The Marriage Struggle - Why Muslim Women Aren’t Getting Married
Whenever I have held a Muslim marriage masterclass, my inbox has been flooded with questions from single Muslimahs. Some women feel scared at the thought of getting married. Others have heard too many Muslim marriage horror stories and are seriously considering staying single.
Getting married is one of the most important decisions of your life. So, before you embark on your marriage journey, you need answers, so you have clarity and the confidence to find a compatible husband. Inshallah, a God-conscious husband who will compliment you, not complete you. This Ebook provides you with answers to the pre-marriage questions you have. Questions include:
Once I get married, will I lose my freedom?
What are the red flags I should look for?
What are the halal ways of finding a prospective partner?
How can I get to know someone without dating?
When should I ask difficult questions about finances, in-laws, polygamy, etc.?
How do I know if he is ‘The One’ ?
Book information: Author: Farhat Amin, 75 pages, 28 pre-marriage questions with detailed answers.
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Podcast Notes
Farhat Amin 00:00
Bismillah Hir Rahman Nir Raheem. And welcome back to the podcast. My name is Farhat Amin and I'll be speaking to Laila today. And we are looking at the issues that young Muslim women who are living in mainly UK, US but when it comes to marriage, it seems like this is what I'm noticing. I don't know if you are as well, that it's become a bit harder to get married than it was maybe 20 years ago. So really the point of this podcast is not to blame anyone for that.
So, it's very easy for us as a community as Muslims to blame women and to say, “The woman is the problem.” There’s something's wrong with the girl, she's got issues that's why she's too fussy, whatever, we've heard these excuses, put on to girls. But what I'd like to talk about, Alhamdulillah I'm so happy that Laila is here to discuss this issue with me because she is a young, educated, Muslim woman who has friends and who herself has noticed these things. So, let's jump straight into it and find out what Laila thinks about this Assalaamu Alaikum. Laila!
Laila 01:28
Wallaikum Salam, Farhat. Thank you for having me on.
Farhat Amin 02:20
Alhamdulillah, JazakAllah, here for coming. How's your day been so far?
Laila 02:25
It's been great. It's cold now. Things aren't as nice as they used to be in the morning.
Farhat Amin 02:32
Yeah, that's true. Alhamdulillah, it was raining a lot yesterday and I couldn't go out for a walk. Alhamdulillah, winters finally here in the UK?
Laila 02:49
Yep.
Farhat Amin 02:50
Alhamdulillah. So, with this topic, would you say marriage has become a bit of a struggle, within your peer group and in your experiences are all Muslim women finding it difficult to get married?
Laila 03:07
I would definitely say that Muslim women are finding it more difficult to get married in today's day and age. And actually, prior to us having this conversation, I did a little bit of digging online and I found that within the Muslim community, and then also outside of the Muslim community, women, as a whole as a, as a group are struggling to find suitable partners that they want to settle down with. And obviously, speaking of those women, that are marriage-minded, and have been marriage-minded from a young age, and they're finding it, that it actually they're having to delay marriage, not through any fault of their own but because the circumstances are just not conducive to them, finding that partner that they would want to spend the rest of their lives with and so yes, I would say that on a sort of larger-scale but then also just within my circle of friends and a lot of us have been wanting to get married for a very long time. And, for various different reasons. It just hasn't happened yet.
Farhat Amin 04:10
Okay, so let's look at those reasons then. So, what would you say is one of the main reasons why it's become difficult, what's the issue that sisters are facing?
Laila 04:22
So this is actually a sort of a very interesting question because the more I've looked into this, the more it seems like it's not necessarily one particular reason but a sort of coalition reasons that have come together and in this article that I found, which talks about Muslim women and non-Muslim women and the different issues that they are facing when it comes to marriage, they cited one of the main reasons as being that for example, women are much more in a different place than the men that are from a similar age group or the sort of men that they are looking to get married to and that's regarding, say, levels of education and their prospects in terms of career and then with men just not necessarily wanting to settle down as soon as women do and so that bit is definitely from the non-Muslim perspective, right? Non-Muslim men not wanting to get married in their 30s or in their 20s, because they feel they have a lot longer.
