 Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim al-hamdulillah wa salatu wa salam wa ala ashrif al-anbiya'i wa al-mursaleen, Sayyidina wa Maulana wa Habibina Muhammad, salallahu alaihi wa salam, wa ala alaihi wa sahbihi wa salam tasliman kathira. Again, as-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. Alhamdulillah, I wanted to thank Rahma Foundation and the Jannah Institute, MCC East Bay, all of the organizers for bringing us back together here again, alhamdulillah. After our last session, we had so much positive feedback and it's really beautiful to see the community coming out again and of course those who are watching online. Alhamdulillah, this conversation, as Usad Al-Fadwa mentioned, is a little different than our last conversation in that we're really dealing with contemporary issues, contemporary struggles. So I have the topic about this notion that women's roles and function in society have to do with how desirable they are and we're going to break this down together, inshallah. Now we did mention before, Asad Al-Fadwa, that the content of this topic is obviously for a more mature audience. So if you have younger girls, I would ask you to please take them out, if you would, just for my comfort level and your comfort level and their comfort level and then inshallah we can proceed, but I'll give you a moment to do that if you feel the need to do that. With that said, again, here is the description that we put out when we gave you the program details about this message. It's a toxic message, but it's a message that is found in every element of our society. From a very young age, girls are taught to think of themselves in this form or focusing on the physical and focusing on that part of who they are and then of course in our cultures and then in media and we'll get to all of that. But I really wanted to talk about this discussion and what I'd like you to keep in mind is this beautiful quote that actually someone posted yesterday, my relative of mine on Instagram and I thought it fit this perfectly because really women have so much potential as we have already learned Alhamdulillah with Dr. Rani's beautiful talk and we will come to learn in the other talks as well, but we have so much potential. It's usually the environments that we are in that prevent us from reaching that potential. So I want you to keep this idea of how can we individually on an individual level also as a community make these changes to the environment that we are subject to as women and so with that said we got to go back a little bit so bear with me because this is going to be kind of like a women's studies class in a way. I'm going to take you on a little bit of a stroll through the past to get to where we are today to explain because again as Dr. Rani beautifully said context matters. So here's the history. It's so important that we as women know about these two major movements that happened almost simultaneously and of course I'm talking about the sexual revolution and the women's movement and there's not enough time to go into all of the major things that unfolded during that very politically intense time but these are some of the highlights that I feel like all of us as women have to understand. So first we want to look at the the pill and it's we should know obviously what that reference is but when it was manufactured and produced and became commercially available and then also the timeline in terms of the political activism that was going on of course we were in the midst of a war and there were a lot of this culture that was right here for those of us in the San Francisco Bay Area right here in San Francisco in the Haight-Ashbury district there was this movement and it was like a commune of people who basically came together with these very very different ideas let's just say about you know opposing war by by spreading love but their ideas of course were perverse and they you know practiced a lot of things that that were just simply haram on every level but this was they caught national attention because there were a considerable amount of people flocking to San Francisco to be a part of this right and I'm sure we all we've all read or heard references to this in the past but another really important person that we should know about is Betty Freiden or Freiden I don't know how to say her name but Freiden maybe works she wrote the Feminine Mystique and she was also the founder of the organization now right national organization for women now look at her statement of purpose and I think this is so important because we want to remember that a lot of the people in that time their intentions were good they were good and well intentioned people they wanted to basically you know bring as the statement says right women first and foremost are human beings to assert the humanity of women so that was the biggest part of of why they they were speaking out and actually you know pushing back and and to give women the chance to develop their fullest human potential so you can see that that is something of course all of us if we can just put ourselves in that time we would probably all want to be a part of a movement like that that was saying yes we're human beings we deserve rights we deserve human rights so in many ways that was the platform but things changed and so why did they change now this event is really important this happened on November 18th and this was in the Chinese room of the Mayflower Hotel so the now basically had their second annual conference and look at the amount of women that attended 105 women it's less than what we have here 105 women and they came together to go