 Ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters in Islam, aslamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wabarakatuhu Hope everyone is feeling well on this rainy night here in Karbala. I'm a bit sick, so if I do sneeze your cough here and there, do excuse me in advance. But welcome to hashtag LNT episode 46 of your favorite show, of course, but not with your favorite man, Ahmad Ali, coming to your life in the holy city of Karbala. Now tonight's topic, we're talking about one of the most important aspects of our time. What it is, what we have to say about it, we're just going to have to wait and check what's happening first. Once again, welcome everyone joining us tonight. Now a truck hit 31, killed 15 people after the driver lost control on Saturday, just yesterday, on the Expressway Tall booth in northern and northwestern of China. Now Chinese authorities have said that more than 40 people have been injured, and this incident occurred in the city of Lanzao, local police in a statement released just today said that they faulted the driver, the truck driver, saying he lost control of his vehicle after continuously breaking on the lengthy downslope leading to the tall gates. Now the driver who had never actually been on that road for the first time, he panicked and he wasn't able to stop the truck and he hit 31 cars. That's a lot of cars, and just from one incident, God forbid 15 people died, so our hearts and wishes go out to the families of those who were affected by this incident. But tonight, we're kind of talking about the same topic, we're kind of talking about the same medium that this article was published on, but we just have to wait until we check out, check out what, we just have to take a break. Welcome back, dear viewers, hope everyone is enjoying their night tonight. Now nowadays there are countless ways, numerous ways to get to know something, where you can get introduced to something or an event. Let's say your friend is hosting a morning ceremony in Muharram al-Saffar, our party throughout the year. And how are you going to get introduced to this? How are you supposed to get introduced to all this? Now the host tries different ways to try and create more audience, to target more audience, so what does he do? He probably brings the best speaker, the best reciter, sends posts on Facebook, has an event on Facebook, does various ways just to make that event happen. And why try to gather that money? People, because it'll show how much, how important that event is, or the level of influence that event may have. You know, he tells friends and family to share the word, post on Facebook an event, as I mentioned, a public message to everyone, even just, you know, sticking a sticker or a paper on the polls, so bypassers can check it out and be there on time to participate. Now there are various methods of sharing news, of sharing events. Some are more effective than others, some require more effort than others, more money, more time, and of course, at the end of the day, more attention than the other events. Now in today's society, media has been the number one main way of spreading a certain message, of spreading a certain event that you want to get it out. Media, and especially social media, has been the main platform for that, any invitation that you want to invite the world. If you're trying to send a message to the world, you have Facebook there, although their privacy breaches right now is going skyrocketing, but you know, we can still rely on them to send a message through. But the largest annual pilgrimage in the world just ended a few days ago, and we thought it's a good time, and now everyone's relaxed, everyone has been back to their countries, relaxed, and it's a weekend. So we chose to talk about tonight's topic, and how important it is to spread the message of this event to the entire world. That's why tonight's question is very important. Tonight's question, we're talking about, and we're asking you guys, how were you introduced to Arba'een? How were you introduced to Arba'een? The number to call in that is plus nine, six, four, seven, seven, four. 0671836. You can let us know by phone call, text message, and note message. I can barely see my eyes. I'm not that sick, but you know, when I'm sick, I just go shut down. But the number to call in that is plus nine, six, four, seven, seven, four. 0671836. Let us know what you think about tonight's question. Let's take a quick break. Come back to you guys very short. Once again, hope everyone enjoyed that 20-second or 15-second break there of hashtag NT. But tonight's question, as we said before, the break is right there at the bottom. How were you introduced to Arba'een? A very important question. A lot of people, when they hear Arba'een, they tend to hear it from friends. They tend to see it on social media. Now, for the past two years, as we get to talk about later on, we've seen it on other platforms. But a very important question, how were introduced to Arba'een? Was it through a friend? Was it through social media? Was it through some people who have actually reached