Fitrah, Fitnah & Feminism

Part 2: Fitnah

Feminism has highlighted many of the injustices women have faced in the past and given voices to women when they had none. But for all the good it has brought, I believe it is not something to be sought for in it's entirety. It is my belief that feminism has brought much harm to society in its implications and practices. It does not truly support women fully as intended.

Ironically, it also benefits men at the expense of women. Especially those who themselves do not hold traditional values. Men who do not value traits such as honour and chivalry. Men who have bought into the feminist movement and seek it for their own gains. This a far cry from the aim of feminism to absolve women from 'the clutches of men'. It just shows that nothing much has changed. Women are still the vulnerable ones in society. It has been that way and it always will be. Rather than turning to feminism, I believe we must accept that so that we can work with it and not denying it.

Below I have listed 7 spheres of a society that feminism has had an impact on. They may be positive in some ways, but negative in many. And those are the ways in which fitnah has been brought to us.

1. Sex

With the sexual revolution (propelled by the feminist ideology that women should have complete autonomy of their own bodies), women are making themselves more available and 'easy' (for men!). Men no longer need to go through marriage in order to be intimate with women. They are no longer needed to be legally bound to care for his woman, to maintain her (living expenses), to protect her and to treat her with justice. He doesn't need to be vetted by her family, or pay her dowry. What is just required for a man to be intimate with whomever he wants and whenever he wants is to just charm and maybe pay for the date he found on 'dating' apps. And that is the modern version of "getting to know", 'dowry', 'consummation' and 'divorce' all in a night. Did zina happen in the past? Yes definitely. But did people have dozens or even hundreds of sex partners as is now commonly found in Western societies? I don't think so. For women who tend to be more emotional and view sex as the manifestation of love and connection, this can only benefit men who may not hold such emotional attachments with sex. Another thing is pregnancy. Not legally bound, the man owes nothing to the woman if she bears a child.

The lustful gaze is a pre-cursor to zina. Even if sex is not involved, women are encouraged to dress as they please, only owing their dress code to fit the occasion (which, let's be honest is left in the air for interpretation). This again, only benefits men as their lustful gaze and sexual fantasies are left free to roam, even during mundane activities such as commuting to work. By Allah, if women only knew where men's eyes land or could hear men's thoughts they would be disgusted. And this is evidenced in the reaction women give when men get caught. Something I always find befuddling is that women are encouraged to dress to "express their freedom", to "flaunt it if you got it" and to "be confident" yet why do they express their distaste if horny men ogle or catcall? Such men are then told off to be not knowing how to respect women, as women have the right to dress as they please. Well fine. But if you have no self-respect, you only attract disrespect from others. And that is true for many aspects in life, not only relating to dress codes. But this just shows that rather than believing in feminist rhetoric, a woman's fitrah is to be modest and private! Anyway, men looking at women are not isolated incidents or exceptions to the norms. Women can be naïve. What they don’t realize is that "sleazy old men" aren't the only ones with 'inappropriate' tendencies. Islam puts an end to this nonsense when Allah commands men to lower their gaze and for women to cover up. Something so simple, yet profound. This shows the veracity of Islam, showing that Allah knows His creation - seeking to solve social issues by relating decency to piety, each reinforcing the other.

Sexual predation. It is also an evil from which has been created, for as long as history itself. Therefore, women, on their part, should do their best to protect themselves. Am I saying that there will be no more cases of sexual assault if all women covered themselves? No. But will there be lesser cases? Yes, I believe so. And that is significant enough. In my opinion, societies with a low percentage of women who have undergone sexual assault and thus feel safer and has less trauma will perform better as a whole. Women who preach free dressing have no idea what goes on in a man’s mind. I’m not saying all men are bad. But what I’m saying is that all it takes is for certain men to have certain characteristics, habits or opportunities that will make for sexual predation become something they enact.

Imagine you had to walk through a jungle, with all sorts of predatory animals such as tigers and gorillas. Option A is to says that they want to stay in the jungle as long as possible, all alone, wearing bright attractive colours. Option B is to they will want to walk through the jungle as fast as possible, with a friend to protect them, and wearing dark colours to camouflage themselves from being spotted by animals. At the end of the day, whatever happens to you is fated. But which would you think is more logical and safe to do? It’s your choice.

Breeding hyper sexualization in society will also destroy the mental health of women, affecting even pious Muslim women as they feel the need to meet beauty standards.