But then from the Muslim perspective, we have this issue within the Muslim community of women, where we have had the same sort of messaging our whole lives that non-Muslim women have had, right? And which is that, as Muslim women, you need to go ahead and you need to prioritize x, y, z before marriage, and growing up a lot of us have thought that way. So, we've thought, okay, I'm not going to think about marriage, I'm not going to think about marriage until I finish university, until I have my career settled, until I sort of come into my own and have these life experiences that I'm looking to have. And that's been something that then before you realize or before you know, it's sort of caught up with you but that's only one side of the equation, right? What happens to all of those women who didn't think in that mind frame. Let's say, for example, you've been wanting to get married from a young age and this is a sort of another set of reasons then and this hasn't happened, the way that our society is configured.
Now, you might turn around and say, "Okay, I'm 20 years old now, maybe I should start thinking early", and sort of be ahead of the curve and start looking for marriage but then, because of the way that people don't really interact in the way that they used to. Like, in my parents’ generation, where there was a community of other young eligible Muslims who were sort of around and knew about them, and because of this community, people would. We're more likely to recommend one another, people are more likely to sort of just meet in a vague way, in a sort of halal way, and then approach their parents about the matter and what we're seeing is, regardless of which sort of mindset you've been in. As a Muslim woman, if you thought to yourself, I'm going to sort myself out and be okay and there are various reasons why women might think like this, and then on the flip side, if you're the sort of woman who thinks, Okay, you know what, I'm young, I'm going to start looking now and you're going to come into obstacles. So, I hope that is the answer.
Farhat Amin 08:05
Yes, it is interesting. I definitely noticed. Nowadays, a young Muslim woman will be thinking in a very similar way to your average non-Muslim woman will think that, yeah, I'm going to study I need to travel, I need to save money, maybe get my own flat, move out, have a group of friends that have a very active social life and even there the idea doesn't creep in that. I don't need a man, why do I need to get married? Let's say, she goes from the 20s to 25 and I'm not passing judgment, I'm just illustrating. It is a fact that this is a way of thinking it's been adopted by many women. I can have fun, I can go out and if I was married, would I really get to do these things? What's the benefit of getting married, when I've got a very full life and I can go out and eat and I can come home late? Especially if your parents are kind of very flexible and they don't ask for too much of you as far as housework or they're quite lenient and I see that thinking is based and it's similar to the normal girls at university that I was with. So yes, I totally see that but there's a mental delay because that was one of your first reasons. The question is, where would you say that those set of ideas come from?
Laila 09:49
So, for the Muslim community, I feel like it's actually coming from two places. So, on one hand, you're completely right in that. We've been receiving the same messaging that non-Muslim women have been receiving this sort of, I don't need a man culture. And, you know, throughout all of this pop culture, movies and TV shows and celebrities, we see this recurrent theme of to be a strong woman to be considered a sort of woman that other women will respect, you need to prove yourself and you need to have done all these things, and you need to make sure that you can be without a man, you know.
And so, on one side it's a very sort of very feminist idea but then for Muslim women, I'd say that the second thing that really affects us. And of course, it depends on what community you're from. But for me, for example, I know that I come from a background where we came to this country as refugees and we suffered a lot of strife in that sense and for a lot of communities like mine, what happened was that in the turmoil of moving and coming to Europe, and going through all the struggles that my parents went through, my mum found herself having to be a lot more independent having to support her kids. My mom and dad were physically separated for a long time. And so she was having to take on the sort of single mother role, even though she wasn't a single mom and so for a lot of communities where this is the reality and Muslim mothers have turned to their daughters and said, "Listen, you need to figure out how to be okay without a man" and it's true that of course, you know, even on both ends of the scale, it is we do as women need to make sure that we can look after ourselves because anything can happen but that is a very sort of pragmatic way of looking at things and I think the issue is that sort of pragmatism that mothers have wanted to give to their daughters has been internalized in a way where, alongside the general, sort of anti-male movement or feminism and women have been made to feel against the idea of wanting a man in their life at all and so it's like this sort of mental block where you're just like, okay, I do, in a sort of abstract way when I get married, I'm not speaking for myself, specifically, but women thinking I do want to get married in an abstract way but then actually resisting the idea in a very real way, where they're not taking steps to find a husband or they're not interacting with the idea of marriage in a way where they're actually seeing this other person as somebody who is going to come into their life and have rights upon them the way that husband would.