Karbala'a and they've told us a story that in their dreams, they were invited to come to Karbala'a and it was for the first time to actually coming to this blessed place. So how were you introduced to this great event? How were you introduced to Arba'een? Now, media, as we mentioned in the first part of tonight's episode, plays a very significant role in keeping everyone updated about a specific event, about a specific news and various events that are happening around the world. Now, today, we can check out the latest news, current doentes, current affairs, with just a few clicks of a mouse, and you can get the entire world of what's happening at your fingertips. Let's take a very quick break and come back to you guys. I need to cough. Let's take a very quick break. One second, we do welcome everyone joining us tonight. Shout out to Mustafa Nadir for bringing me that glass of water. This guy's a legend. But we were just talking about how important social media is, how everyone right now can get the world and the news of what's happening around the world and the events and the incidents, just like how we began our tonight's episode was what's trending similar to other episodes at the fingertips of Ali Jassim. He just clicks CNN, copy, paste the news, and then we roll it. Now, I'm just kidding. But he puts an effort. I'm just kidding. But what we're trying to say, it's at the fingertips of every single individual. Media is the best medium of communication to mass audiences. Yes, you can send a direct message to a certain group, maybe has 180,000 and 50,000 people in a group. But it's different when you put it public, when everybody gets to see that the mass audience that media provides is enormous. Now, with the help of various media such as electronic media, print media, and web media, the mass communication method is accompanied in a very suitable, is accomplished in a very suitable way. Now, the vast majority of people all across the world rely on various types and various sources of media, keeping themselves updated. Even right now, when you see news agencies, they have their own app, Fox News and CNN, and even the independent and Reuters, they have their own, well, we've got to give a shout out to Toronto Star and Hamilton Spectator, of course. They have their own apps where you can check out their news and what's going on in that specific country. Now, we just want to look at some ways and how to understand the significance of media through a couple of points. Now, number one, giving us the immense knowledge and transmits information, that's absolutely true. You ask any student right now, yes, textbooks, print media, you get to learn from that. But when you're trying to do a research paper, when you're trying to do anything, even if you're trying to apply to a job, you have to go to Google and write a job description of whatever project, a job description of whatever, and then you get a few examples and then you put that into your resume or your whatever. Just to, it makes life a lot easier. It's not a negative thing, it's a positive thing. It makes life a lot easier and you get to understand more the knowledge that you're getting. Books right now are old school. Yes, you can still read books, you can still pick it up, but they're heavy to carry. You can get a thousand books just on your iPhone and your Samsung or whatever. So it increases the amount of knowledge and makes it so simple for people just to pick up a book online instead of actually going somewhere, going to a library which is like five, six kilometers down. It is, it's very good to actually go and physically read, but at the same time, when technology advances, people need to advance with it. So they made you a free app where you can download any book or sometimes you buy the book and it's right there at your fingertips. Number two, raises our consciousness and this is very important. Media nowadays, not only it provides us with information and knowledge on what this needs, but it also provides us with a wider variety of understanding. It makes us understand what's going on around the world. Our conscious of the world right now is increasing. You can ask, and today I was actually shocked, a three-year-old on the Ellen DeGeneres show, a three-year-old has the whole periodic table of elements memorized. He just showed one sign and he tells you what's going on or what that element is. So imagine, and the mother was saying, the mother of that three-year-old child was saying that, I thought this child was only six months and he knows all of this. So imagine the awareness and the consciousness that the web and the media right now is providing everyone, but it's up to us on how we get to use that. Point number three and how to understand the importance of media is it raises the voice against issues in society. And this is very, very important because if you were to look at every society, no society is free of problems. Apologies. No society is free of issues, whether family issues or whether economic issues. You're talking about gender discrimination. You're talking about poverty, job loss. You're