Hyper-sexualisation and "female body empowerment" has bred a quality into men that can be described in the following hadith (hadith dayouth)

Such men has been conditioned by society to be emasculated of his natural characteristic to have ghayrah ( protective jealousy) of his womenfolk. This is because they don't want to be seen as backwards or misogynistic by society. This in turn bred even more hyper-sexualisation in society as women are not told to practice any sense of modesty whatsoever. As I mentioned earlier, women may be naïve. They may not naturally assume the worst of men. But we know the truth about men. I have came across a video on YouTube when a lady cried the moment she found out her that her step-dad was consuming her online sexual content and another one where a daughter proudly expressing her involvement in sex work while her father (being interviewed in the video) remained quiet (yet his facial expression is obvious). Or even another, where a mother was involved in porn. Do such women think that the men around them will spare them their innocence? Who do they think consumes their content? They are no one but brothers and sons and fathers. So should a man remain quiet if he hears his colleagues talking about his daughter in a sexualised way (having watched her content)? Or for a son to silently bullying from his friends for having a mother being involved in porn? Or should a husband allow his wife to be comfortable with other men "just as friends" knowing that they undress her in their minds? No. Over sexualisation of society has done no good but led to misery.

Money

Encouraging women to work increases the pool workers. This propels industries (which is traditionally owned by men) to grow, generating more revenue . With their own income and autonomy to spend, this also paves the way for businesses (which is also traditionally owned by men) to target them as another consumer base. Even for businesses owned by women and consumer base is women, there might be investors who are men who profit from the business' growth. From my personal experience and my observation of cultural trends, I believe that women tend to spend on superfluous things, with running jokes such as "my money is my money and your money is my money" and "happy wife, happy life", or women taking into pride the size of their engagement rings, or the ratio of the women's section (the products catered to them) as compared to the men's in departmental stores - signifying that husbands are the ones expected to buy nice, shiny things for their wives. Anyway, I won't get into statistical arguments as it is not really relevant. Households having dual incomes just means that there is more spending power for families to buy 'wants', be it spouses spending on themselves or for their counterparts. Look, this is not to fault women. Men themselves, on the other hand, are stereotyped as stingy and cheapskates! I am just saying that feminism has played into businesses driving consumerism and materialism, all detrimental to the mental health of those who tend to be more influenced by insecurities and peer pressure. This can be seen as businesses try to equate buying their products to being "a strong woman", or propelling the idea that rich women who are able to buy luxury items are seen a successful. But in truth, they are just marketing gimmicks, meant to exploit women into buying them. This has resulted in women unnecessarily pressuring themselves into buying things they don't need.

Family structure

Feminist thought pushes the idea of equality between men and women, husbands and wives. So according to this ideology, a husband and his wife is to share house chores, leadership roles, and decision-making 50/50, but if one would be true to this ideology, then the couple also needs to share financial responsibilities 50/50, protection of the house 50/50 and decision making 50/50. If true to this practice, it results in making the husband's life easier as he as a co-partner to equally share all family burdens with, which men pre-feminism does not have. However in practice this is not often the case and feminism just become as tool for control. Feminist women demand 50/50 in house chores and decision-making but does not want to equally share the financial burden and protection with the husband. This just shows the unnaturalisticality of feminism as they find certain aspects of family rearing unnatural to them. This leads to discord in the family as husband and wife are pitted against each other due to power-struggles and ambiguity in roles.

Leadership

Feminists are not happy that there aren’t more women in leadership roles. Firstly, I question: what is the importance of a women being in a leadership role? Will they make better decisions then men? Or do feminists want women to be in leadership roles just because they are women? Or is it because they want it to boast that the dominance of men have been crippled? I'm not saying that all leaders are completely just. Many aren't. But to insert gender into the topic is implying that men are doing what is best for themselves while purposely oppressing women. If that argument were to be used, then to put a woman into a leadership role to oppose that would just mean she wants to reverse and oppress men. This way of thinking is pitting men against women once again and it is not fair to leaders who do their best. This will also result in the very controversial and ineffective "DEI hires" practiced in the West, where companies regulate their staff not based only on their competency but also based on their backgrounds. No longer just being about gender, it has extended to race, religion, and sexuality. Following this ideology, companies would have equal numbers of male, female, black, white, Asian, straight, gay and trans staff. And it wont end there of course. There is just and endless number of classifications to add. Look, I am not saying that no woman should have leadership roles. Many women have such characteristics and should be praised for such. Islamic history is also proud of women who hold such positions. It is just that the only acceptable reason for a woman might get into a leadership role for her characteristics and skills, and not just be put there “because she is a woman”.

