 I would like to welcome you to our new weekly show, the Thursday night talk and for this night's program we have a discussion on the topic of racism and joining me to discuss the issue of racism within our communities. I have an elite panel of guests joining me tonight. From our guests on my far left hand side we have Haji Ghulam Damji who is an active member of the Haideri community in South London. He's been previously the chairman of Haideri Sports Association and is currently part of the very important burial committee. To my immediate left we have Mr Ahmed Al-Qadimi who is a student of law himself. He has been working in the field of PR for a number of Shia organizations and has also been in the position of advisory positions for a number of Shia charities in and around London. On my right hand side we have the very well known Haji Abu Shabaj. He's a very active member within the Shia community, a known poet, lover of Ahlu al-Bait, has got tons of backgrounds when it comes to charity work and an avid sportsman within our community. To my far right we're also honored to be, we're honored to have the presence of sister Rebecca Marston, the director of online Shia studies and the lead lecturer and researcher in Shia studies who is also specialized in the history of esoteric knowledge. To my esteemed guests, Salam alaikum warahmatullahi and welcome to the show Thursday night talk. Jumping right into the topic in regards to racism within the Shia community specifically speaking and before we delve into this conversation, as has been said as a precedent by our scholars particularly when you come and you study ilmul mantik and in logic whenever any issue or any concept is discussed the first step is defining that concept just so that we have the parameters of the debate and the conversation set out. Having said this there are two definitions that we are going to try and work around one which is the more legalistic definition set to us by international bodies such as the United Nations and because we are shia etna ashari and the belief that the word of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is a word that encompasses goodness for all mankind inshallah we shall try and derive the Quranic definition of racism as well. Having said this to start out from the very beginning you will note for reference over here Surah al-Rum verse number 22 Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says and it is from amongst his signs the plural ha over here returns back to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala wa min ayatihi from the signs of Allah that he has created the earth and the heavens and he has created you with different tongues different mother tongues different languages and even more explicitly the Quran goes on to say and we have created you different colors different races different ethnicities indeed within the diversity of our races and our ethnicities there is the grand sign of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala I'm sure as we will engage with sister Rebecca very shortly whenever the word ayat is used within the Quran ayat of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala this is indicating towards one of those aspects through which not only the existence of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala can be asserted but the tawheed of Allah but it would be fair to say that this issue of how we understand and how we deal with racism is greatly tied to our understanding of existence of Allah and tawheed if I put this out over here for the panel um Haji Ahmad would you be would you enlighten us on legal definition of what racism is from you know international bodies of law for example um racism always is associated with discrimination um post uh second world war when people um started to uh discriminate against certain group of individuals especially if we you know put that between a bracket especially in the united states for example they had in a one um building they had two different bathrooms colored and white and so on and um united nation comes and puts um some declaration for all countries to to sign up to and in the united nation declaration on human rights which is after the second world war they created we've got minimum two articles talking about race uh language gender they say skin color religion and so on do they have a specific definition of what racism is per se um you see let me let me read you from um article two of the uh united nation declaration on human rights but it says everyone is entitled to all rights and freedom without discrimination based on race gender culture and so on and also article 16 what it says man and woman is this uh it's about marriage again man and woman when they uh reach a certain age for example full age without any limitation due to again race discrimination nationality religion and so on can get married sure and found the family so in essence discrimination based on race is forbidden of course the universal declaration of human rights which is established in 1948 tell you um if i was just to put you on hold over here and return back to our panelists within the guest sister rebecca anything that comes into mind in regards to the issue of you know anti-discriminatory rules or regulations within our sheer school of teachings that would match the level of what is stated by the universal declaration of human rights well we can see just from the practices of that halbate alayhum salam particularly with regard to marriage as well that uh there was not an issue of uh discriminating against people based upon their racial background i mean even as we know there are ahadith from the holy prophet peace be upon his holy progeny where you know he very very famously says there is no difference between the black and the red so to speak except you know in piety so you know you are only differentiated in this according to your but then we can see with regard to as an example the women that moms married they married from a wide range of backgrounds so ethnically different yeah the predominant arabs and the arab tribes within hajans they could have married noble arab women but instead when you look at uh you know when you look at um their biographies and any children they had you will see that a lot of well you know many of the imams the the women are not identified but they're called um walad or else they're known to have come from say north africa or al nuba as an example right so um and and of course they were women who were usually employed in the house so they were not from the noble arab families of makkah and you would think that the imams being from the lineage of manihashim carrying the lineage of rasool Allah would only marry from prestigious arab tribes or arab families that are there within the vicinity in fact if memory serves me right um perhaps from the seventh or eighth imam onwards you will find that they married women who are from predominantly from north africa um we have within a hadith for example as well of the books of history that the eleventh imam himself saida narjis aleyha salam was from rome as well um for this idea of engaging within the institution of marriage from different ethnicities different races definitely shows um the example in terms of this is the manhaj them being models of emulation for us that when they have married into different cultures islam in itself or teachings of ahlul bait specifically have a zero tolerance level when it comes to racism or that race should not even be that barrier even when it comes to marriage having said that i think even you know the the the saying of amir al-mu'mineen aley salam that a person or a man is either your brother in faith or your brother in humanity these are statements that need to be seen that are emanating from a head of state amir al-mu'mineen aley salam in addition to being divinely chosen imam by allah azawajal a head of state and when a head of state utters a