I think it's pure hypocrisy and Arabophobia. Why is one process labeled as forced destruction, while the others are framed as natural cultural adoption?

​i need to vent because today was absolute hell and i feel like im gonna lose my mind

​so my aunt 46f is one of the most closed minded toxic people ive ever met in my life she is obsessed with the past blindly devoted to traditional arab culture hates anything western and is just so rigid and arrogant the funny thing is she holds a phd in psychology but she is the most unhinged person when it comes to communication no logic no empathy zero respect for personal boundaries she just uses intimidation shame and power trips on everyone

​today they were showing some documentary or clip about ancient arab history on tv im 18 and i grew up in the digital age reading mystery novels anime spacetoon learning languages getting into tech and just being curious about the whole world i love learning about everything without hating on other cultures or blindly idolizing one thing

​she started questioning me about what i knew about that era i gave her my honest take and she immediately started mocking me she started screaming that im detached from my identity that i have zero culture and that im just trying to copy the west just because i dont have this extreme obsession with ancient poetry and history like she does

​i tried to explain my point of view calmly but you cannot reason with her she worships ancient history and treats it like an absolute cult when she realized i wasnt backing down or agreeing with her she snapped

​she grabbed my hand super hard squeezing it to force me to look at her phone screen forcing me to watch some random video showing ancient arab poetry i kept telling her to stop but she was pressing her phone into my face and squeezing my hand saying look at this watch it

​i felt so violated and suffocated like who does that actually using physical force to make someone watch a video because they dont agree with your views its pathetic she thinks having a degree makes her superior but she acts completely uneducated and abusive

​im just so exhausted dealing with people who mistake toxicity and forced control for preserving culture im keeping my distance from her from now on because im completely done trying to be polite

What Arabic dialect is best to listen to 👀?

She was really nice. We sat down and talked before we did anything and I felt connected to her. The deed itself was amazing too with her.

I got her number and she texted me next morning.

I know mostly its her job to make me fall for her so she gets more out of me. But still she made this night to feel special for me

And since days I feel empty and numb and I just want to sitdown and talk to her again.

How tf do i deal with this? 🥲 please be kind in your comments im vulnerable right now to be open about this

First, I think we need to distinguish between Arab and Arab ,Semitic groups. This is still debated among historians, especially when discussing the difference between people who speak Arabic and people who identify with or have adopted Arab culture. This post isn't meant to answer who is "really Arab" or define Arab identity.

In 1916, following the Sykes–Picot Agreement, the foundations of many of the modern borders of the Arab world began to take shape. This was followed by resistance against colonial occupation, and between roughly 1922 and 1970, most Arab countries gained independence.

What interests me is how different people's relationship with these borders was compared with today.

People obviously knew geographical regions and cities. They knew places such as مكة, القدس, فاس, مراكش, دمشق, بغداد, Egypt, al-Sham (الشام), and the Maghreb (المغرب). But the modern nation-state wasn't necessarily the main framework through which everyone understood their identity.

Someone could identify primarily with their tribe, family, city, or region while also seeing themselves as part of a broader Arab world. The existence of a border on a map didn't automatically erase older social and family connections.

You can still see remnants of this today. There are families with connections across the Morocco–Algeria border, between Gaza and Egypt, between Saudi Arabia and Jordan, and in many other places. I'm not saying borders didn't exist or that everyone moved freely without passports. Rather, the social meaning of those borders was different, especially for older generations.

This was also reflected in the political landscape of the time.

🇪🇬 Gamal Abdel Nasser — arguably the most influential symbol of pan-Arab nationalism.

🇸🇦 King Faisal — a major conservative and Islamic leader who represented an alternative to Nasserist revolutionary politics.

🇲🇦 Hassan II — a conservative monarch who opposed Nasserist and revolutionary politics.

🇩🇿 Ahmed Ben Bella / Houari Boumédiène — important revolutionary and anti-colonial figures.

🇹🇳 Habib Bourguiba — a secular and relatively pro-Western Arab leader.

Despite their huge political differences, Arab identity itself wasn't necessarily treated as incompatible with the existence of individual states.

Then came the Arab Spring.

One uprising in Tunisia unexpectedly spread across much of the Arab world. Egypt, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Bahrain and other countries experienced mass protests, while even Saudi Arabia saw calls for greater rights and political reform.

This seems to have changed how many governments viewed the potential political power of Arab solidarity.

Before the Arab Spring, Arabism could coexist with state nationalism. After 2011, governments had a much stronger incentive to emphasize the individual nation-state as the primary political community.

This is where I think we see the growth of a different form of nationalism across parts of the Arab world.

Governments and media increasingly emphasized each country's distinct history, pre-Islamic civilizations, heritage, national symbols, security, economic development and future prosperity. You began seeing messages along the lines of: our country's stability, our country's security, our country's development and our country's future.

But interestingly, Arabism was necessarily abandoned for security reasons.

The message became something like: we are a Moroccan/Egyptian/Saudi/Algerian/etc., and our national identity comes first and last .

So I think Arab nationalism is simply is sided today, because it's no longer fit the agenda.