over the Bill of Rights which was part of their charter and they wanted to really you know organize themselves so in addition to the founder Betty Freedon there was another woman Margaret Rowalt and she's looked at her age 72 years old much older much more conservative and she was appointed by JFK to lead the Commission on the Status of Women so she also had a very important role and they were coming together joint forces to really again advance the cause for women however in the in that meeting Freedon she basically kind pretty much surprised and shocked everyone in attendance especially Margaret Rowalt because while they were there to vote on different matters the very last vote that she saved was on abortion and that was very device device of the the crowd completely was divided you had very conservative women in that room like Rowalt and then others who were more liberal and Freedon though had a reputation she was referred to as being someone so frightening that she was all of the witches of Macbeth in one person that's what some people said about her so she was a very forced to be reckoned with but she basically got the vote to swing in her way to push for a repeal of all laws that had to do with abortion and this was something Rowalt was not happy about so it was it caused a big problem now two days later what does she do she decides to hold a press conference remember 105 women only I think what was it 57 women that voted 57 to 14 57 women voted for abortion laws to be repealed but she goes in front of a national you know she's this is a press conference and she speaks on behalf of 28 million American women and says that this is what we want we want abortion laws to be repealed this was a huge moment in this country because the conversation around this topic that before then was very taboo was suddenly changing and shifting and of course as media does they're going to pounce on sensational news so the conversation starts to change the rhetoric around you know female sexualities sexual practices health care all of these things abortion start to really change right and then not too long after you know in 1973 of course we have rovers's weight now Betty Friedan was interviewed in 2001 and again this quote is important she says ideologically I was never for abortion motherhood is a value to me and even today abortion is not I believe passionately in 1967 I believed passionately in 1967 as I do today the women should have the right of chosen motherhood for me the matter of choice has never been primarily the choice of abortion but that you can choose to be a mother this that is as important as any right written into the constitution so she was not pushing really for abortion she was pushing for the for the choice right but I don't think she may have realized along those the consequences of what she did because they were severe and what I mean by that is again the introduction of a repeal on abortion law changed every the attitude the culture around these topics and we saw in in 1963 a few years after the pill was introduced right 2.3 million women taking it single women started taking it because they could what have more sexual freedom they could start doing things without the consequences of an unwanted a pregnancy and married women could limit their family size so all of this matters because we have to ask questions right about how did we get to this place now well all of these things are changing the way that our societies was previously structured it starts to shift everything right and so then we have in 1964 this is a major supreme court ruling that this book Henry Miller's book a tropic of cancer was not considered obscene when that you know ruling was was implemented then what happens it opens the floodgates for more and more books magazines movies to begin to start to refer to and start showing more salacious more sexual content and of course at the center of that is going to be women the debates of course have continued ever since for decades on all of these topics from birth control abortion homosexuality marriage and divorce pornography all of these things started to just become mainstream topics that were debated between of course the conservative right and the liberal left and that's continued up until today and continues to be something of debate 35 percent of births today fyi are from unmarried women so we can see a huge again shift because of all of these things and of course the steps i mean we should note all of these these things so now let's get to some facts that again we should all know especially if you have if you're a mother and you have daughters it's so important that we know this but the exploitation of female sexuality again as all of these changes were happening so rapidly the advertisers and people in the film and movie industry the entertainment industry of course sees the opportunity right people are it's not as taboo as it was i'm not going to get canceled right at that time they had a similar concept of cancel culture you couldn't speak on certain things without consequences but suddenly those consequences were removed so now it's about profitability it's about making profits right so the as as they realize that there is immense profitability and exploiting and objectifying women they began to do that for decades after the industry practice was to do what and you can see this i shared actually with sada fadwa um a link yesterday though so disturbing to look because it was someone who had basically collated all of the these ads over how many decades that showed the objectification of women men everything but it was just really disturbing to