talking about so many issues that are happening. Media right now provides the general public, provides everyone out there the platform to come and speak out. Before, if you were to ask those living in the 70s and in the 60s and even 80s, they had no way of bringing their voice out other than voting and other than just writing something in the newspaper. But even back then writing something in the newspaper was limited to a few people. But still that media, that print media back then was still available. Now it's available to everyone. If someone, even if he gets pulled over by a cop wrongfully, he gets his phone out and starts recording it and shows everyone. So it's a message, it's a way to send a message about corruption, about if there's poverty in society. Many organizations right now, non-profit organizations, are using media to show the world of what's going on, of the underdeveloped countries, of the civilians that are losing their lives because of nonsense between governments. So such issues are raised and it brings awareness to everyone, similar to number two. Number four provides the true picture, not the entire media, now we're going specific. Media sometimes is biased and everyone knows this, everyone understands this. But the only form of media which actually tells you what's going on, is the live media. But we'll continue this, we'll continue talking about this, but after we take a very short break to talk more about tonight's question. How are you introduced to Arba'een? Yeah. Once again, hope everyone is enjoying the night. I just sneezed the loudest sneeze, I hope the guys recorded that. But yes, we are back live from the holy city of Karbala. And tonight we're talking about how we're introduced to Arba'een. This to give a quick disclaimer, me and a lot of people after Arba'een, we get sick. I don't know why, but it's a seasonal flu that comes right after Arba'een. Hope everyone is okay and maybe I'm only one. But before that, we were talking about a few points, shedding light on the importance of media. And we just talked about providing the true picture. As you mentioned, media has its bias. There's a specific agenda behind it. Some, their agenda isn't that bad, but others, their agenda is bad and so on to ruin someone's reputation, especially what's going on with the world right now. However, one form of media that provides the actual true picture is the live coverages. At events, even when you want to look at FIFA, for those watching the game, a fight happened like when Suarez bit that guy. You know, in the replays, people might have deleted it, although it's still on YouTube, but it could be manipulated. But during the live show, you actually see what's happening. You know, when the prime minister or the president is trying to give a press release or when he's trying to make a decision whether to increase the recessions on Iran or whether to strike Russia or whatever. We're not talking about Donald Trump, we're just saying, you know, even those or when you have an event, when you have an incident, hurricanes, natural disasters, you have a reporter coming live just like right now. We're coming to you live from a specific city, a specific incident, but the show is live. It's a bit different. We're talking live every night, but it provides the true picture, live coverage is very important and we'll get to emphasize more on this point, but later on, inshallah, in tonight's episode. Number five, point number five on how important media is, is education, is the fact that it educates society. A lot of people know, and I began that with tonight's episode, a lot of people use, especially when you go to YouTube and you find those ads like Grammarly and the other ads, it's the best way of education. You can go to Google, Shaykh Google, radiallahu anhu, you can go to him and you can just write a simple math equation that you're stuck on and it'll give you all the steps to do it. You can write lessons in biology grade 10 high school and you'll actually get them. So imagine the amount of education that's on the web, but it's everyone using that. A lot of people tend to go somewhere else, we can't mention where, but more than they focus on this and it's very important to use that education when you get it, share that lesson, share that quote, share whatever you saw on your social media accounts. Now these five points that I just mentioned to you guys are very important and it shows us the important role of media in spreading a certain message or any message across the world in today's society. However, how much of that media are we actually using to propagate what happened in Karbala a few days ago? How much of social media? I know my friends that have come to Karbala, they blew up their Facebook and their Instagram with pictures of Karbala and that's absolutely beautiful. To show everyone the peaceful nature of Raq and the peaceful nature of specifically Karbala, it's absolutely amazing. For 14 million, as statistics have said, 14 million, thank you very much, Ajassim, for that. But according to statistics, 14 million have arrived in Karbala. So