statement such as a person in this reji or in this domain within this islamic empire within this islamic nation if you say is your brother in faith or your brother regardless he's either your brother in faith or in humanity it just cuts out the root of any sort of discrimination i would actually come forward and say be bold enough to say that tashayu and shiaism should be proud in that we have legislature which which which goes ahead and condemns racism and actually predates 1948 in fact in you know a very brief research that i was doing there was something very interesting that i came across over here and this is the uk law on racism and it was only until 1965 that the race relation act was actually as the first piece of legislation within the united kingdom to address racial discrimination this is just as recent as 1965 and then further research i found out from the institute of race relations that in the year 2013 and 2014 there were 130 reported racial incidents per day in england and wales now my question over here is directed to two of my guests um haji gulam damji and to haji abu shabazz i mean yourselves living here in the uk for quite a bit of time um outside of the shia world or maybe even within the shia world would you say that you have been at some point at your time over here in the uk ever been a victim of racism in your past and experiences yes i came over at a very young age from africa uh studied here uh educated here at that time in the 80s uh there was a lot of racism at that time as well um you know we've been subjected while i've been subjected to racism within school uh in college etc um people of the boat or whatever it was um more probably stronger words than that but uh you know to race especially i mean my origin is from from india but obviously um you know if you were brown then you were assumed to be from pakistan right um so those were always barriers and hurdles that we had to face growing up and was this predominant behavior or isolated cases you would say was this the predominant yeah predominant it was quite right yeah it's quite right at that time within the 80s would you agree abu shabazz um yeah so one of the things i'd like to say firstly is um i'd have to give great credit to british society yeah um i was born in this country i've been brought up from a young age in this country so the first 20 years of my life there was a high level of racism right uh across all angles um the i used to go football matches from a kid right the word packy was something that i accepted if i got to a football match today anyone uses that word they'll get a banning order they won't be allowed to come watch again the football from not mistaken within the champions league as well they have the anti-racism they do campaigns that actually happen on champions league well what i'd like to say is that in british society um they have generally stamped out the problem they've worked very well to integrate people um there's a lot less racism racism will always exist we must look at racism from a different aspect there's religion and the saying you said about imam aliyah aslam um where he turns around and says uh um if you are not my brother in religion you are my equal in humanity being equal in humanity means whether you are from a different religion different color you look whatever you are my equal you're not lower than me but you're not higher than me the word race racism comes from the word race race comes from a 16th century french word uh the word is actually raza and it actually means to it means creed or breed okay so what happens with racism we may look at racism in british society and say okay let's talk about you know how people were racist towards black people people were racist towards asian people people are racist towards islam you have islamophobia you have sheer phobia etc so and so forth let's go back a little bit and let's let's look at our own societies um for example if you're from the west indies um you're both of one color you both look the same but you're a small island or a big island if you're from india you're poor or rich this is also a form of prejudice racism isn't only about the color of your skin it's the society you belong to where you look down on someone as lower than you because of a difference and because of your belonging of course so if you if you i'm sure i know the iraqis have racism with them north and south um arabs have racism between dark and light um kajas a community that my mother comes from have racism between whether you're an indian kodja or african kodja if you're an african kodja whether you're from dar eslam or from nerobi or from kampala and it goes right down because as human beings we are sick in our nature um so whether you're a white racist from the idea or whether you're that kodja who turns around says well i'm a african kodja and he's an indian kodja or you're that iraq you says well i'm from south iraq and he's from north iraq um racism exists in human mentality what do you think is this lead factor what creates this innate feeling within me that i need to demonstrate superiority it's egoism for example okay it's it's it's it's a complex number one it's that i'm better than somebody else that comes from your own egoism one of the things about imam alayhi waslam and why he could live with that saying he had no ego right we have ego so as a human being i'm egoistic in the sense that i'm better than you my community is better than you we're more organized than you we're better than you um if you're white all you are slaves and you know we tend to believe that we're better than the person standing in front of us sure and this is a problem we have because of a lack of spirituality because if we're spiritual then we see each one and everything is equal uh the famous hadith about imam jafra sadiq al-aslam where there was only two human beings and the rest are animals nobody's mentioned whether the human beings were black white brown gray short tall yes so this is to do with spirituality so if you look from a spiritual sense everybody's equal there is no better or worse if you look from our i would say uh animality sense you know you're the king of the jungle you're the lion because you come from a better society right so this is your animality within you which sees you as better than other people and this is where racism breeds from and it's in all societies i don't think we can talk about it in white british society only um i think within ourselves we're probably because we're the minority we won't be seen as racist but we're probably more racist than them sure um sister rebecca within this context so what we're able to gather is that you know the british society at a certain time was predominantly racist as well and then we have a shia community that's trying to operate within this wider community as well the fact that we have shia centers um that are probably constructed built run based on ethnic divides um you've got the iraqi husseinia for example um you've got you know the hodja centers you've got the pakistani centers you've got the lebanese you've got the iranians i mean the fact that our our religious you know as abu shabazz has perhaps pointed out that one of the lead reasons being lack of spirituality as a cause of uh tendency to act in a racist manner do you think that us constructing building our husseinias religious centers for example along ethnic divides um does this somehow contribute or have there within your big your your time for example within serving the shia communities have you seen any uh upfront cases of racism in your experience yeah um i mean i think obviously people want to gather together where they are sharing a similar culture and language and even food uh so they want to feel that familiarity um and as i which is possibly acceptable to a great extent yeah i mean as i've heard uh from people who migrated here as i've heard um from people who migrated here uh