see the the the massive amount of you know these types of imagery that we've been subjected to that we may not even realize but dismembered ads are something that we should know because i i remember i watched and i'll i'll get to that in a moment but it can make when you start to see it or i understand the the definition of these things that you'll start to notice it and it's gonna affect you but what does a dismembered ad when you take a woman and completely um you know parse her into pieces she's no longer a human being that you feature to you know in whatever advertising you do you just look at her as body parts so an arm here a leg here uh you know mouth here other obviously parts as well um but that was just industry practice so we saw it in print media billboard commercials selling everyday products toothpaste right a woman has to be completely almost half naked to sell toothpaste but this is why because again there was profitability in that and so women became objects play things prizes this is what was standard and then of course the subliminal messages right of these uh the non-existent ideal image of femininity which continues to pervade this these unrealistic filtered and digit digitally manipulated images of course which we've gotten even better as technologies advanced but they're plastered everywhere so we as young girls whether we know it or not we're seeing these things you go to a store a children's toy store you can see images and we'll get to again the targeted campaign on little girls in a moment but everywhere we look we see these images in print film television social media and so as a result and look at the statistic this is so horrific it is so horrific to think that in one year a child grade school children could take in as many 80 as many as 80 thousand sexy girl portrayals watching what not adult television kid targeted TV programming they know what they're doing they want to get inside our head they want to break us down they want to reduce us to nothing but a physical object that they can then use and manipulate however they want and they do it at a very young age and of course the consequences are devastating the APA in 2007 reported that the sexualization of girls in the media is far more than the sexual than than boys right girls were often featured in revealing clothing as well as with bodily postures and facial expressions again young girls we're not talking about you know girls of age young girls that imply sexual readiness so they are being told to pose in in ways that invite that and of course you know you can see that everywhere now in this culture if you're looking at children's programming but also as i said just going through the aisles of a store like target you'll see even the way that sometimes the girls the posters for girls clothing or other things the way that they're positioned it's very inappropriate and further studies that again show how widespread this problem is 58 different magazines and according to this study had more than 50 percent of their advertisements were featured as sex objects women were and then in men's magazines 76 percent of the time they're they're being objectified just again you can look at the the the numbers here but it's just devastating and then down here at the bottom the American Journal of Psychiatry this now has to do with social media because we're again we're bringing it we're kind of moving through the timeline here right we talked about the movements and then the print media and all of the the changes that were happening rapidly now with social media we have much more more devastating problems in the fact in the sense that these devices are in our children's hands for nine hours or more a day and they're being bombarded with this type of imagery and again 10 to 25 percent of adolescents who are surveyed in this particular study had sent sex if you don't know what that is you should know that term right because we have text messages and then there are sexed messages which are sexually reference text messages that are either you know with words or images depicting something of a sexual content so almost a quarter of our youth are receiving and sending this type of messages it should really awake us and here we see again the devastating effects it has on young teen girls right 80 percent of women first of all say that the images of seeing other women on television and in movies fashion magazines and advertising makes them feel insecure so 80 percent of us let's just be honest we've all been impacted and if you think you haven't I don't know maybe you're Allah has protected you completely but at some point in our lives we've probably done a comparison we've probably watched something and felt really ugly right I feel like oh my gut is too big my this is too big after watching you know someone else this is what what what isn't exactly intended to happen they want to break us down right because it's all about the physical 42 percent of girls first through third grade want to be thinner first through third grade how many of you here have first graders anybody have a first grader a second grader a third grader can you imagine that they're talking about dieting and that age they're not out there playing they're talking about wanting to be thinner all the below 81 percent of 10 year old girls are afraid of being fat right how did that happen right how did it we come to a point in society where that word is even you know is into this again a concern of children that young that 81 percent of girls are afraid of that subhanAllah and then you know these are comparisons about the average girl is five four but