesses. It's an easy burden of proof. And so what I'm saying is it's definitely happening. I'm sorry, I've said this way before but I mean, Ali Dawa, we went to a

he'll remember this, he went to Sacramento in California. And there was a story that stuck with me, you know, this man who's they were telling me, he went to the masjid, you know, he went to the masjid. And

everyday, and I think he was saying he goes, and then he had a bad divorce. And they were telling me that, you know, that he had his last day with his doors, he's had two doors, and his last day with them. And he couldn't bear that, you know, the other woman, now she's married another man, and that the courts have all ruled in her favor. So she, he's done a monstrous act, you know, he went to the lake, and he killed both of those daughters. And he killed himself, you know, and this is from the

involuntary or maybe he was responsible for this, but this this, this disgusting behavior, or this, this kind of reaction took place because of an initial injustice. Now, two wrongs obviously cannot make you can never, ever justify something. But the truth is, we can avoid these kind of things. Another situation I had just a person who's been prevented from seeing the children literally died from it literally had panic attacks seizures, until they died from it. Why did that happen up because he had a secret second wife or something happened, he went to this country and and then the woman found out she said, you're never gonna see your children again. And a few years down the line,

he just he couldn't he his health couldn't handle it. And he deteriorated and died because of a stroke or some, some heart attack or something, which is related to. Now, what I'm saying is, these kinds of things, if we're really honest about it, could be prevented. But then we need to, I don't know what, tell me if I'm wrong, because once again, I'm not a pastoral. My specialism is not pastoral counseling or something like this is more. This is why I've asked you honestly,

do we? Should we not use a really a sledgehammer approach with this? Like, either if we're talking about the the absent father, or we're talking about the weaponizing? Mother? Yeah. And either, should we not really, you know, should we? Should we really expose these people? Should we not really

let the community know who these people are, so that they are unbearable? They shouldn't be? If you think about it, right? If they're capable of not seeing their children, the case with absent fathers, they're capable of leaving their kids alone, or they're capable of weaponizing their kids. That means that they're capable of putting their children as humans shields in this proverbial game of leverage. That means what kind of person are you you're a narcissist, you're a bad person, and you and if anyone's going to marry you, they're going to have a hell of a life because that means you only going to be thinking about yourself. If you can't even think about your children then you

can't, you will not think about a partner properly. You will not you will not be courteous and compassionate. And empathetic. Am I being a bit too emotional with this?

I as I said before, the family is the unit right? And our families are under extreme pressure. The family itself is under attack at the moment we know this and Muslim families are just if not more under attack. We are just as vulnerable we think we're not but we are and for me, sledgehammer

Okay, it's a possible approach. But I am more concerned about us preparing people for properly for marriage for Parenthood, we don't we still don't have enough premarital counseling, we don't have enough therapy and counseling for people are slung. Because that man who went and killed his daughters, it's not just because his wife wouldn't let him see that he had a divorce. Obviously, the man was hurting. Obviously, he was not okay. So mental health, big issue, counseling within the marriage, helping people to strengthen their marriages, you know, to work on things right? To actually, you know, if then if they can't work at it. If they can't make it work, should I say then

how can we manage the separation because all I care about is the children I'll be honest you to you, man, you woman, you're adults, do whatever you want. You want to have a secret marriage, go ahead. You want to have Miss y'all go ahead, you want to have full women, you want to marry, you know, three men, one after the other, do whatever you want. But the children, the children, they are the ones who experienced the fallout. And so you tried to balance it that you know you give you gave a female example.

Because the reality is we can all do bad, Mohammed, that's the reality we can do bad just by ourselves, you know, and this, this idea, and I might get bought by my mom, because the reality is the reality is, even if a woman for example, let's take let's assume that the woman does not have the upper hand, she has the lower hand, right? The man is over her, her father's over her whatever the case may be right? Do you think that that woman does not have power to be evil? Just because she doesn't have the upper hand? Of course she can. And I'll tell you what, you see it the most? You're talking about weaponizing? The children? What about weaponizing? intimacy? That's a real thing.