So, in a sense, it creates this power struggle of, Okay, I'm a woman and I have this feminine energy, but then at the same time, I want to be a man and I want to be in this masculine energy. It actually reminds me of something else that I read, which I thought was really funny was how a lot of women become the man that they want to marry.
So, you see all these women who have these really fancy degrees, have these really fancy jobs, and then in a partner, they're saying, well, I want the exact same thing if I could do it, then I require a husband who also has it. No, but then it's like well, you went and did it so that you are that husband. It doesn't make sense.
Farhat Amin 14:03
Yeah, that's true. You know, young women are facing a dilemma. It's not nice for them that they're in that situation that you've just described your natural instincts and feelings. I mean, my dad was really funny that he used to pretend that we don't have these feelings. I think we were androgynous. I had no feelings and had no instinct or you didn't even know that the opposite sex existed. That's a really silly mentality to me. And I know some parents that won't talk to kids about sex education at all. Like it doesn't exist. I think what we can't deny is that whilst you're working and earning money and you've got everything you want, you want to have companionship, you want to have someone to love, you want to have kids, even though, you see how it's extremely hard raising kids. And your biological clock is ticking and one solution for some women is that they will get sperm donors or they will adopt. They will find a way.
So, then they have the option of just having a boyfriend or having one-night stands. With the advent of the explosion of all these dating apps like Tinder and we know that's the channel that they then choose to fulfill their desires. But for a single Muslim woman, that's not an option. Let's not pretend that Muslim women don't date men, of course, they do but don't choose that option. But you can see that it ends up being a problem that when we delay marriage or think I don't need marriage, something it's kind of opening the door to shaitan a little bit. Do you notice that as well?
Laila 16:13
I do, I think in a couple of different ways, actually. Because another thing that I've come to know is that for a lot of women. These are sort of the whisperings of shaitan and let's say, for example, a sister is a hijabi and she is sort of modest in her online presence. Ideas come into their minds of maybe I'm not attracting anyone or the right kind of guy that I want because I'm wearing the hijab or because I'm not sort of posting pictures that will gain the man's attention and on the flip side, I can't tell you how many times I've come across stories where there is a particular girl who wears very revealing clothes online and doesn't wear hijab, they get a lot of attention from men and say, one of these men marry her, but he then wants to turn her into a hijabi and niqabi after marriage. So it's a two-pronged sword where on one hand the behaviors of men are signaling a particular reality for Muslim women out there, which is unless you look a certain way, you're not going to get the attention and we can talk about Instagram and how these apps have contributed to creating this idea but then, on the other hand, you have Muslim women, sort of being imbued with these insecurities of, Okay, I present myself a certain way and society's telling me that women like me are often go overlooked. So then what can I do? What steps can I take to attract a male and so, it's a very difficult situation to be in and it does get exasperated the older you get.
Farhat Amin 18:21
Yeah, that's very true and the thing is that I think it's so easy now. It's Twitter or Instagram where men and women can just DM each other so easily and that's it and then it begins. Like I was speaking to a relative of mine and he was saying that and this is so funny because I'm not in that world and they're saying yeah, that's the way people DM each other and then he goes like, they're DM’ing each other based on the filtered image on the screen and then they start talking and they're under this illusion. So, this is that I'm talking to them so I can get married to them, well hold on you've been doing this with 10 girls now so why don't you just be honest, that's not what you're doing? You're just DM’ing girls and then you dump them or they dump you so it's equal but then that's not good because you keep thinking I will find someone better, someone, who fits this unrealistic criterion I've got in my head. But what's interesting is they will not marry that girl because they don't marry that girl that they DM on online. It's just fantasy, getting them to send photos of themselves. It's just like an online dance that in real life they wouldn't be able to do that. How you're going to get a hijabi to send you a photo, meet up with you or anyone, to be honest, to reveal themselves to you, but you can get them to do it online and then once you've done it or whatever you need to do, then they are like garbage, you just chuck them away. But girls do that to boys as well.