the model that's presented to us is the average height is 511 so the ideals presented to us they're thinner they're taller they're obviously photoshopped they're they don't that's not true you know image of I mean oftentimes of what they even look like but yet we do this comparison and then with young girls who are bombarded with this type of imagery how's it affecting them they're feeling lonely depressed anxious lack of confidence right and and so it's it's clearly a problem that we need to be aware of now this is the this is a really important if you've never watched this please and if you have young girls especially if you have teenage girls please watch this with them I watched this in college and this is probably one of the I remember it was very transforming to watch this documentary Jean Kilborn for four decades has been researching the exploitation of women in media and she has an amazing series that she's done every decade subhanAllah where she just goes and she'll pull up ads to show you you think this is all you know we're just making it up it's real and it's getting into our minds because when you're passively watching television or film you're not always aware of what you're taking in but if it's there's enough of a stream of it and it's constant enough it will start to break you down and make you feel bad about yourself so excuse me so definitely check this documentary out and I think she even has it free like it's on youtube so what is the mechanism that these advertisers use well it's pretty simple right attractive bodies are employed so they find these models they find these subjects so that they can grab people's attention and then simulate what desire so it's like oh and women we we have to you know there's desire of a sexual nature that obviously men would feel but for women it's that desire to be like what we see on the screen so it is desire that is the impulse that is what they're tapping into right and so you know and then they hope obviously that that desire will transfer to the product that they're selling so you know as they say buy the beer get the girl in this way women's bodies are equated with commodities presented as rewards of consumption right and so here's some examples and again this was from that website that I mentioned um just look here this is a dismembered ad right we don't see a full body in the first two here we just see legs I mean that's just terrible and we shouldn't look at this like oh it's no big deal no it is a big deal especially when you look at the psychological effect and the ramifications of this type of messaging from a very young age on girls and we wonder why we have an epidemic of of in a crisis of eating disorders and other problems it's because of these types of messages that get into our minds right and then look at this this is a beer ad right Michelle Oak she's she is the bottle she's not even a human anymore let's just forget her humanity let's just infuse her into a beer bottle that's how desperate they are to get female you know uh consumers to buy their and male consumers obviously they're targeting men but still you know look at that and then I don't know about you guys have you ever jumped on a car with like 30 of your home girls and done a picture like that I don't know are we missing out on something uh how unrealistic and ridiculous is that image it's just so ridiculous right but we will just pass it by you know looking at an art instead of being angered like why why do we have to you know spread ourselves on a car I mean are we I don't know about you I've never met anybody who's loved their car that much to to do that you know and this poor woman at the bottom here with her dog I mean the dog got more showtime than she did her ankles were all that mattered here let's just hide her behind some wallpaper I don't know what that is fabric but let's feature her dog her dog is important I mean this is the kind of stuff that should again anger us like why why are we okay with this and going back to you know the now's charter like really what happened to the humanity of women if this is what we're dealing with now and this poor woman I mean she's got beautiful teeth no doubt but what about her eye I want to see the rest of her why are you teasing me with just her face and I mean smiling nose why isn't it you know this is these are the types of things that are subliminal but they get into our psyche and we should just again be angered by these things not look at them like oh what nice lipstick no that's where's the rest of her right exploiting the female consumer right 500 billion dollar industry the the beauty industry individually 313 dollars per month women spend on beauty products creams lotions makeup and that's not to say that we can't beautify ourselves which we'll get to but just think about why do you see men you know I mean I just saw yesterday I noticed there's a Sephora and there's Ulta and there's so many makeup stores like you know they're everywhere they're really in almost every shopping center where the men's like I don't see men having a store about beautification like just for them but we we need it apparently so we're so desperately you know unattractive that we need a store pretty much in every shopping center it's just tragic and in a lifetime two hundred twenty five thousand dollars you're spending on beauty products the procedures cosmetic you know I was thinking I saw a video the other day of this dentist who she was making a tiktok to try to save women from doing what running or getting on a flight to turkey which is now a popular destination where they are doing what any dentist here