Here's what here's what I'm gonna say, Look, you're talking about secret second wives. If someone's doing something like that, I would go and tell them to get three secrets second wives I mean, to be honest with you, she's she's secret second way to get three because I know that sounds maybe harsh or something. But if a woman is doing something, which is clearly Haram, which is intimacy, surprising intimacy, that secret second wife, which is what he means, not telling the first wife, which is not even a shot, and then it can even be compared to that, in the least, although due respect is completely the two different

things altogether. So if she's not doing it, and then he knows that if he's going to tell her that he's going to be in polygamy, that she's going to take his kids and go to another country or bar him, then maybe secret second, maybe secret second, wives other way to go for such people. I mean, they're, you know, yeah, what do you think, okay, I'm not gonna go down on paper saying, Yes, secret secondaries are a thing.

But But I think, again, my really what I wants to say, and the point I want to make is that we must be careful of buying into the narrative that only the dominant party can be evil. Only the dominant party can oppress only the one who has a level higher, can actually do wrong. And the person who is under is always right, is always a victim is always, you know, basically not to blame. That's not true. Okay. It's not the fact. And anyway, as we said, you know, and the thing is, again, it's not something we talk about very often. But if you if you start Look, this is this is the I'll just give you a little bit of background. I have not spoken about these issues before. Because up until last

year, I never listened to men anyway, right? Muslim men didn't really talk about their own personal issues. And just in general, in the culture, the culture around this is very female. It's very, very female dominated the culture. I'm not talking about economy. I'm not about politics. I mean, the culture, okay. And it's not only very female, but it's also very females trick. So women's stories dominate women's view of the world now dominate women's ways of emoting ways of expressing themselves they don't need the culture that we live in Western culture, right? Yes. So it's very easy to get a feel for what women like and what we don't like and how women see the world that's

very easy. But to find out how men feel and how men see the world and how men experience the world actually been a lot harder up until a year or two ago certainly for me, so all of this even weaponizing intimacy I would never have thought it was an issue because I never heard men talking about it and of course women are not going to talk about that this is not going to sit around saying yeah, it's been three months here until I get that car or anything like that it's not going to happen okay. And you know and to be honest, you know, in certain places that might even be applauded, like go get yours girl, you know way but have you ever heard something like that Not my

sister sisters, not sister sisters, you know, but just within hellos, withholding

sisters she asexual, this is not she doesn't she want to herself or something. Maybe she

Maybe she does different things there's lots of different No Brother Mohammed we're not going down that road three months and come back what's going on three months what's happening what you she doesn't want to herself. if everyone's interest anyone's interested in like knowing more about this, you just have to just search YouTube and you will see three months sorry. Three months is a very very is a very big example we should be talking about three hours or three days. Like how about how about two years? How about two years?

So what did you expect him to do? Maybe you can't imagine it but maybe you can't imagine it but one lucky this is the lived reality for some men some Muslim and

then the secret second was on Father's revival.

No, I think that if you know you are in a situation where you know intimacy is being withheld. Okay. For whatever reason, right? Because if Sharia wise and in general in terms of you know, marital relationships, this will be seen as abuse acceptable. Yeah, of course it Yeah, I mean, it is seen domestic violence. Domestic Abuse.

Domestic Abuse. Um, you know, you will see that Oh,

can you pause moment? Yeah. Yeah, just cut that, please. Oh, gosh.

Am I still on? Yes, I am. Yeah. Am I still here?

It's not live. It's not live by the way. Okay, cool. Yeah. Oh, no, cuz I was signed out of my account. Okay.

So that's cool. Okay, this is where I was, I am withholding intimacy, let's cut let's go back to this. Okay. So

So, so that so when I say that this is something that people are going through, you will see that obviously, if there is no spacing, which is acceptable for either partner to withhold from the other, but what we're seeing is, you know, it's like, it's a thing weaponizing intimacy is a thing. May Allah guide us?

I know I'm taking up a lot of your time. I'm, I'm not gonna take too much of your time. I know you're very busy. But

I wanted to ask now, the issues that we're facing a lot with, with like the females, I've heard you speak about this before, I want you to kind of articulate it the way I've heard you said it before.

The

the issues relating to like how some sisters can perceive what men do, as always oppressive.

Why, by virtue of this feminist kind of second wave narrative, which is that man is the oppressor by domination, because he is, he's in power over the woman, the hierarchy, the managerial hierarchy that is set in place by Allah subhanaw, taala, the TA, a wema, all these concepts, they are themselves oppressive. So if you, if you so much as an act them, then you are the agent of oppression. How do you combat this? How do you talk to this?