in the 70s and 80s when the shia community was very small everybody used to go to one husseinia and then the more people came in from different countries then it started to split apart the community started to split apart into different centers uh so obviously as a convert i tend to go to or have gone to all different centers i don't stick to just one center um but i would say that uh i mean people might think as well because i'm european that that i might be always treated very favorably but a lot of european or white converts are not always actually treated that favorably um by by um you know other muslims um and and a particular example um that you would like to outline maybe in terms of us i think it's important to be able to point out certain cases to see does it qualify as racism and if it does um you know what practical solutions need to be implemented by heads of communities or people who are active within the general community to ensure that future generations of this behavior is not repetitive i mean i well i have uh i i have i know that for example with regard to marriage um even white converts have a difficult time marrying into a community so um you know as a white convert you will be obviously maybe praised and martial law because you've come from uh european background europeans think they are superior to the rest of the world but you've kind of turned your back on all of that and you've converted to islam and well done but that's kind of where it stops so whether your male or female european converts um it stops but we don't really want you in our family you know so um and i and i've spoken to you know male european converts and female converts as well right so so it's the same it makes it it makes it very difficult to find a suitable partner i don't know whether that's because um among communities themselves they are equally i mean they're also discriminating against each other as well another thing is that there is uh uh there's definitely seems to be a kind of racial pecking order so uh i mean you know i know uh a convert who's uh well she was from a sunni family she's become shia um the family is bangladeshi right and um so she doesn't fit in anywhere um she doesn't fit in with pakistani shia doesn't everybody looks down on her yeah everybody just doesn't fit inside that subcontinent she's at the very bottom understood so there's this kind of racial hierarchy so uh alhamdulillah you know i got married to someone from uh indian uh background but when i did people were saying to me india i said but i thought you might marry like a iranian or an arab yeah this is a mental perceptions within people in the community i understand definitely perhaps one would be able to argue on the point of marriage that more than racism it has to do with compatibility um yes i mean people think that obviously you you you want to you're very uncertain about someone who doesn't know the ways of your of your family or your culture so maybe people are kind of wary uh you have a mother-in-law who wants you to cook a very specific type of dish for example you've got a father-in-law who expects certain tasks from the daughter-in-law so on so forth so culture does play its part to a certain extent yes but i can understand it's a very fine line when a person tries to seek compatibility between individuals families and actually being racist if i just um you know pause on this uh on this conversation for a second and come towards you um haji abu shahab haji ahmed very very lovingly known as haji abu shahab because you've been in PR public relations for sheer organizations you know let me come out and don't mind if i put you right on the spot haji we have hossanias that are established on ethnic divides language is a big issue um if i was to bring any shia person a newly converted shia person who has just embraced the willi of amir of mu'mineen bring him into the center the speeches in arabic um the people who are speaking are all shouting in arabic to make it worse it's even different dialects inside of arabic and you know the person is just absolutely feeling out of place when we have issues whether it's in regards to marriage where it's in regards to new people who are embracing the willi of amir al mu'mineen feeling like they don't fit in people who are within the willi of amir al mu'mineen can't fit in center that's running just arabic programs center that's just running for example uldu programs i'll come to you haji gulam very shortly on this haji what's your opinion on this you've you've worked in the field of PR um let's step back a bit um before we see what the converse or a feel about marriage and others and integration within the certain let's say Arab societies or communities even just also on a program basis yes um i think we have to see we have to first educate ourselves as you rightly mentioned and other guests mentioned that there's no difference between this person and that person that's one thing and one the in theory yes i mean yes of course yeah and when you have a guest a convert comes in to this center to any other center the best i think the best thing to say is to educate both sides to for the convert to say this community is the manner the way they talk the way they discuss it or the way they accept the guest is in this way and of course for the community to explain people from different countries different background european or wherever converted and then they need to be welcomed into the society so both groups should be educated by each other um if they have knowledge about their different people different circumstances different lifestyles especially for people newly come to part of would accept each other as a matter of acceptance to educate others about others and also uh going back to that uh a regal or in in arabic there's no difference between uh and i think for when i dealt with these issues one person comes in here i'll try to explain how we do things in the center for example with regard to accepting guests with regard to let's say eating with regard to programs with regard to marriage so many other things when the person comes in is it's not strange for him because he knows it already or they know it already and on the other hand our community just it's a matter of education matter of education who takes the owners who take ha you're in pr what's the strategy that i put forward where we have free flow of movement and intermingling even i don't think personally speaking i don't think this is an issue with people who have newly embraced the willi of amir al muminine uh against those who are already born inside of the faith because within the shears themselves if you were to gather you know you were to do a statistical research and get a sample group of people from the shears within london and ask this one who rake frequently visits center a how many times throughout a year have you ever gone and visited center b c o d and then do the same for the different centers that we have inside of northwest london or south london for example and you know many times um i'll say this with all humbleness that i've served as resident alim in two in two different our community centers and you see there is this um sentiment of absolute loyalty for example where you could have two husseinias within do you know what a span of maybe half a kilometer two kilometers apart from each other but no one's visited or very few people have sent visited the other center they've lived their their whole lives but they've never really gone to the imam aga across why because this one's a paki this one's a koja this one's this this one's that what PR strategy um haji haji gulam damji what's your take on this well we've touched on several things here and and the main topic that comes out of it is culturalism our culture culture is what is actually dividing us from following the islamic path because in islam as you said you read the ayat out we've made you in creed