While speaking to Nadia a couple of episodes ago as well, she was saying that the phenomenon of affairs. Let's say you do this, like you said, a girl feels the only way to get married is if she changes her whole look. And then she gets married to a guy. But then what if you're used to getting that attention online, and then suddenly you get married, you don't just switch it off. You don't tell all the guys that you're in touch with, you can't DM me anymore, they're all still there. And then once you have an argument with your husband or he's not giving you attention, they're going straight back to those people who did give them attention. So, in the longer term, That's not a route that will bring happiness.
Laila 21:25
And it's so interesting, because even as you're describing the sort of situation that you are pointing out it occurs to me that a lot of women and I suppose men or women more so end up wasting their best years, if you can call them that, you know, a lot of their youth on these halal relationships, I mean, if we can be frank about them, regardless of you know, whether or not it's just completely online or not, it is not this sort of emotional attachment, this emotional drama and then it takes a long time for them to bounce back from that, even after it ended and I think that you're completely right. Of course, this is across the board. But it's just yet another thing of how is the messaging that women, Muslim women are receiving, affecting the choices that they make when looking for a husband. I think, coming into this culture, what we're finding is that the concept of femininity, is completely butchered and this is something that I've even noticed within non-Muslim trends.
It's quite sort of, I think, like a bit underground at the moment, but it feels there is this resurgence of women who are pushing back against feminism who are saying actually, we want to live in the feminine energy that we have as women as the sort of God-given thing that we've got, where we don't want to be the men, we don't want to be like men, we want to be in a relationship where we are women. And what does that mean? It means understanding what it is that you bring to the table as a woman. And I think as Muslim women, we are often denied the education of what it means to be a woman and I think when it comes to education, unfortunately, a lot of us just take straight from the non-Muslims.
We don't really like, what we do educate our children, with regards to Islam is not really so much about what the deen tells us a woman is like a woman is to be. It's more just what culture expects from you. And that's sort of what's taught individually in the homes and oftentimes, that's not very conducive to a healthy self-perception, a healthier marriage later on but for us to sort of understand that there is a femininity that exists that Allah(swt) has given to us and to really internalize that and then to understand also, what masculinity is and how men think differently to us? I think having this sort of perception understanding would be very helpful and very useful, later on when looking for a partner because then you're not projecting onto men, and what women expect in a relationship, right, what women expect in a marriage and I suppose vice versa and a lot of the time I think going back to what we were saying about women dressing a certain way and giving certain affordances to men that are against the dean that is sort of degrading to their own personhood.
If a woman were taught very clearly from a young age, look, these are the sort of parameters that you should have and these are the sort of things that men would do to overcome them if their intentions are not good and I think that would really protect women, and not more, because I think the trap that a lot of women are falling into is not knowing actually and how the correct way of going about marriages. and then also, what the sort of psychology of men are. Also, they have the tools then to go into these interactions with men in the correct way, protecting themselves first and foremostly.
Farhat Amin 26:16
I think that's such a good point that I really want... For sure, I was told nothing because my mom was told nothing. This is a podcast of women, but really, this could all be applied to men and guys, boys as well. But sitting down and finding out the nature of men or women, what does Islam say about what a man should be like? There's a really good book by Ameen from Seera Masters. He had a conversation with my husband in his podcast, Thinking Muslim, and I put it on my podcast channel because there were so few discussions about what it means to be a Muslim man and masculinity and the qualities, but then, like, it's interesting, when discussions about Muslim women, it will be okay, of course, modesty, that's fine. But you're right, as far as how to know when a guy is basically playing with you and he isn't serious and how to keep your self-respect. We need conversations about that? That is very lacking in our communities. I know, it's difficult that's why it's not talked about. It's embarrassing, and it's you have to say things but the point is, what's the alternative we have now?