You know, Subhan, Allah?

For me,

the answer for me, and I could be wrong. But whenever these questions come up, I feel the answer. I believe that the answer is always found in the CETA.

And why I say this is because the Sierra was the lived example. Right? That was the lived experience of our Deen. That's how people actually applied it, right? So you know,

what we know from this era, is balance.

However, what we need to be careful, and everybody needs to be aware of the fact that we live in a cultural context, okay? And that cultural context, wherever you are in the world, whichever era you live in, it impacts the way you view things. So in the 1950s, for example, Islamic values, were pretty much in line with society's values, traditional gender roles, man's the head of the household, you know, when daddy comes home, you know, he comes in deals with the problems, he goes out to work, mom stays home with the children. Muslims would not have been strange at that time, okay, because the society was pretty much based on that. Fast forward to the 70s. Now, Muslims are

starting to look a bit old fashioned starting to look a bit out of touch. Fast forward to today, and our sense of what is balance has shifted dramatically. Let's put it that way. So those of us who especially younger, you know, we're trying to make sense of everything, trying to make sense of our identity, trying to make sense of who we are as individuals. What you know, what does Islam mean to us? You know, how much of you know which of our identities takes precedence and all of these things because those are the questions that young people are asking now because of the society that

We live in. And so what we may see as fair, what we may see as balanced, what we may see as just may not be what Allah sees as fair and balanced and just, we we have to be aware of the fact that we live in a paradigm, okay, we are in a context. And a lot of people I find a lot of us think that our views are our own. You know, they come from ourselves, you know, people are all my truth, I'm speaking my truth. This is this is how I see things right? Not understanding that your opinion or your ideas and your feelings, etc, they aren't, they don't, they're not created in a vacuum. They're not something that sprung up from a well within it is a combination of what you learned, growing up,

what your parents taught you, what you learnt in school, what books you read, what films you watch, what music, you listen to the friends, you have the social media, your own, all of that is impacting you all the time. And that's your paradigm. So I digress. When we look at the record, and managerial hierarchy, and we look at the prophet SAW Selim, I would love to go back to the example the prophet SAW Selim, because you know, we're having this conversation about masculinity. We're having these conversations about alpha and beta, and dominance and all of this kind of thing. And what we see, really without any bias, when we look at the Syrah, we see a man who was holistically masculine,

because we know that every one of us has got masculine or feminine tendencies or fighters anyway, right, we have that we have those energies, when you see the prophet SAW Salem, and how he was able to be strong, and decisive and dominant and, and have a goal and go after it and fight an order for people to be punished. And all of these alpha traits, right, because that's what alpha is, how we're seeing it now. Strong, dominant, etc, masculine, he also had the flip side of masculinity, which is the ability to be humble, to be protective, to make people feel safe to make people feel like you know, grounded, because that's the beta side of the male. It's not alpha, good, beta, bad. That's

just ridiculous. It's just that you have the ability to be both right. And the prophet SAW Salem, when you see him with his family, he had a balance of both, we've got stories of him laying down the law. And we've got stories of him completely giving up his right and it doesn't mean anything, we I don't have to go into the stories in the series, because I think we all know what I'm talking about. And so when we look at the ideal, the ideal that we are aiming for, especially brothers, I want to speak to brothers on this point. I also speak to sisters, because sisters, you want to be married to a brother, hopefully, maybe you are married to a brother, and hopefully you're raising future

husbands. So being able to appreciate that a real man is one who is grounded in his belief in Allah subhanaw taala and his sense of mission and purpose. He is humble before Allah subhanaw taala and his actions are all for Allah subhanaw taala there's no ego, right? There's no ego, there's no my way or the highway, because I wanted to this should not be the way that we think right. But that man, he will have to make decisions, some of those decisions, we will not like them. But that's his Huck to make those decisions. And that man as well as responsible for making you feel safe and secure, and loved and protected and looked after. So I don't know, I guess the the long story for me

is, if we can go back to that model and understand it, and know what it will take from us to be able to embody that standard. We'll be on our way to something special at the moment. Everyone's on ego. Everyone's on myself. Well, I want what I like women and men. Right now that's why we're clashing because the sisters now they want that piece right before it was the brother wanted this piece. And everybody had to kind of run circles around him. Now this is the light No, no, I also want my piece. And that's partly why a lot of our marriages are fracturing. Because all of a sudden, you know, there's this there's this power shift this this dynamic that's shifted, but sometimes the original

power dynamic was not the healthiest dynamic, and it wasn't on center. It was something else, something cultural, something whatever.