I think I would be so mortified as as if I was a part of you know that industry to see people what they do they shave their teeth down right to get the caps you see it these are young girls sometimes in their 20s as soon as they you know hit 1920 it's like your teeth aren't even good enough my god what's left what is left that we have to shave down the teeth Allah swt gave us which are such a blessing I mean you can talk to any medical practitioner they'll tell you dental health dental hygiene is related to overall health and if you have good teeth even if you don't think they're nice yeah thank you I have my own teeth but these poor girls are being conditioned to think nope they got to get rid of them because if they don't look like chicklets in your mouth you don't have nice teeth right like you just got to have a set of chick I mean I don't know again how we got to this point where we had bought into this right or you know other countries did you know the number what is the number one country in the world for rhinoplasty you're on that's a Muslim country so there are people right you know I mean in our own communities maybe in our families who are again so impacted by these messages that that our own countries are now offering these services upon Allah now the biggest target of the US cosmetic industry is millennials right now so if you're a millennial age 18 to 34 they're coming after you you're the target right because some of us who are on the older side we're over it I'm over it I'm over heels I'm over lipstick I'm over all of it right exactly I'm over it but those of you in the younger generation they're coming after you so they're you're the ones that they're gonna tell you need everything's wrong with you nothing is good enough nothing right nothing stop for a while so please watch out and then what's really ironic and this is actually tragic too we have to feel sorry for these people because when you see Hollywood and you see these actors and these actresses and these singers who are just being used and everywhere and yes they've made a devil's bargain likely in order to be in that industry we can say that but they're still being exploited 94 percent of women employed in that industry have been victims of some form of sexual harassment that is shocking to me that is shocking to me that they are still willing to be in an industry where they will report actual harassment on levels that are so troublesome I mean stuff a lot you know it's one thing to have an inappropriate joke but look at if you go down the list of this um a proposition for a sexual act or relationship can you imagine staying in a job being propositioned inappropriately by someone how many I mean most people who are you know thinking would be like I don't need that job right or to have uh you know being uh if you go further down here being forced to do a sexual act 21 percent of the women were forced to do something it's just tragic so we shouldn't you know look down on them we should feel sorry that they are so again uh being so manipulated to think that they have to subject themselves to these things that they're willing to do that but also we should be aware of how much it's affected women because if you look at this list here right um this is the top artists that sing about sex and love I looked at it and I was like stuff for a while right away look at it Lady Gaga I don't know SZA who that is Lizzo Whitney Houston Beyoncé these are women and then on the right side in the text you'll find who got in 2021 she was prized what a great prize to have the most sexual references in her songs Nicki Minaj right 43 direct inferences to sex in one song on a and then um of course two years ago or almost two years ago I'm sure you guys remember it was all over the news you couldn't escape it but there was a song that came out it broke records it broke records many records for the biggest 24-hour debut and then also on YouTube 55 million views in a week and this was of course the terrible song Awubu Billah by Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion um I don't want to go into that but just enough this this critique at the bottom is enough for you to know about this song it's degrading and disempowering to women due to its sexual explicit lyrics and overt sexualization of women's bodies so these are all realities and our youth are are you know watching this content I work with youth I know they're listening to these I've had literally classes with and sessions with youth where they admit that these are the people that they're listening to in our homes in our Muslim homes these are the musicians that are you know that are young girls are memorizing their lyrics and what are they talking about and then you know this is the genres that we also need to be aware of um and this I thought quote was really good this was from you know he was the the president of this delamere health that put this study together but he said music industry in many ways glamorizes and glorifies drug drugs and alcohol use drugs and out drugs alcohol and sex within lyrics is something that can be influential on the behavior of children and teenagers just like adults they begin to relate to the artists and situations in personal ways that's really important so it's not just that it's entertaining they start to see themselves in relation to who they're listening to to who they're watching to so when you have a young again 12 13 14 year old girl listening to this stuff she's going to start comparing and contrasting and thinking well I'm not good enough because I don't look like again Cardi B or Nicki Minaj or what have you the