cultures different so that you may mingle right now the practice is not quite there uh it's quite evident that the practice is not there because we have different imam aga different husseinias who commemorate in different ways who celebrate in different ways okay one thing we haven't touched on is sister rebecca mentioned the european element of converting or reverting whichever it may be but we haven't talked about converts or reverts who who are black who've come to our religion of course um this is not disrespect to anybody but i can only give you my perspective of what racism feels like to me as a brown person i could never you know um stand here and say what a black person feels like it would be nice to have somebody perhaps on the panel who could give their point of view 100 percent and this was one of our goals as well however unfortunately due to unforeseen circumstances there were a number of cancellations but um definitely i mean the the african brothers and sisters um haven't added i would fairly say an added hurdle to kind of overcome i think we have a question from the audience as well um minhal into the dearest respected panel um i think one of the main questions is because the prophet Muhammad peace be upon him and his family is seen as the exemplar for all muslims all 1.6 billion muslims around the world um the real question is how did he deal with racism as in we see according to a bbc summary um and some islamic reference books we see that um that the prophet and the imams during their times didn't really deal with racism you know there were there were slaves still about um and this sometimes included race so can the respected panel clarification in that islam and the rasulullah or rasulullah and the ahlul bait did did do or did not do so they did not because you know there was slavery there there were still slaves at that time right and uh this included the race and can can you guys elaborate on how rasulullah and the imams definitely will address your question um with quite a bit of detail and get back to hajj gulam as well but inshallah all this after a short break ahsan tomb salaamu alaikum wa rahmatullah respected viewers and guests within our live audience welcome back to the thursday night's talk and uh indeed quite a bit of an interesting discussion we've had with our esteemed guests within the panel in regards to racism current day acts of racism within our communities and um there's a number of things that we've touched over here one of them being which i seem to see as root causes over here lack of spirituality which was pointed out by haji abu shabazz earlier on on the show and it seems that our affiliation with our culture and drawing the line between what is acceptable as holding on to cultural practices and turning that into something that leads to discriminatory behavior towards others within within the fold of tashayu these are the points that we have been coming towards over here for the break a very interesting question by um uh one of the brothers within the guests that apparently according to a bbc documentary is that islam didn't do enough the holy prophet of islam didn't do enough in order to fight racism and one of the evidence that is cited is that slavery um was a rampant practice during the islamic times um i've definitely got a word to say over here word or two with our panelists anyone like to jump in and address the question yeah um i disagree with that um the biggest example the earliest example and the biggest example we can we can give you is that of hasid willow in terms of reciting the azan his pronunciation because he was a black man his pronunciation wasn't as it should be in arabic um obviously they said he shouldn't recite the azan you know the story i didn't have to go into that one so that's the biggest example i just add to that sorry just to add to that point the azan or giving the azan reciting the azan is a very very prestigious position and even when you're looking to the books of fika when you return back to the older books of fika what is at the top of my mind shall i lay islam by mohakkika hilli uh rahmatullah aley you will see that even the adab and the akhlaq of a muaddin the muaddin the person who recites the azan is supposed to have a certain number or certain type of he's supposed to possess certain type of characteristics within him that shows the elevation of his soul and his spirituality you find that rasulullah has given this prestigious position that perhaps a number of people were longing for from amongst the ansar or the muhadrin the ashab of rasulullah who would have loved to be in that limelight it's a public position by the way being a muaddin you're in the limelight um three times a day three adhan for five salat that are stipulated and on the occasion when the salat was separated five different adhan's nevertheless you are in the public light and it's it it's a massive figure you find that rasulullah didn't give this to any of the tribes is given it to an abyssinian slave who was then freed and there is enough historical evidence just to show bain al-kawsain to put this between the brackets that actually the liberation of said malal was done through the wealth of say the khadija umul mu'minina salamullahi aleyha okay abu shahab i just wanted to give an example to brother minhal you know islam satan gradually it wasn't from day one rasulullah sallallahu alayhi wa alayhi comes and say the slaves are free for example he was fighting the kufar so few problems from problems and defense yeah of course yeah yeah and educating i'll always go back to this what educating that's one hundred percent the other things that two examples i want to give you one is about imam sajja salamullahi imam sajja all i all ms but in this example imam sajja aley salam used to buy these slaves from the market and free them say you're free hurray la la go fi sabil allah but the beautiful thing is that person that is slave which freed said i want to stay with you the imam masum sallallahu alayhi and then i stayed with imam for years and years and years that's one example and the other one is jone in karbala is one of the companion of imam hussein aley salam he was a sweat he was black he comes to imam and say my my color is a sweat black and it's like i say my my riha is netting or i'm so very bad kind of a smell okay i want to stay with you imam hussein aley salam until my blood is mixed with your blood a sweat and instead with the imam and then what we do imam sadaq aley salam teaches us where so when he stands someone says yeah imam how do i go for zear to this uh a shohada say stand and then say be abi entum wa ummi that is my father and mother be sacrifice for you jone one of them is jone aswet we're also um um miqdad uh and umar abanyasar we're also african so um you know out of uh the four prominent lovers of ahlulbayt lovers of amir mu'mineen aley salam um two of them were and miqdad was again a very well-known prominent horseman as well very skilled horseman another issue is that um we can see what amir mu'mineen aley salam did when he finally got those four years as um as caliph after the first three hulafa because it was umar abal khattab who had tried to promote arab superiority um and you know by by giving more uh higher stipends to arabs than to non-arabs and had made moves to prevent uh non-arabs from coming into arabia for too long he put restrictions on non-arabs coming into trade yeah imam aley salam when he um became caliph one of the first things he did was to equalize the stipends of the soldiers who were working for the state and of course that did not make the members of the arab tribes happy and that's one of the reasons why they didn't give him a lot of support against ma'awiya you know when it came to the battle of of syfine um so so we can see through his economic means he I mean he worked to correct a lot of what the previous caliph had brought in arguably what you could say