As for marital affairs, feminists are not happy that men are the leaders by default. A leader is supposed to be stable, calculative, far sighted and strong willed. And those are the exact qualities that women look for in a man. Yes, many women might be professional, skilful, on-point and quick to make decisions at work, yet many women I know put those aspects of leadership at the door when they come home. In front of their husbands they become emotional, fickle-minded and less resilient to stress. That is not to say those are bad characteristics. They play an important role as they act as a litmus test for when something is not right at home; a counter to a man's tendency to choose to ignore such matters because it might seem easier to them. Just as how man are created in a way, women are too. But taking that into consideration, who is more preferable to be the 'man' of the house?

Public Sphere

This is generally the least contentious in the list, but can also the most tricky. Traditionally women has had the role of not involving herself in the public sphere ie. being 'out there' and working but instead has the default role of being a housewife. Although this isn't the case in terms of absolutes as there is histories of women in many societies that have involved in public sphere

Feminists might argue that women have proven their competence as they are able to have jobs all the way up to a professional level. However, what I think they miss out is that people behave differently at home and outside. We all leave our suits at the door to our house and our aprons at the door to our office. That is to say, we behave differently outside and at home. At work, we are expected to display a level of professionalism. But behind closed doors, we put our guard down and show significantly lesser restraint in displaying our true selves. At work, some women may seem to be a natural at "climbing the ladder", but nobody can deny that is physically, mentally and emotionally draining as it not only includes pushing the boundaries at work to please bosses, but also dealing with colleagues in office politics. and front of their husbands, they might be the one who seeks a good coddle. Again, I am not saying there is anything wrong with that. In fact, the way they behave at home is more in line with their fitrah, which is to feel protection, comfort and safety physically, mentally and emotionally. It may be tiring not able to comfortably display it at work, even amongst their friends (for fear of backbiting, being judged, etc.) hence it is perfectly normal for them to seek it from their husbands.

Another need that stems from the need of feeling safe is their need to be meticulous or being treated as just and fair. However, this might sometimes feel misplaced at work, often resulting in finding themselves the result of ire or being 'blacklisted' by their bosses. What many don't immediately realize is that their bosses are not their husbands to whom they can openly complain to. On the other hand, men are more resistant to changes in dynamics. When both spouses (that is to say, men are also susceptible of this) bring "spill over" emotions from work, the household suffers.

Thirdly, this has impacted the children. Let's face it. By now we must all agree that the fabled "super mum" (in the sense that she is able to have a successful career as well as family) only exists in rare cases. Yes, there are countless career-mums who have raised successful children by any standard (and there are also countless housewives who do not), but let's be truthful here. Everything has limits, with time being the biggest factor. Something was compromised, be it taking a step back in the career, not creating strong bonds with children during their crucial years, or affecting the relationship with husbands.

Lastly and most importantly, the greatest fitnah is that the frequent mixing of men and women in the workforce has resulted in are illegal relationships. How many marriages have been shattered by this

Broken Relationships

Living in times where the female voice is valued over reason, boys have been raised up to think that outcompeting women or expressing their masculine traits are seem as toxic or misogynistic and are socially unacceptable. Girls are also brought up to think that they must pursue careers in order to be considered 'successful'. This will breed effeminate men and emasculated women in society. I won't deny that feminine men and masculine women do exist, but they are the exception rather than the norm. But for the vast majority of the population, this might not be the case. When men cant be trusted to act like men, and women cant be trusted to act like women, this creates confusion and uncertainty in what the genders expect of each other and what one assumes others expect of themselves. This uncertainty creates broken relationships when both parties cannot get their natural needs fulfilled by their counterparts.

Transgenderism

Feminism first started to obtain freedom of choosing gender roles. This then led to freedom of sex (promiscuity and homosexuality), which led to the freedom of choosing genders itself (ie. transgerism) The problem with liberalism is that they do not believe in a red line. In this case, feminism's liberative values has shot itself in the foot as transgenders (specifically men who 'transit' to women) invade female spaces such as toilets, changing rooms, and compete with women in sports (even up to the Olympic level). It's not hard to guess how easy it is to abuse this 'loophole' and who it ultimately benefits. A result of this is a 'true feminist' movement arising out of feminism!

Feminism is the biggest enemies of a woman. Why? Because it was not men who said that women are lower than them but it is feminism itself who said so. Why? Because it is feminism that says that for a woman to bring themselves up, they must assume the role and responsibilities of men. In other words, men never said being a leader, being a breadwinner for the family or being responsible for defending their family is better than being a housewife. But it is feminism that said so.