I'm curious what people think about this interpretation, especially those from different Arab countries. Is the rise of stronger national identities after the Arab Spring actually connected to governments becoming more wary of pan-Arabism, or am I overstating the connection?

According to the Telegraph, even a US ally, Oman, is fair game to be bombed if they reach a deal with Iran independent of the US!!!
Oman hosts a US base on its soil, and has been a US ally forever, and here’s the orange lunatic saying he will “bomb the shit” out of them in an interview with Fix News.

Assalamualaikum,

I hope everyone is doing well.

I have been with my partner for two years, and since around our six-month mark, I have been hoping and asking for an engagement. His parents initially resisted because he was still in university, and they wanted him to graduate and start working first, which I completely understood. He graduated and started working in June, but he currently has approximately $400,000 in debt from medical school.

My dad recently called his dad and said that now that he has graduated and started working, he felt it was a good time for them to formally come and ask for my hand. They agreed and planned to come yesterday.

Last week, our fathers discussed mahr. My dad said he was not asking for any muqaddam or anything else, but only a mo’akh of $500,000. He told his father, “I am so confident in their relationship that we will never even ask for the mo’akh because it will never reach that point, but he needs to have a leg for his daughter to stand on.”

His father immediately rejected this and said that we were asking for too much. His offer was a paid-off house and a small wedding.

My dad said they would think about it.

Yesterday, when they came over, the issue of mahr was brought up again. His father said that they could not give me mahr. He said, “My son is a doctor. If they get divorced, the Canadian government is going to take half of his assets and give them to your daughter, so there is no reason for a mo’akh. I need to protect my son.”

Because of this, they were not open to offering either a muqaddam or mo’akh, and they also did not bring a ring.

Ultimately, the engagement did not go through because his father said he was not willing to negotiate mahr and felt that he was already giving enough by offering a house and paying for a wedding.

My dad’s concern is that his son is currently $400,000 in debt. If, God forbid, something happened within the first year or two of marriage while he was still paying off that debt, I could potentially be left without much financial security. My dad also says that in our family, it has never happened that a daughter was married without a mahr, so he feels strongly that he cannot give his daughter away without one.

For additional context, his family is very wealthy. They have three paid-off houses in Canada, his father is a doctor, his mother works and earns a substantial income, and they also have three paid-off properties in Dubai. My family is also financially comfortable—we have a paid-off house in Dubai and are currently paying off two houses in Canada.

I am genuinely looking for unbiased opinions, because I am having a hard time understanding this situation emotionally.

Is my dad being unreasonable by insisting on a mahr? Is the $500,000 mo’akh an unreasonable request, even if we are not asking for a muqaddam? Or is his family being unreasonable by refusing to offer or negotiate a mahr altogether?

And honestly, one of the things I am struggling with the most is the mindset behind it. I keep thinking: Why are they so concerned about protecting themselves from a divorce when we are not entering this marriage expecting or planning to divorce? Mahr is a requirement in our family and something that the men in my family have always given when getting married. To us, asking for a mo’akh is not an indication that we expect the marriage to fail or that we are planning for divorce. It is simply a form of financial security and a religious/cultural requirement.

I also find myself wondering why my partner is already thinking about what happens if we divorce. I understand that he has significant debt and that his parents want to protect him financially, but emotionally, it is difficult for me to hear that reasoning when I am simply asking for something that has always been considered part of marriage in my family.

I would really appreciate honest and unbiased perspectives. I am not looking for people to automatically take my side. If you think my dad’s request is excessive, please tell me. If you think his family’s refusal is unreasonable, please tell me that too.

I would especially appreciate perspectives from people who understand both the Islamic concept of mahr and how marriage/divorce and financial rights work in Canada, because I want to understand whether I am looking at this emotionally or whether my concerns are actually reasonable.

Talk in Arabic, and it drops a pin on a map for the city and country it sounds like you're from. It got my country right and then missed my city by a little bit.
Curious how it does on people here.

There's also a listening game mode where you can try to guess other Arab accents and get a score, with a leaderboard for the highest scores.

Let me know what you think of the site!

اكره المغرب، اكره كوني مغربيا وكون ان القومية الامازيغية تنتشر كالنار في الهشيم في هذي البلاد، لا اشعر باي انتماء او تعاطف مع الحركات القومية الامازيغية ولو انني جينيا امازيغي لكن هذا القوم لا يمثلني من يحاول استدعاء التعاطف و بناء سردية الاستعمار العربي الاستعمار العربي هذا الذي حاولا طمس هويتك لمدة 1400 سنة ومع ذلك فشل!! مما فقط يوضح مقدار هذي الكذبة.

انا فقط اعلم ان هؤلاء القوم لا يريدون الانتساب الى القومية العربية واعلم ان في المستقبل القريب سيزداد الشق بيننا وبينكم

افكر فعلا الى الهجرة الى المشرق لاني بديت احس باني اجنبي في بلادي.

اشعر بازمة هوية اعلم اني جينيا امازيغي لكني لن اعتبر نفسي امازيغي قط!