is just to add to the sport sister abacad that this is now amir mu'mineen um he's been the imam whether the people have accepted him or not obviously just now that that dahila khilafa is given to him when he implements strategies such as this we can safely assume that this is legislation being passed so the islamic government or the ruling government of the time is passing down legislation to eliminate racism from a governmental perspective any sort of discrimination or prejudice based on race based on ethnicity for example based on political affiliation because amir mu'mineen's government yes he was leading the government from kufa but a number of people were not even supporters of the willy of amir mu'mineen a lot of them had their loyalties towards um towards ma'awiya a lot of them had othmani what is known within the books they had othmani affiliations despite that amir mu'mineen as you rightly says gives or makes legislation which is understood in today's language puts out legislation that regardless of your political regardless of your ethnic affinities the stipend from the government is going to be one yeah and it's surprising that for policies such as these he ends up becoming a martyr yes subhanallah abu shabazz um slavery was solid point sister slavery was more a problem of privatized nations when we say the word slavery the first thing if i said to you name a creed or people that were slaves everyone stay africa whether you're from white society asian society arab society this is unfortunate because they were privatized people people can make documentaries and talk about islam but we must remember 16 17 18th century what happened to black people in australia by educated what we consider the educated white civilization australia europe and america they were brought over as slaves 14 15 centuries after islam islam had freed these people had given them where where she mentioned and uh brother gulam mentioned hasith bilal not only was he given the um the the high accolade or reciting there's on when the muslims regain mecca he was told to climb on top of the kaba and give the first call to prayer as the first calling to prayer in the city of mecca so we are hadery and i think even in all our centers now we can show there is a fight against any form of cultural racism or any form of racism because we have uh speakers from uh african backgrounds who say on our member who lead our prayers we pray behind a black man my question of course even in birmingham we have a question within a question um active steps that the husseinia or the imambarga that you attend to what active steps would you say you're just proud of as a center this is the biggest proof that your center in particular is not we were the first ethnic races first center who made a full decision to have all our lectures in english so that everybody who came to our community could understand what was being said rather than it staying in our cultural language of urdu so we changed what maybe 20 years ago everything's been in english from that day and my mind speakers who are not from the subcontinent for each other and that's allowed us to have speakers from different areas as well we have arab speakers we have african speakers so you know we've had these sort of things my bigger question is i've always learned to i've always learned from my elders or people that are above us i went through shia theology etc etc and i'd like to ask you this shake has there ever been a black ayatollah because i don't believe that's either a statement of saying black people are not good enough to be ayatollahs because they're thick and they'll understand thick or there is racism within the marja system and there has been for a long long time i don't why isn't there a black i went to Saudi Arabia i saw a community of black people who originate from the holy fourth imam and man do they have knowledge i didn't understand what they were saying but the person who turned around and told me what they were saying was on a high level but i asked one of them how comes you haven't had a black marja haven't someone from your family ever become a marja and i just pointed to the color of his skin very um a point that is absolutely sharp sharp as an arrow let me answer this because we have a question within a question and we're in a question running so we just try to tie these loops up at the moment um returning back to the question before i get back to abu shabazz on this issue um when it comes particularly to slavery i would highly contest the fact that even the statement which is made that islam never did anything to abolish slavery in fact when you're looking back at the time of rasulullah the the core akham sharai and compass and revolve around abolishing slavery how when you refer back to the books of fika you come and you look at a number of the akham when it comes to the kitab al ibadat when it comes to kafara at different number types number of different sets of kafara within different categories some of them are based on preference some of them are based on if this is not possible then you should do this whether it is kafara for example for purposely breaking a fast at the top of my head during shahro rama dan or going or breaking another for example or the kafara for a yamin for example you find that the manner to rectify this is what one of the first options that is given to you whether it's on the basis of option or obligation is another thing but you will find one of the solutions there is what atkor rakaba to free a slave within the core of sharia ibadah you have transgressed against your lord the first way to fix this is to try and abolish slavery you have you have committed a sin against Allah azza wa jal you have violated the right of the creator of the universe where he tells you you want to fix relationships with me the first thing you need to do is go and abolish but at the thawab when you come and you have a look at thawab that is mentioned within the hadith the thawab of liberating a slave thawab of liberating a slave the thawab is there for what this is to show you that there is legislation in place within islam that if you want to ascend within the ranks of spirituality then go and free the slave this is what if you want proximity towards Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala you got to abolish that slavery yes the Rasulullah and within the daydana of islam is that abolishing slavery was not implemented by force just like any other aspect in religion la ikraha fideen there was a greater hikmah because it's not only abolishing slave trade but it's about the victims of slavery how they are now going to be integrated within wider society and which is why you have the nautical quran imam sajjad alaihi salam the seerah of imam sajjad is a reflection of the teachings of the quran as per the school of ahlul bayt the quran is the example there the the personification of the values within the quran when imam sajjad year in year out liberates a hundred slaves this shows you that the vocal quran is taking a stance against slavery so where does the idea come that islam didn't do against uh didn't do anything against slavery something that was highly contestable i think we have a second question from the crowd before i come back to haji abu shabazz yes hi uh salam aleikum sorry just from what abu shabazz was saying um i've been working in the community for more than 10 years and um i completely agree with abu shabazz there is um a great deal of systematic racism and there's nothing that you panellists could say to sugarcoat it yes there is no racism racism in islam is not acceptable and it has no place but regardless of what you say or how you say it we're racist the shia community are incredibly racist i've worked for the stanmore community i've worked for hydrae i've worked for multiple broad broadcasting stations you know the pakistani community i mean i find it quite incredible that you know