Laila 27:57
And then you’re 30, 40 something and everybody's like, why are you not married?
Farhat Amin 28:00
Yeah, exactly. That's so true. But no one's talking to young girls about this, young single Muslim women and educating them. And also, I think this might be another reason when I see young girls walking down this road of there, this leading to, unfortunately, I see it leading to them not getting married, they might have a lot of money and they might have status, they might have a good job but they're not going to get married and have kids now. And now, Allah knows best there is a reason why we're told to get married, have families, Allah knows why and when we decide, okay, I'm not going to make that my goal. I'm going to make what modern-day feminists are telling me. They're setting our goals instead; I think we have to think why? Why are we allowing a bunch of women from maybe Mary Wollstonecraft to Gloria Steinem to Emma Watson to Malala Yousufzai? Why are you letting them tell you what's important and what your goal should be? I think that's a question we need to ask ourselves?
Laila 29:21
Yeah. And also, it's so bizarre, because in listening to these women, we are oftentimes going against our own very nature and what happens is, you know deep down the things that you want, you know that if marriage and children are very, very important things to you, and they are to a lot of women, Muslim and non-Muslim. And actually, more often than not I see the sort of heartbreak of realizing that, oh, I might not actually be able to have children. But I've seen that heartbreak in non-Muslim women. If you come to that mid-30s, or late 30s and think, Oh, my God, like, what if this actually doesn't happen to me or for me and it's a very, very sad thing because you've seen these people for years and years for decades deny their own nature and deny themselves the truth of admitting that they want these things and then suddenly, it's too late and so Alhamdulillah for a lot of Muslim women, I wouldn't say that it's the same in that we're so outward. In either way. I think a lot of women do internalize this, I mean, going back to the beginning of our conversation, this thing of I don't need a man, I should like, wanting a husband wanting a family shouldn't be a goal in your life for you to make it a goal is for you to degrade women. That's the sort of overall messaging of feminism for you to do these things it's for you too. What do they say like to take us back to a time when women were oppressed?
Farhat Amin 31:09
Yeah, that's it and I just think, Emma Watson in particular. I know people look up to her, maybe there's someone else now. But yeah, she really does project that thing that I'm a successful actress, I don't need a boyfriend. No one needs to tell me how I should dress like and she's a role model, and for many Muslim women now, unfortunately. Let's also talk about, do you think that there's a certain amount of vilification of women who are choosing for whatever circumstances they have, you know, not allowing them to get married at the moment. Do you think sometimes they actually get angry at men? Because they're being vilified by certain men, not all we are not generalizing, but online, there seems to be this trend?
Laila 32:04
Yeah, I think there's a lot of anger on both sides, right. So interestingly enough, I think this goes into sort of alt, bro space, I don't know if you're familiar with this term. But on the other side of feminism is this movement, I don't know if it stayed down in the last few years. But this movement of men who are sort of trying to push back against that, and we see a lot of Muslims subscribe to the ideologies of this, where they sort of beat down on women and the trends that they get kind of take any anything a woman says only assertion that a woman makes it's like, "Oh, you're a feminist." And they are outraged by the idea of women having thoughts and able to think independently.
So, what I noticed with a lot of these spaces, this sort of open space is a deep vilification of women in general, and a lot of that being concentrated towards women who reached that age and then aren't married. And I think what I've noticed with this is that well first of all the whole discourse is, it' simplified and made into, well, you had your chance, and you blew it and it's sort of very smug position to come from because a lot of these men think to themselves, well: - I'm a man, I have, all my life, to start a family. You're a woman, you don't, by this biological reality that you're facing and it's almost like they're taking it out on women in general, but specifically, I think oftentimes in their minds on those women who rejected them, when these women were 20 and attractive, so they rejected them. And now it's like, "Ha-ha, look at you, you can't have children." So, it's extremely petty.