Part 3: Fitrah

hadith about men care takers of women

In Islam, women are not specifically told that they are forbidden to work or are forced to get married, or must assume to perform all house chores. Islam places very few 'set' rules for either spouse to follow, albeit those rules are comprehensive and play a huge part in gender roles. This is to allow for flexibility for couples to operate their families as Allah is aware of the vast differences of every man and woman He has created, whilst still providing strong foundations for any family to thrive. 'Masculine' and 'feminine' characteristics, difference in strengths and weaknesses vary amongst each man and woman and must all be taken into consideration in matrimony. However, that is not to say we are free to do whatever we wish, abusing the rights or shying away from the responsibilities that are given to us. We are obligated to treat each other with mercy and justice. For example, there is no exact law that forces wives to perform house chores. However, if her husband is financially providing for the family, it is only natural for the wife to assume the role of the (main) homemaker. A wife also have a right to their husband's wealth for her own living expenses (shelter, food, clothes etc.), but she should also practice mercy on her part and not to ask from her husband of that is outside of his capabilities. On the other hand, a husband has the right for intimacy and obedience with his wife, but cannot expect them in absolute from her if he is pushing her capabilities to her limits, and especially if he has taken a share of his wife's wealth for the family's sustenance. These are only sensible things that a couple must practice with in order to live in tranquillity. Gender roles in Islam should not be seen as something rigid and oppressive. Instead of using the law or emotional blackmailing as a weapon against each other, compassion towards each other should be the one that 'fills in the gaps' of gender roles.

Allah has also drawn lines that we must not cross, to keep ourselves in check. This is for the purpose of maintaining the marriage, and without which, will cause it to fall apart.

hadith about disobedient women, dayouth men,

A wali is the male guardian of an unmarried woman. It is usually her father if he still alive and well, or a male relative is he is not. For a married woman, that person is naturally her husband. Under no period of a woman's life is she not under the care of a male guardian. A wali is responsible for the maintenance, safety, the general well-being and seeing through that the best interests of his women are met. He is also required to be present when she is to be married. This means that it is also his responsibility to vet through her potential suitors beforehand. Now, in this day and age where women have empowered themselves to financial independence, self-defence and autonomy in their bodies and choices (in romance), many would claim that this concept of a wali is outdated. No doubt, feminists will get repulsed by this idea that a Muslim woman's life is intrinsically tied to a male and see this as oppression. Yet, they do not understand the importance of the role. In reality, men and still stronger than women (in general) and men are more inclined to violence (an important aspect for self-defence). Men are also naturally more logical thinkers ( a very important aspect when choosing spouses), and he knows other men better as compared to his womenfolk who tend to be more emotional and who might for example, be swept away by "bad boys" or other men who have ill-intentions in marrying them. As for the maintenance aspect of the wali, what person wouldn't love for their basic necessities to be paid for? While the need to have male approval might seem stifling for some women, you must understand that Islam is a principled religion, and it always places prevention above harm.

Either way, feminism, which puts one's desires first, in its truest form is hardly practiced in reality. In practical households, all values, not only those tied to finances, leadership, or strength (ie. masculine traits) are treasured. Both spouses should play to their strengths (and realize weaknesses), and should have no problem with issuing themselves to playing the support role in certain cases if needed. Rather than feeding personal ego, marriages become successful when all members play a part with preserving healthy relationships being the goal and having Allah and His Messenger, peace be upon him, as their guide.

I had the privilege of doing my umrah. So, one of the experiences was that I was able to immerse myself in a pure Islamic culture, and where every women practiced the hijab. Majority of women even practicing the niqab. Maybe women might not feel the impact of such an experience, but on reflecting my stay there, I realised that being surrounded by women who held laws of modesty had freed up my mental space.

A Muslim is a worshipper of Allah. In that case, it must be a Muslim’s responsibility to obey Allah as He is the All-Knowing Creator. He created both men and women. It is perfectly normal to dislike some of Allah’s rulings (especially if you are ignorant on the issue) but what is required of us is to abide by them. We should trust that what Allah has asked us to do is for own good. Therefore no matter what the people say that a woman should do should be secondary to what Allah has told a woman to do. Sometimes the people say things that may seem nice on paper, but in reality it might not be practical at all. For example in Islam, women are told to dress modestly. There are varying levels of what “modest” is in practice (and the madhab), but at the minimum, Muslim women only can expose only their face, hands and feet, minimize their contact with men, and behave differently around men. All this is to protect both the men and women from fitnah ie. sexual attraction and contact, consensual or otherwise. No surprise that Western societies will find this oppressive. They have laid the blame on men to prevent themselves from sexual misconduct ie. harassment, molest and rape. Islam doesn’t deny men that men too have a requirement to carry themselves well

Verse (address men first, men caretakers of women)

how it affects men, force men to act against their fitrah