I was gonna say I was gonna say, that's really the only thing I would just kind of like, talk about here. Well, I want to I want to kind of clarify it. I mean, you know, the whole red pill movement we spoken about, I mean, Alec doll made a video about the MiG towels and the red pill and whatever they call themselves, you know, and these terms are not the same thing. But anyway, yeah. have very similar ideas, you know, but it read to have their ideas mctighe their ideas. A lot of it is is a reaction to feminism and my view

whatever it may be the terms alpha and beta The reason why I personally don't use them or don't subscribe to them, is because what they because there is a quantity just like with the patriarchy, you know, I don't accept the term patriarchy

The reason why I don't accept the term patriarchy like some men use the term in a positive sense. They're trying to return the word or something like that, oh, what patriarchy has historically and in the literature always connote it at least if not sometimes even they've been defined as a systematic oppression of woman by men, or through domination of power structures on our lap. Yeah. Now if I'm if I'm affirming something which is known in the in the culture to be oppressive, then I'm not doing a favor to the model of Islam, which I'm trying to espouse. Likewise, the what beta hat has, we're not reclaiming the word beta. No, no, no, I don't want to reclaim any law because

it's already been, it's already been distorted by the is beta is, even though they don't maybe define it. They don't have any books. So very limited academic works on these kind of things. It's all wasn't on social media. Now. It's kind of like a social media thing. It's being used in a pejorative sense is being used in a week. So he's on this this is the bank going the Joe Rogan experience or the bml. And laughing at him? Yeah, sure. No, that's true. Did you know I mean, so so what what it is, is that the way is, can I just say sorry, just before we go further, yeah, just for anybody who is listening to this and watching it, please do not go and tell people sister name or

call the Prophet Mohammed or sell them a beta male.

I know that you, I know that you were very careful

in your articulation, and definitely She didn't say that. That would be lying about you anyway, don't worry, you didn't say that. But what I was gonna say was the qualities that are like compassion, for example, compassion. Compassion is associated with what maybe beta, but this is something which is for us are seen as allies of Rahim, why is he a beta? I'll tell you, and it's

an insult using the beta as an insult. Yeah, yeah. That is the problem before that. Yeah. Yeah. Another one is leadership. And this whole thing of alpha alpha, one of the things I'm always seeing on the social media thing is alpha male is a leader. Our religion doesn't tell us to go up to be leaders. Honestly, it does not tell us to go and want to be leaders. Our religion places more emphasis on obedience than anything else, not just for women, but for men as well. And not obedience to not obedience to just the Allah, lat Athenaeum of Look, if you ask, it'll highlight that there's no obedience to the creation and the disobedience of the Creator, but also obedience to the

creation. There's very harsh headaches. So

you have to be strong with the Dalai Lama. You have to obey the will of the Hadees like that and the deen and yeah, so what is it telling us there's only one eye and the Quran, only one that I can think of, which is the Dwight to be a leader, which is what Jonathan and mustafina in the one verse time, we are kind of incentivized, if at all incentivized to be leaders, is what allows pushing us to make a block. Well, we don't get it from our own neffs because being a leader is being arrogant, is what you want to be a leader why so you can assert yourself, you can be dominant, you want to be dominant, Allah Sally, you were trying to, like, we're trying to do a lot of calamus law, we're

trying to make Allah's column dominant, ourselves dominant. So in fact, men, tada, a lot of Allah, whoever humbles himself to Allah, Allah racism. So this idea of leaders and this and that, well, usually those people who are most hungry to be leaders are the worst leaders anyway. You know, the ones who are good leaders, they never think of themselves as good leaders, the people push them to that position, they never opt for that position themselves. So this idea of was alphas connected with the leader, this is an Islamic actually

