u/Arbitrary_Sadist

Honestly, the more I look around, irl or online, the worse things actually are. People genuinely believe there is this echo chamber of red-pillers and misogynists who get their beliefs about women from nowhere. This simply isn't true; the beliefs are created and based on the things people have seen and observed. Nevertheless, I am not here to talk on behalf of anyone but myself, and the more I look around, at the Muslim youth and Muslim social media, the worse the situation has become.

There is a huge genre now of women who wear full makeup, beautify themselves, and post thirst traps on social media. This has led to the rise of the "hijabi" category in pornographic circles. It's actually disgusting, and literally sisters have to hold themselves accountable for this, because no one is to blame for this other than themselves. I remember recently seeing a video of this looksmaxxer, and he is a known playboy with absolutely 0 regard for women, but a hijabi came up to him to take a photo, and he put his arm around her.

When he realised what he did, he immediately apologised. The craziest thing, however, was firstly how a Muslim woman came up to take a picture with a guy like him, and secondly how she didn't even mind him touching her. This is literally someone else's wife, and the fact that a kafir felt more shame than her just goes to show how absolutely shameless some of these sisters are.

Regarding such women, the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) said:

> "The worst of your women unveil their beauty, take pride in their appearance, and they are hypocrites. None of them will enter Paradise except as rarely as you see a red-beaked crow."

And Umar (RA) said:

> "The foulest of women is As-Salfa'. The immodest woman who mixes with men and is not shy from them."

And look, this is one end of the spectrum. We can dismiss those women as non-religious and non-practising. Although, to be honest, many of them openly show themselves to be somewhat practising Muslims.

Now, on the other end of the spectrum, we have this new wave of Muslim women who cover their faces, wear masks, not even a proper niqab, and under the guise of giving dawah interact with non-mahram men. There are clips I have seen of such women literally laughing with the men they interact with. I have seen other clips of them getting emotional and using crude language as well.

Muslim Lantern, a very famous Muslim dawah guy, made a video on this recent phenomenon of Muslim women getting into dawah and basically interacting with non-mahram men and using it as a platform to gain fame, he condemned this and gave evidences from the Qur'an and Sunnah as to how this is haram.

And if you think about it, this type of woman, deep down, is very much the same as the one who wears a hijab and posts thirst traps for men. Because both, in the end, want attention and fame.

In addition to this, these women are literally laypeople like you and me doing this. Most of their talking points are taken from other, more famous Muslim dawah guys. So honestly, as Muslims, we have to condemn this shamelessness on both sides. If you just sit quietly on this, it's genuinely harmful to society as a whole.

I recall a quote from a famous person who, on the topic of Western women's immodesty, mentioned how the main causes behind it were twofold: firstly, the nature of women and their desire to want to be seen, and secondly, the lack of men stopping them at a certain point. If you look at how the dress of secular Western women has transitioned since the 1920s, you can see how more and more shamelessness has increased, and it's primarily because the men didn't stop their women, and the women kept pushing the boundaries.

Likewise is the case now with Muslim societies as well. The one saving grace we have is the clear commands from Allah (SWT) Himself that make it mandatory for women to cover. This is literally the only thing preventing our societies from following their route, and despite the command of Allah Himself, look at the shortcuts so many of these women are finding.

So the least one can do is openly condemn such stuff.

It's quite interesting how marriage has shifted from something that was an absolute survival and societal demand to basically something that is desire-based. Now young men, and especially young women, view marriage primarily through the lens of desire before functionality.

Many modern day women in particular have such a flawed and distorted view of their own market value, and the kinds of guys they feel attracted to, and actually want. And when they are unable to find, and for those who even find them, unable to keep these guys, they resort to staying away from marriage as a whole. There is such a large group of Muslim women now who have 0 desire for marriage.

Now firstly let me clarify, marriage is a human need; men and women both need it, so anyone who claims they don't "need to marry", there is something wrong with them. It could be due to their experiences with men, or it could be due to them indulging in haram or having distorted expectations or whatever, but there is fundamentally something wrong with someone who feels no need or desire to marry.

The other thing is, if you are a woman who wants to remain single for the rest of your life, you are literally and figuratively a heavy load on society. Think about it, a man can be single but still contribute positively to society through his profession, but as a woman, what exactly are you doing? Any profession you can do, another man who is likely unemployed due to a lack of vacancies can do (better). So what is your contribution to society? The answer is nothing; in fact, you are a literally wasting precious resources of society and humanity and not contributing anything at all.

The job of men is to build the known world, and the job of women is to raise the next generation. If anyone doesn't do that job, they are a burden on society. It doesn't matter whether you are a man or a woman. As a man, if you are unemployed, sit in front of your computer all day and spend time playing games and watching stuff all the time, you are a burden too.

So women who choose to remain childless or not marry are basically the female version of this.