evidence is there's ample evidence there's it's undeniable right to conclude that the sexualization of girls has negative effects in a variety of domains we're going to just quickly go through these cognitive and emotional consequences it you know sexualization objectification undermines a girl's confidence and it also causes problems emotionally right and self-image problems by increasing shame and anxiety mental and physical health consequences we have eating disorders low self-esteem depression depressed mood and then as well as negative consequences to sexual development right that they can't develop a healthy sexual self-image so really important content I know it was a lot but there's still a little bit more to go so bear with me but these terms we have to know and we have to teach our children at appropriate level so that they're aware of what they are and how to define them what is sexualization right it's the act of endowing with sexual characteristics or of excessively emphasizing those characteristics in the real world and then here the APA says that sexualization occurs when any of these four aspects occur one a person's value derives solely from sexual behavior sex appeal including any other characteristics so when you have again women being told that they have to look a certain way they have to dress a certain way because that's all that they have to offer that is sexualization a person is held to narrowly defined standard that equates physical attractiveness with being sexy so again it's all so important to know these definitions and then a person's objectified because they're valued only for others sexual use right and how many broken hearts do we have of young girls who are taught that unless they perform unless they do certain things they have no value this is the peer pressure of this modern age right our age some of us who are in the gen X or older was maybe drugs maybe you know doing something rebellious now it's uh you need to prove your whether or not you're you're you know sexually available is where you get your worth from and if you're not doing those things you're not considered worthy so clearly all of these things are happening and then sexual objectification is the reduction of a woman to her body body parts or sexual function in other words we have nothing else to offer and this is again everywhere you see this and it's a form of oppression right to be treated as a body or a collection of body parts we're only valued again for our use of or consumption by others so forget you know our our needs as long as we're you know pleasing other people that's all that matters and this is detrimental to a person's what self concept of humanity so when you have this message enough you start to forget your humanity you forget the other aspects of yourself and this is why we have a crisis that we have with so many young girls in this society um and then the word desire we're going to go back to this point what is being desired really means for women look at the key words in the definitions of desire as an a verb a noun and then desirable as an adjective i just pulled out some of the key words is this what we want for our young girls that this is what we see ourselves that we are craving i don't want to be anybody's craving you know thank you uh that all we are is an object right um and and we're our own only purpose is to bring about lust and desire but this is what that word desire and being desirable in this society means right so then how can we understand and define desire in a healthy way so let's take back and reclaim what what healthy desire is because this is a toxic message and none of us need to ascribe to it of course we don't need to look any further than our team so simple and that's it the presentation's over no i'm kidding but all the answers are in our team the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam reminds us verily Allah does not look at your appearance or wealth but rather he looks at your hearts and actions this was for all men and women stop hyper-focusing on your external it is about the inward inward beautification verily among what i fear most for you are seductive temptations in your stomachs and passions and the misguidance of whims so he's telling us he feared that we would fall into these things where our whims and desires and lusts and the need to be desired by others will preoccupy us and if he feared that for us we should fear that for ourselves verily every religion has a character and the character of islam is modesty love this islam is modesty this isn't the domain of only women this is the domain of every believer very important message women in islam of course we're honored right the natural aspects of us are honored without compromising the essential it is possible to do that what does that mean our bodies and souls like that of men are created primarily to worship their creator and the form of the woman women's physical form in every aspect psychological intellectual physiological biological emotional sexual is positively acknowledged and recognized in islam positively there are other faith traditions that make negative associations with those things and our dean they're all positively acknowledged and recognized women's rights including sexual rights are clearly stipulated and upheld in islam our existence and value in society is indisputable in islam it's not even a question of debate our safety and security from all harm all forms of external harm must be guaranteed at every level of society the objective of every of every man and woman in islam is the same to worship their creator and live righteously in