push back on that I'm gonna push back on you should know, let me let me clear up. Clarify before you go. Well, I mean, as you should not desire leadership, you can be a good leader, but you don't need to desire it. Desiring it is problematic because it is a form of I want to impose myself on other people. Yeah. Our Deen is not about power, like that. Our Deen is about we just okay, that's that's the Yeah, that's the point that I want to get to because I think that you know, even in you know, certain discourses, right, the issue of of you know, male dominance, etc. patriarchy it's, it's everything is about power, right? And when we look at leadership in the dean, looking at the

shepherd, for example, every one of us a shepherd of the flock, and you'll be questioned about them, what does that mean? It's not leading to dominate it's leading to take responsibility. So every man is the mirror of his household. He leads the household because he takes responsibility

on his own colloquium Ryan will call it Yeah, it's it's you know, everyone has every one of us is a shepherd, right? So I mean, I, I personally, I would love to see more of our brothers developing themselves to be the very best that they can be and leading their families because either

Though we have a big, you know, very loud, maybe minority complaining about toxic masculinity. We have also a very vocal, I would even say majority of sisters saying where are the men? Where are the men who know how to be men? What does that mean as far as they're concerned, who can take care of the household who can lead us who can protect us who will bust his his backside to make sure that we have what we need because sisters are overworked right now. And sisters have been overworked for a while. And again, again, it's all anecdotal. But when you hear about sisters whose husbands he could even be present, but she's she's doing everything she's you know, getting money for the kids, his

her house, she's working as well, you know, the money is coming from the government, and he's not really kind of bringing anything to the table, etc. These issues, a lot of those sisters that I just wish he would grow up, I just wish that she would man up. And I know it's not like, it's not politically correct to tell a man to man up. But this is this is what women need. We do need men who see themselves in that role as I'm responsible for this flock. And it's my responsibility to myself, to optimize myself in every way that I can, so that I can do right by these, this umbrella that Allah has given me. So I think if you want to see more brothers stepping up and deciding to work on

themselves, Dean emotionally getting, you know, in mental health issues out of the way, physically, you know, getting healthy, you know, finding ways to kind of maximize their income and the impact they have in the community, you would find a lot more sisters who are happy to let them leave, and happy to relax into their feminine role. And it wouldn't be this type of fight, but I could be wrong. No, no, I appreciate all of that. And I think you've articulated it very well. But I think there's one thing which is conspicuously missing in the articulation, which is that you've mentioned health you mentioned mental health and you mentioned you've mentioned finances but the one thing

which is the dean actually hierarchize is is not any of those things was his religiosity. I didn't find him spiritually at the beginning was the first thing I said actually I did well okay let me be more clear about this right so Allah subhanaw taala he mentioned sort of Mojo that I mentioned, your fi level Latina am and woman come when Latina or to Lima, the project that Allah in terms of hierarchies that Allah subhanho wa Taala he raises amongst you those who have believed among you and those who have been given Island knowledge in dynajet this knowledge Islamic knowledge maturity level be higher on you for care of it then as you know the Hadith very famous, whoever wants good

Allah Who wants good for them Allah gives them knowledge of the religion or understanding of the religion even Yeah, now the thing is like when men are looking for women to get married to or women are looking to men, this whole rental community what do they favor? Oh, she's got to look like this she's got to be like a often not saying that. A good looking woman is not important and not saying a rich husband is not it's not good to have. But what I'm saying is that when the Prophet Mohammed Salim said Tom Kamara Turrialba that the woman is married for four things, Lee Jamali, how will he actually, you know, will he Maliha? Well, he didn't he had a father for me that he didn't and he

mentioned her beauty and her new her family and him and her wealth. But he says But Father, Father, be that Dean, but be successful with the one who is religious. Now why is this important? Because, you know, another way he mentions in schuff of this hadith in Sahih Muslim he says, when the pronouns are Salam said, Tonka her ma, ma ba

he said it's not other set of armor meaning it's not he's not saying you should marry a woman for four things. He's saying that these are the four things these are the four things that are married for buy and the Prophet said okay, these are important he didn't say like you know go for the one who's most beautiful he's aof 10 and nine or 10 He didn't say go with the one who's got the most money says go with the one who's most religious. Now the same thing applies for the woman like you can have someone who doesn't have as much money who might be in a council property, who might be whatever but he's, he's a man of piety is known as a community gentleman to say he's he's memorized

the Quran he's done this he's done that that person, okay is higher if if he's a class in place, in the hierarchy that Allah has put for him your level.