Now getting back to the main point of my post, and that is, due to the shift in marriage becoming primarily a desire-based pursuit rather than a societal need, it has led to elevated standards amongst people, in particular your average woman. This also affects guys too, and it would be unfair to point only to women here, although given their hypergamous nature it definitely has a greater effect on them.

But in general both men and women are searching for the perfect "the one", because they are approaching marriage from a desire-based lens. For the record, men have basically always approached marriage through this POV, as a man's only real interest in a woman is through sex. So attraction and desire to him are very important, but the baseline for what a man finds "attractive" is a lot lower than vice versa, so men will find the majority of women attractive despite the inflation in expectations caused by social media affecting both genders.

However for women, it's a genuine recipe for disaster and misery, because being average, you will never be able to bag the 10/10 guy; it's never gonna happen. You have to be exceptional to get such a guy, and if we are taking it from an Islamic POV, for him to be religious and God-fearing on top of that, it's like digging for a diamond in the depths of the Earth.

So women have to lower their expectations, for the sake of their own happiness as well as for the welfare of society overall. If you want a happily married life and a long stable relationship like your parents have had, you have to think like they did.

And the other thing if someone says today, "Why should I lower my expectations?", it's because you are out of touch with reality.

If you look at the entire reason a woman can even transition from security-based partner-seeking to desire-based partner-seeking for marriage is due to the luxury and convenience of modern-day life built by men.

So if lots of men are single, and there are lots of women who are single, inevitably society will collapse and it will suffer. These conveniences will decline and things will go back to how they used to be. Civilisations never go in a single upward trajectory in terms of advancements and developments. Anyone familiar with history knows that after long periods of war comes peace, and after long periods of peace and comfort come extreme hardship and struggle. It's a wave that goes up and down, and even Muslims, whose very religion teaches this fact, seem to have forgotten that and don't deeply reflect on it.

Hence why you see the rise in Muslim feminists who think they can do without men and don't need them. 50 years down the line, when society is in ruins due to these very individuals, you will never find a single feminist. These feminists' ancestors were traditionalists because they understood the reality of the world, and their descendants (if they even manage to have any) will be traditionalists also, whether by compulsion or willingness.

Hence my advice would be for everyone to stop searching for the "perfect" spouse but rather search for the one that will just do, as long as they fulfil the baseline requirements of religiosity.

If you want a good partner and a stable marriage, this is the first step towards it.

I often see cases where sisters are trying to get closer to the deen and seek knowledge, and they come across things that trouble them greatly, mainly the "misogyny" within Islam.

And this is basically things like the various ahadith talking about women being more in the Hellfire than men, and statements of scholars that affirm the superiority of men over women in intellect and religion, as well as the statements of the Prophet Muhammad pbuh himself.

They also find the restrictions around the dress code too restrictive and find all this too much for them. They feel like their entire lives are dictated by men, and are for men.

They have to cover "for men", they have to "obey a man" and accept his superiority in worldly and religious matters. So if there is a young Muslim woman who grew up in the West, being told "men and women are equal", "women can do all that men can do", and so on, then naturally when she sees all this she will begin to lose faith and find things hard to reconcile with slogans deeply wired in her.

Here is where I think the irony is. It's ironic because these women place their entire self worth in competition with men. The truth is, the entire life of a feminist who claims independence from men revolves around obsessing over men and trying to compete with them. As a woman, you cannot escape men or be independent of them, your entire living is sustained after Allah, by men. Every modern convenience you have is because of men. If one opens their eyes, then they will see it all. If men disappeared from the Earth, literally humanity would go back to the Stone Age, and this isn't even an exaggeration. Your WiFi would stop working, no planes, no cars, no more houses would be built, or roads, no more ships or transport vehicles, no more supermarkets either, because guess who was transporting all this food to these supermarkets over long distances? It was the men.

So yeah, it's the reality. Now here is my advice to the sisters:

You need to stop associating your entire self worth with competition against men, and viewing yourselves through the lens of how you compete with men. If that is your entire mindset, then naturally when you see all these ahadith and statements of scholars you will be distraught and have a literal existential crisis. Many even apostatise due to it. Like think about how ridiculous this is for a second, on the day of judgment when Allah brings you forth, and there is a full list of why you didn't cover properly, or when you didn't obey the men in your life, or why you apostatised, do you think the excuse "It's the fault of the men, they were being mean" is going to be sufficient? Like how arrogant does a human being have to be to think they are above the commands of God and his Messenger? Think it through for a second and you will realise how ridiculous even obsessing over and competing with all this is. When God gives someone a status, in religion or in this world, then it's not up to the creation to dispute that and go "well ackshually". Because Allah can never be wrong and you can't tell him on judgement day: "Allah I think you made a mistake (May Allah forbid), by giving men a superior position in the world, this is why I strayed from your path."- That's exactly what Iblees did and said regarding Adam (as). So one has to think things through.

