Before You Say I Do – EP03 – PT 1

My fallen.

Allah has given you a companion and friend to stay and always be seen as man and wife, fulfilling the deen From this day on forever the true

rajim Bismillah Alhamdulillah wa Salatu was Salam ala rasulillah All praise is due to Allah and made his peace and blessings be upon our beloved prophet muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, brothers and sisters Assalamu alaykum wa rahmatullah wa barakato

talking about love is ultimately talking about male and female relationship. And this is what we will be considering, before we go more directly into the topic of love, that male and female relationship talking about love, ultimately, this is what we're talking about. As you can see that the male female relationship is the most fundamental relationship in the world, can't have any motherhood can have any brotherhood can have any sisterhood can have any sibling relationship can have any marital relationship can't have in laws, unless we begin at that very fundamental, most fundamental, male female relationship. So speaking about it, we're almost talking about the very,

very basic, and that in itself is a good reason. Not only this, but male female relationship dictates and shapes, what kind of society we are going to have. How do men treat women? How do women treat men? What kind of families do we have? What is the role of the woman what is the role of the man, ultimately, all these things are going to have an impact on what kind of society Do we have going on for us, it also shapes our capacity for resistance. Now, this is a very nice concept, especially when we talk about sociology, many times people's ability to resist, and here by that we mean to resist oppression, to resist being marginalized to resist menacing, believe it or not, it

stems from this idea from this concept of male female relationship. So for example, if you study slave families, be they in North America, or in South America, or in parts of the Middle East, or in Europe, that will tell you the ability of the slave families and how they were able to resist or not resist was really based on how did they relate to one another as males and females, and also male female relationship reflects on the family. Obviously, the male is going to be the father, the female is going to be the mother. And as such, they will have a children, daughters and sons. But eventually, the family starts with male female relationships. So when when we speak about this,

we're actually talking also about the future, such as their children, the offspring, and what is going to happen to them. And of course, when we have strong families that is going to reflect on the nation that we will have nation happy families, make out happy couples, make happy families, strong families, make a strong nation, strong nations make strong societies, maybe inshallah, who will have a happier world as such. But again, these are the basic components of why are we talking about male female relationship, simply because it is this type of relationship? Or it is this relationship? That is the most fundamental. And ultimately, when you speak about love, we're talking about how do

male female relationship works out? Now, generally speaking, we said that we are attracted, we will be attracted some point in our lives to somebody from the opposite sex. The question is, there are personal factors, such as what kind of a person do you like? What kind of a personality Do you get along with, but believe it or not, also, as we are making these choices, or as we think that we're making these choices, there are non personal factors that are going to affect this type of choice that we are making, and not only the choice that we make, but also how our perception of male female relationship is shaped? For example, economics. How does this reflect on male female relationship?

Well, remember she was talking about is that not necessarily what would happen, but how does that shape? How does that shape to begin with, it's not about whether families are going to be

Have you or not? But how does my economic status? How does it shape my understanding of our relationship? What happens is that we use it to define the roles of the others. So for example, in some areas, women are known to be doing 123 and four, and that is it. And men are known to be doing one, two and three, for the economic and the financial well being of the family, such as the men go out there on the hunt, they bring the food and what do women do? They go, they collect the water, and they come back, there was actually an article that spoke about women in Ethiopia. And they said that women in Ethiopia, as they go and get the water, they needed to bring the water for the family.

And in many some African villages, that is still the case, the women would go out there, and they would do so. And you know, if you have never been into that situation, where you have to walk miles, before you get to the water, and then come back, it does something. And not only this, but if I remember correctly, in the article, they were talking about men being so lazy, that even when they're not working, and the women were sick, they would not even do that simply because in society that was a woman's job, and they could not participate in doing something like this. So what we do is that via economics, we define what male female relationship is going to be like, in addition to

economics, media plays a big role as well. You know, one thing about the media is that when people watch TV, they think that TV sells products only, the only thing that we think TV does is that it sells products. In reality, TV does not only sell products, it also sells what ideas, it also sell ideas. And some of the ideas that are out there on TV are good ideas. But some of the ideas that are out there are very erroneous, and they ought to be rejected. The sad part is most of the people who when they watch TV, what do we do? We put our intellect where it's on vacation, we are not critical of what we watch. We watch what we watch. And we do not question it. We watch what we watch. And we

immediately accepted and we are influenced by. So for example, if you were, let's say that you are an alien, that came from out of space, and you decided to know about humans, and the only way to know about humans was through TV. So you turn on your TV, what kind of an impression would you compile about men and women? What is the media? What would the media tell you about men and about women, just about men and women? If you were to just watch TV, and that will be the way to get this

success depends on how you look, but specifically Who? Women. So the success of women is going to be determined from now on by their shape. And by their looks, what happens. And who set these looks to begin with? Who said the criterion for beauty the media did. So if you do not fit the media's description and definition of beauty, you're not beautiful? And if you do, then you are. So the media is not only selling us this, the media sells us definitions about what beauty is the media sources, our definitions of what success is what is success, according to the media, lots of money, material gain, you are on TV, or all these things that is success. So the point is, media is also a

non personal factor that shapes and dictates our perception of male and female relationship. If I am a man, and I watch TV, what are women for? Therefore pleasure?

They have to serve. And they're supposed to be what they are the man's trophy. If you're a politician, what kind of a wife are you supposed to get? presentable on TV? Right? That's what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to get somebody that is presentable to the media. Okay, so this is this is what's going on. She has to be subservient. She has to be submissive, she has to be and you look into all these factors and ideas that the TV is telling us in the process. There is also religion, okay, well, how does religion factor into this? If you read, for example, Genesis, and in Genesis, what does it tell us about women, that they are guilty of the first sin? So you look

into this and say, what kind of an image would you have about a woman if that's where you get your understanding of who women are? Do you get the point, and sometimes even within on Muslim society, what we do is that we misuse and abuse, some of these statements that are made about women, and then our perception of women becomes very what it's very negative.

Example. How do you Stockman love to quote one of the hobbies which are often quoted by usually men is that one wherein if a woman goes to sleep and her husband is angry with her, the angels will cause her all night long, which I feel is always, you know, how is this abused now? How's it abused? He could be angry for the wrong things or, or what else you relate to a person by taking them on a guilt trip, you use the form of almost fear. Say that Oh yeah, you're not going to make me happy then what happens?

agents are cursing you.

Exactly. And now what happens is that it also can erroneously lead to what elevating the Status of Women simply because now the angels are on your side to the point that what if the woman makes you angry then what happens? The angels are going to be cursing her okay. So religion can be used or abused or misused as we are talking about the non personal factors that shape our male female relationship ideas and with this inshallah, we will take a short break and we will be back so please do stay tuned.