So I think a lot of these discos get colored with a capitalistic lens and we have to really be careful because this is not our is. It's like feminism it creeps in. But we have to remember what is the hierarchy? The Prophet Muhammad wa salam you mentioned in the Hadith.

You mentioned

a dunya melona or Milan mafia illa zikalala II Wylie moon one Matalan, that the whole dunya is cursed and everything inside of it is cursed.

Except for the remembrance of Allah, and someone who is a teacher who knows and who is a teacher, and someone who's learning so there's three there's three things you want in your life they could have a lot and you want to teach the deen which is the most important thing even though other knowledge is are important as well because the prophets Arsalan told us to make da llama in this locale my nephew Anwar is compilable while I'm in the water cabela I'm enough and has any beneficial knowledge but but you know so this is a thing that sometimes in this discourse we're talking about men need to be men What do we mean that they need to start studying the religion by that do we mean

that they need to start going to pray to pray five times a day by that wake up or pressured by that? Do we mean that when the Quran says mineral mineral you know and then when from the the movements are regional also in other areas it was your source you really want to Haru which refers which which links masculinity with with cleanliness what's what's that link?

What's that got to do with alpha and beta sorry nothing that if you go in the Quran just forget about this one I'm sorry to say but just go through the Quran and look at what this 23 or 24 instances with what Roger Roger lamb is mentioned what regions are mentioned anytime the word man is mentioned, look at what is connected to is connected to a man is connected to another fight cleanliness

is connected to kawana.

protection, maintenance, like what you said, but what we what we do. Sometimes we just focus on that one thing, which is necessarily on protection, however, and we forget about all the rest, you know, what can I just say, I hear you and I and I agree with you given you know, expanded my thinking on it as well. Mashallah. But I think, I don't know what it's like now, because I think that the landscape has changed so much from when we were kind of coming up. Because when we were coming up, it was very clear, who was on Dina who wasn't sisters got hijab, you were safe to make such a making yourself out to be like her older woman's just like what you're wanting to say I am. No, no, I'm I

told you I'm, I'm an ontology. No, I'm an ontology now. hamdulillah

she walked by it, it was safe to make certain assumptions about her lifestyle, about her values about the kind of marriage she was looking for. Similarly, if a brother had a beard and a phone, and he went to pray at the masjid, it was safe to make certain assumptions about what he expected in a marriage, the role he was going to play his lifestyle, etc. My friend Those days are gone. Those days are gone. Those days are gone. Because we are such a mix of the elements right now. You've got sisters in hijab in the club. You've got brothers in sobe selling drugs, you know, you've got you know, this one here with the pornography addiction. You've got that one over there who's kind of you

know, messing about with girls. It's completely it's no longer black and white. So and I think as well, people experienced this idea of marrying only for them and let's be fair, it's the appearance isn't it of doing and that's the danger because a lot of people did have the appearance of Dean meanwhile they've got mental health issues meanwhile they've got anger management issues and while she she's you know she's angry with the kids that she beats them when she doesn't look after the house nice stuff happening. Yeah, yeah, so I agree with you the dean should be a priority However, there is a danger of us becoming kind of fooled by people's exteriors. It's not that simple anymore

because as I said, even though the Muslims that you see now if you bring a whole group of practicing Muslims together who are don't all go to the same places, you'll find that they're virgins there their views on things are different their lifestyles are different there's certain things they consider to be just fine certain things that I want to married like this on a marriage like that. So it's not so simple anymore. And I think that people need to be really honest with themselves and realize that the appearance of Dean on somebody external is not all there is to know about that person. You do need to do your due diligence you need to peel back the layers and we need to be

honest with ourselves that's that's what we need to we have to have the dean as a standard Yes. All I'm saying is we're not in a place anymore where you can say she looks religious, I'll marry her. Oh no, you can't do that. He looks religious. Mashallah, I've heard you know how many times I've heard had sisters, marrying brothers who have mental health issues. Yeah, bipolar, schizophrenia, anger management, whatever. But what did they say at the masjid? Mashallah is a good brother. Mashallah is a good brother. He's always in the masjid praying. What does that mean?