people stand up here sit here and they say oh no no you know hydrae like or stanmore or whatever centre there is although there is no racism there's systematic racism not only within your schools but within your mosques and your communities and i'm just wondering um as panellists representing those communities what are you doing about it perfect before we answer this question and we're getting into a loop where we have questions within questions piling up let me get back over here to haji abu shabazz's question in regards to marjahia um you know the claim that is put forward is that because we have not had an african marja for example that means there is or a black arab marja for example that means that there is racism within the institution of marjahia is this a claim that can be attested with evidence or not what i can say to you is this that and what i can safely say for you within hausa zainabiya because these are the environment with which i've been exposed to so it would be unfair and um it would be speculation if i was to speak about a greater hausa setting which i've not been a part of within hausa zainabiya and within the hausa ilmiya naja fil ashraf for example you will find that within these scholarly institutes the only merit that you possess is your academic strength so the the the depth of research your aptitude when it comes to books of principles of jurisprudence your ability to research your ability to understand and analyze hadith this is the grounds of respect within hausa ilmiya and within naja fil ashraf and what used to be of hausa zainabiya back then you will find that anybody of any color if he's able to go there and establish his strength and i'm not saying that perhaps african people haven't done this but what we need to do is that if we are going to identify or we're going to come forward and put a claim that there is racism against black scholars that is preventing them from being declared marajah taqlid now what we need to do is we need to have historical evidence where a black aleem for example is brought forward we need to see where are his researchers what were his talks where did he reach in regards to the level of it's tihad and why was he denied for example a license of it's tihad all well and good sheik but as a layman right um let's go back 20 years was an Arab footballer no was an Arab well no footballer no no there's loads not every community produces gems and pearls sure if you're going to sit here and say to me no black man has reached that level then that is sugarcoating it what i'm saying is that we need research and we need evidence well the problem is if you went evidence is based on research if we went to these institutions for example somebody comes and says to you we haven't had the marajah taqlid from kermanshaa no does that mean that the hausa elmiya is racist against kermanshaa no but i think the township or the city of kermanshaa i think a small town compared to a whole race okay africa contains so many countries blacks exist in arabia in a high level how many of them have gone and spent time in hausa to the level to distinguish the heart how many of those have been invited or accepted accepted an invitation is two big different things but because we can't have a big movement shake we can't sit here and say okay not black man has reached that level i'm sorry i'm not saying that either well i think we need to have evidence in the sector of america some of the best university lecturers come from those backgrounds black people are very intelligent my friends my friend's father is a head judge um you know one of my friend's father is written books on law another one he's a one of the top consultants okay they are intelligent there is no way that within the society of uh islam shia jurisprudence you know no black guys come forward who's had the ability to be some form of racism we can't just sugarcoat and say well you know what no one's been at that level it's all like a there is racism there's racism within our hausa institutions you're a shake you may not want to say this you know in a position to bark and tell you i've been when syria was there i've seen the racism towards black people asary people non- iranian people not pakistani or pakistani people even within hausa systems back in syria you at the pakistani hausa and iranian hausa right look if we're going to deal with racism with shia islam it's got to start up there it's from our teachings our teachings come from those who give us our laws and regulations of course so when you say racism within the hausa again over here what you're saying is that you're making out a blatant claim that there is discrimination absolutely and research being shunned absolutely because of color and there's circumstantial evidence to back this as well well the fact is that if you go to any hausa i'm asking circumstantial evidence per case yes or no before we move on i'm in no position to go and do research because i'll probably get shot but anyone who's come forward to you for example from from the african community i told you i told you i went to medina um there is and you can verify this there is a black community i forgot what they go by uh who are actually descendants of the holy fourth imam right they are highly educated they're very um pious they're very spiritual people um they've said it to me themselves they just point it to the color of their skin so we have a very interesting turn over here yeah in regards to racism within the highest educational seminaries that are there and we have one case of a person who's come forward can this one person uh who has come and said based on his color he's not been allowed to progress circumstantial evidence that can be shown over here that the hausa ilmia actually bars colored people and discredits their research this is the point that i'm looking for here well circumstantial evidence uh may not be in terms of you know um in writing or whatever in physical but you've got to ask the question are there any alims or marchers that are going to hausers that are from the ethnic you know from uh from the from a black background what you've just mentioned there there's a personality in nigeria who's done some wonderful work there you know for the shia community you know is there any support for him let alone inviting him or whatever right in terms of from our marchers i for my limited knowledge because there is um there is uh politics that is involved as well number of amount of people or the different type of peoples whether they want to be involved in politics want to be apolitical but putting forward the claim that we're not going to support ex-sheikh just because his color is black again looking around those lines abu shahab your take on this yeah what i want to speak about is sorry about the subject just one minute just to go back um after the united nation declaration of human rights right european convention of human rights created and in 1998 uk created enshrined all those laws into a u k law which is called human rights act okay united nation europe in england in particular all are saying about race language color and so on for the last 60 70 years but 400 1400 years ago whatever that's then say this one kid islam one of the brothers i think brother shawas mentioned that we brought the racism into this religion quran says surat al-hujarat okay what is this what created you from male and female and created you into a nation and tribes and so for what to get to know each other and with your all these differences okay what the i is saying in our kramakum and Allah atkakum so the the best way to get all these races and out of the way is okay again again comes from education when someone a pious people group of pious people but do not have racism within them you take ahlul beth alayhum wassalaam of course salamu alayhim 14 infallibles you can't see a dharah racism between them or from them towards their teachings to say yeah and