Farhat Amin 34:17
Okay, because we know that online, again, people will be extra nasty online, because they can get away with it. There's no you know; it'll be an anonymous name they use and that kind of emboldens people to say things that they wouldn't say in real life to a person's face. So, you can see that happening. And generally, the nastier, the louder, it's like in school that the most disruptive noisy kid would get the teacher’s attention and cause problems for everyone. So, it seems the same thing online. That seems to be the one who makes the most noise you know, Trump is an example. They get the most attention but the thing is that they don't represent everyone, it's just because they're making the most noise. That's why they're getting heard?
Laila 35:14
Yeah, absolutely. And although I do feel like one of the issues with these sorts of people is that they're getting heard because they're so loud, they inevitably attract people who were on the cusp of thinking like that or who probably didn't think of that before. But then are persuaded into this mode of thinking and then it sort of snowballs from that, right. So, I do have a couple of quotes and he was speaking specifically about Muslim women. And he says that "After women pass 30, they lose a lot of their shine to men, immediately, suddenly, magically not attracted to them and that disqualifies them". And then he says, "Nobody owes you marriage, you made the choices, you made to pursue your career and pursue your education, to get your useless undergraduate and graduate degree in feminist dance therapy. And you made the choice to enslave yourself to another man, because you didn't want to be a slave to your husband, i.e., you're enslaving yourself to your male boss instead. And you made these choices. And now you're 35-year alone and you’re fat and your eggs have run out. And you might not be able to have a child and you want to Muslim man to take one for the team and marry you." That's the first quote. And then he's sort of comparing Muslim men and Muslim women, as I said, sort of a sort of pat on the back for Muslim men who can have children well into their 70s and then he also goes on to say that Muslim men like the older they get, the more they're sort of financial status improves, their social status improves, and so they become really more attractive, whereas women have until 35 and then that’s it. And then he says, "Now there are all these 35-year-old women almost going on spinsters, who want to marry men in their prime. Why should we pay for these mistakes that you made in not getting married when you had the best prospects of getting married? That's not our problem. What you should do instead is use your prime years of life to get married. And then you have after that all the time in the world to pursue your education career." These quotes are from a conversation from a podcast episode around which there was a lot of outrage, I think rightly so. That podcast episode has now been removed.
Because this sort of language and especially the way that he packaged his message was extremely cruel, really to women of a certain age to have these problems and like I said before, it is a massive simplification of circumstances, to turn around and say, "Well, you made your bed, now lay in it, just completely removes so much of the very rich context around people's individual circumstances, and also absolutely removes what we as Muslims believe, which is that ultimately, what is meant for you will be regardless of what is it that, even if it's between two mountains, it will come for you and isn't marriage, one of those things, not saying, of course, that people don't tie their camel, but we do have to afford some space for the fact that Allah’s (saw) plan is going to unfold no matter what and it really surprised me to find that there are so many Muslim men who resonated with this. But also, it disappointed me greatly to see that very few Muslim men were picking up on the etiquette in which this person was speaking about his sisters in Islam, right, to turn around and to vilify other Muslim women. And even in the surrounding conversations to sort of laugh about it and pretend like this isn't an issue. It's not a community issue. It's just your individual problems. That is in itself an issue.
Farhat Amin 39:36
Yeah, you're right. It goes back to how I started this. I said that it's easy to blame. The lazy option is to just blame individuals. But if we really care about our women, we care about each other. We wouldn't do or say things like what that guy said, because you just have to think it's interesting you hear that, and let's say women may do the same thing. The question is what does it achieve? All it achieves is fitnah an argument and hatred amongst Muslims. Muslims were supposed to be one body and especially feel love and compassion. So, when as a Muslim, you hear other Muslims attacking Muslims or specifically attacking women, we shouldn't listen to these people we should, if we're going to listen to them, then we should contact them and account them.