What does that mean? If you don't know him beyond, he sits in the dogs. I'm sorry. I can't accept just that as a witness. I have to get a bit more information than that, you know, and say

With the sister this this is a crazy out there sisters who literally have mental health issues and they Mashallah wrap up really nicely covered in hijab everything Mashallah sister Solomonic everything everything, you marry that sister you find that she's actually crazy. So that's all I'm saying it's not as simple as that any more stuff out there that's why I said protecting the family unit by making sure that we are all healing firstly and that's, that's big because so many of us are carrying traumas and it's not like our parents generation you know I had this conversation with him about khatola in our own free podcast and I talked about our parents and our grandparents their

lives were much harder than ours right much harder I'm sure your grandparents had had you know they may have gone through some wars you know the immigration the racism the you know poverty, living on the streets all this kind of thing, but when you ask them about it it's a long gone memory they don't even remember it and they certainly don't say I was scarred for life. Like I've never gotten over it that was like it was life. That's what happened. I think his name on this point, you know, like a lot of today's conversation is to cut you off please remember you structure a lot of what you said today you mentioned like key term we talked about the patriarchy and how it can be

misappropriated or it can be misused and or if it is used, it has some negative connotation. We talked about alpha beta On the flip side, but this term trauma which has become almost a buzzword now as well, I feel like that itself can be it can reinforce them bad memory, like traumas and is like the lexicon has changed to the extent where the lexicon has changed Yeah, there's trauma there's triggered yeah triggers.

Yeah, exactly. And what that does it just kind of like if anything sometimes it can have a negative it can have can have an adverse effect because this is like Like you said,

All my all my grandparents are gone now. But when I was when I speaking to them when they were alive, or even my parents, you know, they don't speak in that language. that language is unusual. It is unusual language because the presupposition is almost that we shouldn't be. It's like we're entitled to a life without trial. That's the presupposition well, problems. Yeah, yeah. Even first of all problems like the people in the festival think that they shouldn't be trialed, like fasting unless I use Roku Roku Emma gnome live channel the Quran says a few people think that they will just be left alone to say we believe and they will not be traveled to Panama you know and the reality is

like that you know the trials of this life are for everyone. Every one of us not just the believers disbelievers Muslim men women, young old everybody everyone's going to get a Pete says in his book she felt like Helene is a very good book some of it has been translated as one of the best books you can probably read on these matters and he was talking about like

the Daniela trials and stuff and he was it was he was basically describing the dunya as a combination of heaven and hell basically if you hear that you didn't put it in that language like I am paraphrasing okay, but if you put together you have the dunya if you want to put it it's like that that make that yet I like that you know i mean it's it's there's a reason there's a reason why there's a bit of hell in the bit of heaven in this dunya just like a lot of them give us either or it was both because it's the place is the testing ground for the graduation to take place and it will test all see the true colors what he was talking about certain things happen which expose

people's true colors. Yeah, this dunya is the is the biggest thing that happens which expose all of our spiritual, true colors. Yeah. And the Day of Judgment is what's going to put us is whether the results of that is going to be manifest 100% I mean, I think you know, this, this issue of and again, this is why I keep talking about the cultural context that we live in because it does affect us you know, we can't none of us can see very few of us and I think only those few are the ones who are steeped in Islamic knowledge. And that's a tiny minority of us majority of us just me my friends actually now

you hate to hear

Steve steeped in Islamic knowledge and the your Islamic knowledge informs your thinking it your your Islamic knowledge is actually the thing that is your thinking is rooted in that there's a tiny handful of people in the world. Yeah, because because you read Quran doesn't mean that your thinking is like rooted in Islam. It's not the case. But what my point is that even you know, and I've been transparent about this, you know, at the end of the day, I'm not a scholar, I'm just a person.

And, you know, for example, I

always talk about Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Yeah.

We're just trying our best, but Maslow's hierarchy of needs, I find is very, very, very instructive. And I know that because people have said, That's not our hierarchy of needs. We have it

hierarchy

just because this might be something they don't know it's basically a triangular structure at the bottom of which is like you know, you have your basic needs like shelter, or whatever. And at the top of the pinnacle of this triangular structure is something called self actualization. And according to Maslow, people like Einstein would have have achieved this self actualization people like I don't know, choose whoever you want fill in the blank, you know, successful so called success because it's basically the goats, the goats and whatever, but it's good like you said, it isn't I think that's a good way to put it is definitely instructive because it gives us something to to opt

for Islam. So Quran is in the Hadith, where the Prophet Musa Salaam has his own triangular structure, which is all well, Islam. And then the five pillars and well, amen. And then the six pillars there, well SN and tabula and the Katara. phylum tekun, rock sands at the top of it, you know, we've got a wrong one, but certainly Muslims, what is instructive as well, yeah, keep going is interesting to me. So what's interesting to me with this hierarchy of needs, at the bottom is basic needs food, shelter, you know, food, drink shelter, I think it is.

intimacy is indexes. Next up from that is emotional needs, I believe. And then it's sort of, I think it's not professional, it's like mission, and then self actualization.