And on the other hand, if you are a woman whose self worth is derived from her relationship with Allah, the Creator of the worlds, and who understands that her Creator cares for her more than any man or any human being ever could, and that He knows exactly what is best for her, and He made her in the best possible form, then you won't feel distraught or unhappy about all those statements. For you, men aren't the competition, your competition is your own nafs and your own self, and it's beating Shaytan, your enemy.

And you accept the statements of the great men who possess knowledge and look up to them, and you accept wholeheartedly the statements of the Prophet Muhammad pbuh too. Because it doesn't impact your self esteem if more women are going to Hell than men, what difference does it make for your ultimate goal? Nothing at all. It doesn't matter if Allah has granted men more worldly knowledge and strength, they have a greater burden of responsibility as well. So what difference does it make to you and your duty?

And that's the root cause of all this pathetic discourse over "men and women are equal in Islam" and all, like they aren't. Let's just admit that, anyone who has a bit of knowledge can tell you that it's not true. So rather than denying it, or crying over it, it's better to shift your perspective. And that's really my advice, and I hope those possessing a sound mind will find reason in it.

EDIT: Just to clarify, I am not saying that men are more likely to enter Jannah than women simply because they are men. That is not the point of this post at all. I am speaking strictly from a biological and religious perspective regarding gender roles and responsibilities, and how to prevent your emotions from taking over when it comes to facing these topics.

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So this post is mainly aimed at sisters.

What I have noticed amongst the youth of today is that most of us grow up with traditional ideas of a marriage. We all grow up thinking we will find this amazing partner and have a wonderful long-term relationship with them, just like our parents did. However as we know, in our modern world, long-term stable relationships are increasingly becoming rarer and we need to talk about the actual root cause of this, because I feel it's the sisters who are responsible for this change. Let me explain.

As men growing up, it is drilled into our heads that we have to be providers, we have to earn money, and we have to be responsible; we are told "you attract what you are". Otherwise, you can forget about ever being married. The average Muslim man therefore does his best from childhood until he reaches maturity to be the kind of guy who will attract a good woman. In addition to this, guys are genuinely interested in understanding women, because they realise their role as the courting gender, they are the ones who have to understand women and try and attract them.

The opposite however isn't true. Guys growing up are told to study, and then get a job, because they have to be providers. But girls growing up are just told "study and get married". You see, the parents don't prioritise how the girl will be as a wife, or try to train her to be a good wife or a mother. Their entire focus is just to push her to study hard. They completely neglect her character development, her expectations, her emotional maturity, or how to understand a man. This is incredibly dangerous because when parents leave a girl's understanding of her future role entirely up to society, social media, and modern ideologies, she develops zero role awareness. She is never taught how to cooperate, how to manage a home, how to respect a husband's leadership, or the sheer sacrifice required to be a mother. This therefore leads to entitled and immature brats who think they deserve a long-term lasting relationship with an amazing guy.

There is no personal self-improvement when it comes to character. You are basing a lifetime commitment entirely on luck and chance. And to be honest, women by nature have incredibly poor partner vetting characteristics when it comes to men. A woman is attracted to a confident and charming guy, as biologically she is looking for a leader and a protector, so she mistakes the confidence and charm of a guy with good leadership. And so because they lack character development and vetting skills, the only guys that actually end up coming onto their radar are the ones who are playboys or toxic guys. Good Muslim men won't even approach women like that, and they won't have that slick, smooth confidence around women to even be seen by her. They are busy working on themselves and respecting boundaries set by Islam. This is also why a wali is mandatory for a woman to get married. Real good men want responsible women who put the family first and understand their roles. They won't tolerate a woman who is entitled and basically does what she wants because she was never taught any better.

If a guy has a leader mindset and high standards, he won't sit there trying to fix a lifetime of missing character development. He will simply leave, and you'll be left stuck with the exact toxic guys that seem to be in every modern woman's life. This is the reality of why the divorce rates amongst Muslims are increasing and why there are so many women who are self-sabotaging themselves and are unable to find good guys to marry. In the end, "You Attract What You Are", so if you can't seem to find good guys, then perhaps it's time for a little self reflection.

I am going to link the post here: https://www.reddit.com/r/MuslimNikah/s/WpzS7OH8kw

The core issue in this is simply the fact that she a) doesn't respect him and b) doesn't find him attractive at all. She also knows he cannot leave her, so she treats him like an absolute slave. Islamic scholars of the past have already warned against a man being too attached to a woman, even if that woman is his wife, because if she realises the extent of his attachment she will treat him like a slave and a prisoner. This is exactly what is happening here. The brother thinks that his accomodation of her and being kind to her is romantic and chivalry, but rather she views it as weakness and evidence of his slavery to her. And that's the reality of the situation, too many guys hide behind the shield of "romance" to be literal simps and doormats.