Ask them, why are you doing this? You shouldn't be doing this, advise them, this is wrong and you should stop. And for sure don't join their courses and where they try to sell you products because this is a big new business model, isn't it? Create hatred, create attention. So, this guy, he's going to get attention. He's going to get men who are finding it hard to get married or divorced or their girlfriend broke up with him. And he's going to say to them, "Oh, do my course I'll help you understand this." That's the game they're playing. Their sincerity has to be questioned because they're causing so much trouble amongst Muslims.
Laila 41:14
Yeah. And the reality of the matter is that for men who are attracted to this sort of discourse, there is an underlying disregard for women. I mean, it's so interesting, because I feel like in this sort of space of the alpha, Muslim men and you have these men who are so and oftentimes rightly outraged by what feminism has done to the community but actually, in their behavior and in their portrayal of women, all they do is push more women towards feminism because it's this dehumanization of women that other women reacted negatively. And then they think, well, how can I fight back against this? And then you're creating and adding to the problem that you're trying to solve in the beginning? So, it is a very secular problem here.
Farhat Amin 42:03
Yeah. And the thing is it's easy to, let's say you, you read on Twitter or buy into some of these ideas. It's easy to just react and Twitter back and the thing is, what I would say to you is, don't do that. That's exactly what they want. They thrive on attention online, people want attention. And so, the best thing is, you just cut them off, don't give them the oxygen. It's really weird how sometimes people would send me DMS, of un-Islamic nonsense like this. And they'll say, oh, have you seen this, and then before, I would have reacted and said and passed it on, now we need to shut it down. That's what we need to do. This is what we can do. If we don't want our sons to turn into people like that, or our daughters to face these problems. We need to talk to the people who will actually listen to us. And sometimes your sons or daughters can actually not listen to you. But you should have a go. That's what you have to concentrate on. And also think about ourselves: what ideas have we adopted that are causing us problems?
Laila 43:18
Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's sad to say that even with this sort of rhetoric and even with everything that's going on, in this sort of epidemic and that's occurring in our community of women getting older and not getting married. And I'm finding that there's a lot of people who are experiencing a lot of hopelessness. And a lot of women who then will listen to something like this, especially because in this conversation, it's not like he's offering any solutions to those women that he's sort of sneering at. He is saying, you’re this, you're that, you're 35, and nobody's going to marry you, and why should Muslim men settle themselves with you? And then his whole solution at the end of this is getting married before 35. And so, then what, as a Muslim woman hearing this, who is at that age or who's in her 40s, so, whatever the situation might be? What do you take away from this? And I think oftentimes, people take away that hopelessness and I think what's really important for us to just remind everyone is that ultimately, you do what you can in terms of educating yourself and in terms of sort of deprogramming a lot of these feminist values that you might have subconsciously soaked up in your life. And that's you tying your camel, as well as putting yourself out there, in whatever Halal means are possible. But then after that, you leave it to God because Allah (swt) does not forsake you, and what is meant for you will come to you.
And so, this patience that we need to have as Muslims will be rewarded one way or another and it's just really important for us to, even though having children and having a family might be really important to us, it's also just really important to center ourselves and remind ourselves that actually, this life is temporary. And the real goals of this life and this world aren't necessarily those things you know, those things are a means by which to go closer to Allah (swt) but if they're not afforded to you, then there are other means to reach a state of contentedness in life.
Farhat Amin 45:46
JazakAllah, Laila that was a lovely ending Alhamdulillah and again, I'm sure we need to have more compassion and do dua for each other that all the sisters who would like to get married May Allah make that path easy for them inshallah and they will get good Islamically minded husbands if that's what Allah wills inshallah. So, yeah, you're going to have to come up again.
Laila 46:17
Okay, InshAllah.
Farhat Amin 46:18
Take care. Have a lovely day for us today, InshAllah. Assalamu Allaikum.
Laila 46:22
Waallaikum Assalam.