Yeah, guys, go and Google it, please, it's there for everyone to see. But my point is this is that, my observation is that when the lower people are on the hierarchy of needs, as if you're still at basic needs level, it's very easy to be satisfied, because all you need is your basic needs to be met. Once you have transcended basic needs, and you start to go into higher pursuits, the higher you go, and the higher you aim on that triangle, the more likely you are to be frustrated and disappointed, because not everybody reaches the top of that triangle. Some people stay on the basic level, some people will go up to having their emotional needs met. But there are children, even

today, who don't get their emotional needs met, we know this, okay, maybe they have a home, maybe their parents feed them, they make sure they go to school, but their emotional needs are not being met. Maybe the parents don't know how to do it, maybe the parents themselves never had the emotional needs met, whatever the case may be. Anyway, I digress. My point is, we need to be careful, because we're living in a world where that bottom is done. First of all problems means that we're always looking at self actualization, we're looking at, you know, me, you know, kind of finding myself and becoming the better version of myself, and, and usually not in a religious way, but in other ways,

right. I think my concern for my community is that we aim so high, that we firstly neglect to be grateful for what we have. And we also are not able to be satisfied. So we are constantly chasing the dragon. And that means that we're always in this perpetual state of chasing after the dunya. Because that's what it is, is chasing, doing. And that dunya could be the relationship. It could be money, it could be, you know, to a certain lifestyle, it could be academic pursuits, whatever it is, right? But I just want us to be circumspect, I think, and try to have a balanced approach to it. Because even in relationships, we're seeing it, you know, people expect more from their

relationships now than they did 20 years ago, even Muslims. And I think that is one of the other reasons that is driving high divorce rates in the community, because one partner has a higher expectation for the relationship than the other, and the other one is perfectly satisfied. Listen, we are together.

You'll cook for me. I've got wonderful kids. hamdulillah. I'm happy. I'm good. She is like, we don't do date nights. You never listen to me. You don't really see me. I feel like you don't appreciate me. I want more. I want a best friend. I want a companion. I want an all new things. Yeah, these are new things. Because when they first got together, this was not the conversation. When they first got together. It was Bismillah for the sake of Allah, you're going to give me your rights. You're going to give me my rights. I'm going to give you your rights is easy. Yeah. Because remember back in the day, that's what everybody thought a successful marriage is what two people get married for the sake

of Allah, they fulfill each other's rights happily ever after. That's what people thought. But the more we want and the more we demand from our partners, and I'm going to switch this because I don't want to be accused of bias.

Let me switch it. So say Say Say Say we want to hear that we want to hit a few more problems as well. Yeah, I'm gonna say so the sister is not this is not the this is the husband's problem because the sisters problem a lot of the time is you know, she has a vision for her life and a vision for her relationship. But her husband doesn't meet her there anymore. Like maybe her vision was here before. Once she starts

to elevate that vision, he's not following her. He's like, why are you doing all that for like, you're doing too much, just relax, we're good. And she's like, oh, but I want this, but I need that. And her needs are changing. She's, she's evolving, she's becoming a different person. So that has caused a lot of friction. And I've seen this more and more in the community. Right? So that's that. flip side. Sisters, like hamdulillah I've got my husband, I've got my kids. You know, we don't have all the money in the world, but we're happy. Yeah. And I'm happy with where we're at. Meanwhile, the husband's like, you put on weight, you know, and he's thinking of, you know, like, How could my life

be he likes them, maybe.

We're flipping it with flipping it, remember? So for him, he's thinking, I'm this person, I should have this type of life. A lot of our brothers unfortunately are, you know, not a lot. Now I'm gonna say a lot of our brothers. porn addiction is a thing. My wife doesn't do what those women do. This is a problem for me.