obedience to Allah both men and women in islam are taught to struggle against their lower self the nefs that part of us that pulls us into desire right to suppress ideas impulses and thoughts that lead to illicit desires and actions both of us are told to control that part of us right both male and female sexuality and sexual desire is viewed as natural healthy and something to be enjoyed when explored within the boundaries of a lawful marriage between a husband and wife and both men and women in islam must guard their chastity and live according to the guidelines of islam which strictly emphasizes modesty in word action dress and behavior for all this is so beautiful did you know that there is a verse in the Quran that was revealed Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has not forgotten us he never has but this is so beautiful right that he's defending a single woman from the inappropriate gays of men through this verse right this is chapter 15 verse 24 we surely know who comes first among you and we surely know who comes last so according to ibn abbas he said that a woman was so beautiful she would come to the masjid she prayed behind the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam she was very beautiful everybody acknowledged her beauty some men because they had what taqwa they had that fear of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala they would come and they would go to the first row so they wouldn't be uh you know look at her others however would come so that they could be in the last row why so that they would they would go into sejda what would they do they would peek through can you imagine i'm sure we've all we all those of us who have children we've seen our our children sejda right where it's not the the forehead it's the top of the head can you imagine grown men on the top of their head trying to get a peek at a sister because she's so beautiful and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala revealed this ayah to defend her so we should all think about this that this he's telling us right he's obviously teaching the men here but also for us as women that we shouldn't seek to be desired that way by anybody we shouldn't seek other than our spouses obviously but we shouldn't seek that to be looked at right in that way which is what the society tells us to do be beautiful go out there put yourself out there if you got it flaunted we need to reject that no if you have it protect it not if you got it flaunted please exactly exactly mashallah now because and i have to credit us at the fact that she told me you got to put something in about this because you know you're going to get some pushback of course beautification in islam is important it's not to say we completely leave that and let ourselves go no it's highly encouraged in islam as a practice of what first and foremost gratitude to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for one's blessings because the body is a blessing it is a blessing to have health and well-being and so you take care of it right maintaining cleanliness and hygiene and then following the prophetic example so here all these hadith the prophet says them said verily Allah is beautiful and he loves beauty he loves the loftiest of affairs and disapproves of pettiness as Dr. Rani beautifully reminded us let go of the pettiness Allah does not love the pettiness right the prophet said them said that no one with an ounce of arrogance in his heart went to paradise now in seeking to understand remember mashallah the sahaba were always you know they wanted clarity they asked about what what arrogance means and they said oh prophet of Allah what if a person likes to dress well okay so for those who are into fashion don't misread what i'm talking about he answered that question again Allah is beautiful and he loves beauty arrogance is rejecting truth and looking down on people so when you put on your nice outfit and your nice clothes don't get ahead of yourself and start to think of yourself as better than anyone if Allah's giving you jamaal you have beauty you have clear skin don't look down on people who have unclear skin right this is the message that whatever you know blessing you've been given see it as a gift from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala honor it but also don't you know see yourself above anyone because he could take it from you just as quickly as he gave it to you and so that's what we when we mention these things but of course we can dress nice and we can we should look presentable right and then cleanliness we should all be aware of these things we should teach our children from a young age to be mindful of keeping themselves clean and pure practicing good hygiene making sure that all of the areas that need to be taken care of before they come into public spaces are taken care of right so checking their smells i i have two boys one of them is in hitting the teenage years as soon as he steps out the door my question you can ask him is did you put deodorant did you put you know some what we call hushboo and for the Urdu speakers right which is like a perfume or a cologne or something because i don't want them to i want them to follow the sunnah and i don't want them to offend people we should teach us and i can't tell you as someone who does coming of age talks i've had multiple requests from parents and teachers alike to say please address this with the teens because we're failing our kids we don't let them we're not doing a good job of this it's a very serious problem i don't know why but some of our our youth are just not really taking care of their cleanliness