going back to the scholar the questions you're asking i think personally i think it's not about me inviting or how the comes and invites someone from let's say black background comes and say come and study and to go house and become a marja is the person themselves or the group themselves need to have self-esteem and confidence to go up if i think as a black man i've been slaved and for example races against me or discrimination against me and so on i would step back but so i think those communities which are i have been labeled as a step they need to step up okay and other mergers other scholars other communities need to again educate educate about the different communities i think the key is education but i think another point over here is also understanding how the house that structure works um over here i'll answer that too in just a quick second sister rebecca any take on this um racism within she are educational centers seminaries perhaps at the highest level well obviously i mean i haven't gone through hausa so but i can only um mention a few incidences that have been mentioned to me um by um one scholar of african background i mean he said as an example in quam um there were african students there who were say it um but um people in quam couldn't believe that a say it could be african and so they would go up to the african say it and shout at them and tell them to take off their black amama this is where in quam okay uh and also i have been told by um an african sheikh that um in certain uh mosques uh they have been reluctant to have an african alim um speaking in their mosque or you know leading the leading the salah um so uh so there are definitely um you know there's there's there's an attitude we could say uh that that is there but i think it's very difficult maybe to publicize it sure i think it touches a lot of sensitive courts over here and um i'll put this down for the record um if we see that there is any sense of um injustice happening regardless of whether you're a scholar you're not a scholar if you're with ahlulbayt your obligation is to speak absolutely and um i'd like to say that is something that hopefully is a value that i myself or all of us over here are trying to uh are trying to achieve and truth needs to be said now what needs to be done is just so that i can um you know put a pause on this with um uh on the hausa issue and racism within the hausa in itself and we've got a number of questions that are lining up as well but however let me say this um i'm not going to be one who's going to hide and deny or do anything of the short we have examples of prejudice happening within scholarly circles okay number one this is not something that is confined to a hausa ilmia but it also happens just if you hear me out and it's not a justification but this is not an issue which is exclusive to the hausa it happens in other scholarly sectors as well absolutely it happens within hossanias as well certain people will only be invited or will be allowed to be a part of a management so this issue is not just exclusive number one to a hausa ilmia this is number one number two the other thing is that hausa policy hausa mainstream teachings is one thing and the people who are within the system and the actions of the people within the system is a different thing altogether just like the way we say islam is one thing and the action of the muslims is one thing hausa ilmia in regards to what we say naja phil ashraf the legacy left behind by sheikh tussi and the stronghold and the bedrock of marjaiya as an institution upholds the teachings of ahlulbayt and keeps alive the teachings of tashayyo throughout time within that institution if there are individuals who have come up and who have prejudiced and exercised racist behavior towards any other student of ahlulbayt then yes they need to be condemned why because their presence there stains the institution of the hausa so what i would say is the hausa is an institution is pure in its teachings perhaps the actions of the people inside over there if they have these tendencies between or tendencies within them that needs to be addressed it needs to be corrected is not correct one other thing let me just say over here before we move you on when it comes to marjaiya as well many times many times well i don't even need to go and take permission i will say this it might be a very unpopular comment but i don't need to go and take permission from a b c o d to go and announce my ht hard or my marjaiya if a person feels truly that is from the african descent or black person and i'm truly an hd i reached the level of marjaiya well you know what if you've been a victim of if if if hypothetical if you have been a victim of racism within the marjah and they didn't allow your endorse you baba by step them announce your marjaiya inshallah and you will get 50 people 100 people there is a guy in america the guy who translated the first volume of al-kafi i'm sure you're aware of him again someone not accepted but this is the subject i just wanted to bring this out so we become free thinkers now why i would say what i would say real quick because yeah how how did how within british society my first statement i started with was we've moved on we've progressed a great deal how did they come to that they they encourage studies they did internal studies of course they said why isn't there black students at this university why isn't there asian teachers why isn't there this why isn't and they did studies into these things why that question is up at that level someone's got to say why isn't there a black marjaiya why hasn't there been a black marjaiya but that's not for us to go in and study because there's more knowledge than we are it's for them to start off the um uh process right it's gotta go the other way um just quickly uh with regards to the sister the question she asked look in society in communities there is a few people who will um always be racist and they will be terribly racist and i will give you one very simple example i had a white friend um who became a shia muslim and decided to donate money into the box and i heard one of my uncle's turn around and said did you see him that tarik boy he was taking money out um i really got upset because that's really bad way of looking at things but um we as youth and and and we as i grew up as youth um we've had black shia muslims white shia muslims coming to our community since 1992 the first english lectures ever in england um the whole 10 days was done in 1992 in our community and because we forced it because we said these guys they don't understand all do blah blah so on so forth and alhamdulillah it's had changes we can always do our best we will welcome them in fact if you come to hedria alhamdulillah we do have people that come from different backgrounds however i'm sure they face racism but you know what it's like we grew up in this country we just got to deal with it because there's good people and there's bad people and if we're going to pick and say bad people bad people bad people those same bad people they'll be racist to people from their same society who are poor that that is also a form of racism when you prejudice someone against someone because they are money or someone who doesn't have boys for children they'll be like oh he's only got daughters like he's not a man or this is the stupidity it gets to like i said this is a lack of spirituality a black man a white man an asian man a pakistani akhujat nobody's different we're all the same at the end of the day if i need a heart chance plant and my heart comes from someone from a different uh background it's still a heart he still has the same feelings the love he feels exactly the same emotions that i do the tears that fall from his eyes for imam usain al-islam are the same tears that fall from my eyes he's made he's are probably more sincere but unfortunately in society there's nothing we can do as as a