you can imagine from various angles and from various gates in Karbala, you're coming from the north, from the south, from the east, from the west, everyone is flocking towards Karbala. It's beautiful. People taking pictures at main gates of Karbala, at the borders of Karbala, or at the borders of Raq, showing everyone how safe Raq is and that's beautiful. This is what we need. But there's one very important point that we need to focus on. You know, every year, many news agencies, TV channels, prominent figures from around the world, come to Karbala, visit, I'm not saying, contribute, they walk. This year, non-Muslims also walk. Every year, non-Muslims walk towards Karbala to try and see why do these millions, every year, flock towards the same place? This year, there was a team from France TV, a team from the Turkish TV, a team from Pakistan TV, Persian, Italian TV, people from the United States. This is the Turkish channel that was doing a live broadcast and interviews right above the shrine of Al-Abbas was that Hussain, alaihi salam. Different figures from different religions. This year, as we can see right here, this Irish Christian lady who joined the walk from Najaf to Karbala. So you can imagine, even those who sometimes don't believe in the same ideologies, but yet still wanna check things out. Why? And here, we have a reverend from Georgia, and this guy was actually amazing, one of the guys that bowed to the shrine of Imam al-Hussain, alaihi salam. So this is very important, especially the media, the media of the holy shrines is doing an amazing job and how they convey the message of Imam al-Hussain, alaihi salam with their news and with their reports and international media department. So it's one way to spread the message of Karbala and spread the message of Imam al-Hussain, alaihi salam. Last year, just last year, you have journalists from BBC, you have journalists from Reuters, the independents, CNN and The Guardian, all of them writing about Arba'een, this is the independent right there, writing about Arba'een, millions of Shi'a Muslims. And let me read it, Shi'a pilgrims flock to Karbala for Arba'een climax. So back this, Arba'een millions of Shi'a Muslims take part in the world's greatest pilgrimage as ISIS is finally defeated. So this is the strongest article that can be written on how peaceful Karbala is and how peaceful the atmosphere in Iraq in general is when ISIS was defeated, you find people flocking towards Karbala. And this is why this Arba'een was amazing, although the numbers weren't like last year because of the currency deficiencies in countries, but we still saw millions, 14th to 15th, 17th people say the largest, the highest number was 17 million, but the average they say 14 million entered Karbala. Now despite all of this, despite the journalist, what they were, and despite all the channels that have arrived, the entire world, if you were to look at your friend next door and you were to ask him about Arba'een, you'd be looking at him like, what? What's Arba'een? Who's Arba'een? We haven't done, it's an amazing job. No one's criticizing me for that, but media is larger than that. Instead of writing an article, it used to be a live broadcast from Arba'een just like how IHTV was doing, although some technical difficulties, but things were going well, Alhamdulillah. So one of the points to take into consideration is the fact that we haven't done everything in our power to shed light on Arba'een. You know, the media platforms, yes, only in the 10 days that we're here to post pictures and show the world what we're doing, but at the same time, across the year, those 10 days or 15 days that you're here, it's great, but those 150, 350 days that you have across the year, you also have to update your friends, update your Facebook status at least once a week, once a month to show everyone and to make everyone understand what Arba'een is or who Imam Hussain al-Islam is. If you know any prominent figures around the world, ask them to send you a video, collaborate with them, try to host an event. I know it's a bit expensive, especially for getting the high-end scholars, but at the same time, you can people are there to donate and you can have the best event where you can share, just like the Hussain Day Convention in Bengal or India. From 1992 up until today, they've been sending the message of Imam Hussain al-Islam. Such events have placed a huge impact, they've placed a huge impact on today's world. And this is what we need to continue to do. We have to make sure that everyone around the world, whether they're living in the East, Far East, or whether they're living in the Far West, they have to understand who Imam Hussain and who Arba'een, and what Arba'een is and try to invite them and persuade them and motivate them to come to Karbala. That's it for tonight. I hope everyone can go share something about Arba'een in your unique way and insha'Allah everyone may be guided towards Imam Hussain al-Islam. Thank you very much for joining us tonight. Do stay tuned for the upcoming episodes. Wa-salaamu alaikum. Wa-rahmatullahi wa-barakatuh.