Mufti Menk – Is Feeling the Social Media Pressure

			I think especially in social media, because I'm so involved in it, one of the things you realize is
people, you know, we've talked about relatability. Right? And then people can relate to, but also,
with social media, it's like, oh, I can just DM with you right now. I can DM Seth, it's just
becomes, there's no barrier anymore. Before it used to be like, if there was a celebrity, they'd be
not reachable. So you'd be like, okay, the ROI but now it seems like Oh, I could do this. And yes,
you can. And Inshallah, if you put the time in and you know, if you want to become a mufti, for
example, you can do that. But you don't see the background of how much work and hours and days and
		

			sacrifices you've made to be able to come to this point. So how I deal with that is,
		

			before I used to feel very, very hurt, that I was unable to respond to everyone, but now I've I've
made peace with Allah subhanaw taala, in the sense that I feel, I do live Allah, you can live for
long enough, Sonny Llosa, Allah does not burden you with more than you can cope with.
		

			I feel I, I can do this, I'm going to do this, I can respond to 10 messages or respond to 10, the
11th, one drop, and it's one of those things, if we can give priorities to some like it's a follow
up thing or something you've been involved in, it's a different scenario. But you have to understand
as a human, you are not accountable. For every single message that came to you to respond. It is
humanly impossible, it would need a lifetime. So I've got 200 responsibilities in the day, for
example, one of them is to respond to messages, for example, which platform you're going to have to
choose, and you're going to have to choose what to do and how much. And so you leave it, maybe
		

			that's something good for the AI.
		

			There is. Somebody's actually put it up. Yeah. And I don't know how effective it is or how accurate
it is. But I don't know, I don't know if I could actually say that I support it, because it could be
very dangerous. You know, we talk about the criticism and the kind of becoming more well known. And
often the discussions I have with people who criticize and a whole range of people is, well, what's
the alternative? And I say this as a parent. Now when I look at my children, who would I rather,
they were following because you you can't remove something without quitting avoid. And then they're
complaining at the same time? Well, it's easy to go down, you know, a rabbit hole when you start
		

			going up to social media. And if there's reminders that coming up, etc. Or we don't have events
where Muslims can come in at 10, get some benefit, and also socialize, would you want that
completely removed? What's the alternative? I think different people are on different levels. So a
person who's on a higher level of piety will never understand why you have a massive event, for
example, on a night, like the 27th night, but the fact that it's fully sold out, and there's so many
people and most of them are young, who come in, it shows that if these people were not there, they
not all of them. But if none of these people were not there, they may not have used that night in
		

			any form of productivity whatsoever. So are we going to just stop everything simply because the
pious people are telling us, you know, what, why are you doing this, and they are not experts in the
field of data. This is one thing that I, whenever you hear pious people say, Oh, this was bad. And
that happened. And this happened. And I always tell myself, these guys are not experts. But we are
the experts, we know what's happened, we make sure that we will tie all loose ends possible. And we
learn from experience, and we develop over time, but we will make available, whatever we can on all
levels and categories. And that's why earlier I said that, the scholars were a little bit harder,
		

			they're also needed, the ones whom you feel a gap from, they're also needed. And then you have the
cool guys, you know.
		

			So the same applies in the field, that all these are dependent on the level of the individual. And
we should never forget that everyone is on a different level. I love and care for the one on the
lowest level as much as I would the one on the highest level. I've seen that from my own experience,
if I can just say working in the corporate sector, you see running Muslim networks, you know,
sometimes the practicing as a practicing person, we have echo chambers, but when you're dealing with
the people, the type of issues they'd have, like is so far removed from the discussions we'd have in
our religious circles, that you don't know the Hall of people and even just a little reminder, they
		

			hold on to that. The only time they even go to pray perhaps is on Eid. And you know, sometimes it
feels like maybe we're pushing these people away some of these I really do understand your approach
the world out there is such that if you were to not pay attention to them, they will probably turn
away completely. So any form of attention that you pay to them and you offer them some form of a
platform that they feel come
		

			taboo within a non judgmental there's a difference between giving advice and judging that's a topic
on its own but a non judgmental welcome them. They are our brothers, their sisters, like I said
earlier I've specialized in reaching out to non practicing non Muslim as well, the week those who
are struggling to practice and so on. And when you're practicing, move on, you can hold yourself to
the highest standard, but doesn't mean you have to apply that to others. Exactly. Meaning you must
be understanding of the fact that everyone is different. They go through different challenges,
they've been through different upbringings. They face things if you hear a quarter of what they
		

			faced, you probably will drown in in your, in your mind, you know, you know when you hear the term
walking in somebody else's shoes, like you don't know, the challenges we've a lot of us have been
blessed, you know, with maybe coming from practicing homes. So then we've already had that, and not
everybody has that advantage. So absolutely, absolutely.