so we have to be on top of them about these things to follow the sunnah and the Prophet s.a.w said the people of paradise will enter paradise with smooth and hairless skin so no more waxing and shaving ladies we've got a lot of things to look forward to inshallah natural kohal don't go get tattoos and all that don't do that we'll get the natural kohal in our eyes in janah inshallah that will be that ripe age of 30 or 33 years of age inshallah and then the last one here um loveless right this is from ibn abbas he said verily i love to beautify myself for my wife just as i love for her to beautify herself for me due to the saying of Allah Almighty they have rights similar to those over them beautiful balance of our deen both are responsible to take care of one another this is not just the burden of women to to kill ourselves trying to look beautiful for our spouses while they let themselves go our our you know we need to go back to this right and then of course real beautiful beautification is sourced from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and directed inwardly right Allah says surely we have created the human being in the finest stature and the Prophet s.a.w said this is his dua oh Allah make what is within me better than my outward appearance and make my outward appearance righteous oh Allah i ask you for the righteousness of what you give to the people of property family and children without being misguided or misguiding others so that was his dua it should be our dua that we want our inward beauty to be better than whatever outward beauty we have right and he also said Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala loves to see the effects of his grace upon his servant sallallahu alaihi wa sallam he loves to see that when he's given us blessings that we show them but we show them with what with refinement dignity gratitude we don't show them with boasting and arrogance we don't mimic what we see in this toxic culture that pits women against women where you see a woman entering a space and she just all her brand names are out and she thinks she's above everyone else we don't do that if you have blessings of course you can share them show them but do it with them that mindset that this is my way of showing gratitude to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala not arrogating myself and presenting myself to people the provisionalism said gentleness is not in something except that it adorns it so that's an adornment that we need to all know to be gentle to be soft to be kind in our words in our actions that's real beautification right no amount of lip filler is going to you know make your lips beautiful if you have a toxic tongue right you can go and inject all you want get all the botox you want but if you have you know these character flaws that's what we need to work on and then ibn al qayyim may Allah be pleased with him said and it is enough to realize Allah's beauty when we know that every internal and external beauty in this life and the next are created by him so what of the beauty of their creator that's the beauty that we should seek here's some ayats for you if you wanted to screenshot these are but these are all reminders for all of us and is in and of his signs is that he created for you from yourselves mates that you may find tranquility in them and he plays between you affection and mercy indeed in that are signs of the people who give thoughts so this is how we as women should again see ourselves right and in this ayah Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala he's honored us in ways that i think some of us may not have yet realized but inshallah may Allah open our eyes to the fact that he mentions us in this way right separates us from the men so that aim i go back to that um you know the the now their mission that they wanted to bring forth the or remind people of the humanity of women well here what's more uh approved than this right where i lost Prada the Lord the heaven of the heavens in the universe is telling us right who we are and what we should aspire to so i love this ayah but even um leslie hazelton she acknowledged that this is really remarkable in that comparing it with the bible she said the bible exclusively addresses men right using the second and third person masculine whereas the Quran here Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is addressing women directly so that is him elevating us that is him honoring us and this is again what we should aspire to so in summary sisters and i'm done don't be seduced by the sinister and evil propaganda of western culture and media that mean manipulates girls and women to ascribe to a distorted dehumanized and destructive understanding of themselves women in some are honored for their entire being and not devalued for any part of our creation or their creation by overemphasizing beauty beautification and sexuality women may inadvertently deny their more essential purpose the beautification of the soul developing beautiful character and striving for the pleasure of Allah and that worldly delights and we must learn to nurture all of the gifts and blessings right our intellects relationships talents skills interest hobbies that Allah has given in order to find true fulfillment not just focusing on the outward so i'll leave you with this last slide remember if anything's missing in your life look around in the environment and make those changes and then inshallah you will come to bloom because Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has given us all of the means to do so it's in our hands to change what needs to be changed inshallah