panelist here i do my best to welcome and and you know be very very hospitable to anybody from any side of any community and any financial background but there's always going to be the guy next to me who's going to be horrible towards him yes we've had situations in our community which i'm embarrassed to even bring up i'm embarrassed to even talk about but we had a situation where we didn't bury it obviously i can imagine there's a lot to see over here i'm sorry i'm going to cut you short over here and uh as you can see it's it's a very emotional topic and um obviously it's going to touch a lot of uncomfortable nerves the deeper you go into it but this is a topic that needs to be addressed over here um individual effort is very important countering ignorance is important we have a question that's coming down from the guest side as well from the sister side before we take that question let us just take a question because they've been asking for quite some time sorry haji gulam yes please salam aleikum my question is about this issue of um which has been raised by a number of the panelists about spirituality about dakua about education um i've been thinking from another perspective as a psychologist i'm thinking that we are as human beings it's natural for us to judge and judgment is is normal it's very ordinary and it's part of our uh being and it's a part of our trying to understand the other one of the things that we do as human beings is to other people there's difference diversity and when we other people we put them in a different category to ourselves we have in groups and out groups and unfortunately racism and discrimination and prejudice arises from othering people one of the things i've seen in the hossain years in our iman bargas is that the more that we have um togetherness and we come together we understand each other so i from from my perspective i think it's quite natural that we want to come together in our own communities because we know our communities and as human beings we feel quite comfortable with what we know within the safety zone comfort zone exactly we want to stay in our comfort zone we want certainty we want assurance when we see something different we're shaken we don't have assurance we don't know what to expect so first of all to say that this is quite a natural human way of being secondly what i've seen is that there's a general generational issue here i'm actually quite um very very excited and very happy to see how in our different hossain years which have sprung which have mushroomed there are many from all of our communities represented now many many more i feel that the younger generations are very integrated they simulate with each other and they hold many programs together and there is no race um discrimination between them what we've been talking about with the hauser system with some of the um stand more or hey the reparticular management structures these are constitutional issues especially specifically related to some of this um about being who's allowed and who's not allowed in management structures what i'm seeing on the ground is that there is some encouraging movement especially from the younger generations to come together in what sense would you be able to elaborate just one example of what you think the next generation is doing to break this barrier of of racism that is perhaps maybe from the generation before i can give an example from my own um profession so i work as a psychologist and we have a group of psychologists psychotherapists and psychiatrists who come from iranian kohja indian pakistani black all all communities um that we come together because of our profession and it is a you know it's a lovely feeling to be together i go to our ehle sunnah brothers and sisters psychology professional groups and they look at us with envy and say we are a sunnah community very very very very very um diverse and we're dispersed and we're dispersed on national and racial lines i find that we as a smaller community are much more based around our faith-based issue so in our psychology and mental health meetings for example we have a very strong framework and perspective that which we're coming from and that is we lie over me and what we need and following the 14 muslim and based on that we work together very well in our mental health work with the olemah with the community members with the generations so we find that we are looking at each of the it's kind of lifespan if you like child and adolescent uh working age adults seniors we work across the range spectrum that is you're working because we're working from a faith-based perspective we have the same platform and we're coming at it with our mental health expertise or skill or knowledge or training whatever we might want to call it but we're coming together because of our faith understood it's interesting over here and i'll point out a couple of things that your profession brings you together with a number of individuals overcoming the race barrier what allows this diversity the common factor between you guys is your profession and the funny thing is over here our faith is the one that is driving people apart but let me just make one thing um or let me say one thing as a comment before i go back to the panelists over here is that perhaps one thing perhaps one thing that makes it very easy is that you have a common language of communication between all of you within your respective fields whether you're psychologists therapists so on so forth you're not communicating in the same language however when you come down to our centers you have different centers holding programs in different languages and the fact that you can't communicate in that language in itself ends up becoming a barrier there's just a point of contemplation over here but thank you for your comment thank you i just wanted to say for the sister's first question is that what are we actually going to do about it and she's mentioned that some you know the youth of today are actually going and being proactive in doing something about it and in eradicating the racism that we we have within ourselves right i think the first and foremost thing to do is that is to admit it of course to admit that there is a problem to admit that we are racist who admits on this is this you and i can sit here we can have a hundred shows like this and we'll admit there's racism within our community day and day out every day of the week yeah who needs to do this absolutely i run the community and how do people who run the community i said now we're going to the meat and bones of solution unfortunately we're also running short on time because we are almost just within the dying minutes over here so just to tie and wrap this up and give at least something to our viewers to ourselves to the audience excuse me in regards to a roadmap on how we need to go forward so the leaders of the community need to be addressed what's the platform in which they're supposed to be addressed as if as you're supposed to have mass protests are we supposed to go out and um uh you know um in the agms you know the infamous agms where even you know all type of chaos and uh you know mayhem opens accounts don't even get me started man but what is the platform let me just ask haji abu shahab because he's part of pr as well go on adjo we want to you know as brief as possible keeping in time we need solutions over here leaders of our community we are suffering from racism how do we need to brother rightly mentioned about admitting that there is racism within communities um whether hoja iraqi iranian and so on well i think the the way if wanted to admit it if i admit it if you do it and he does it and she does it nothing is going to change but it has to be from the hierarchy how do we get to the higher how do we get to the hierarchy we go to the marja or representative we have when they accept that there is a racism and then they admitted or denounced it as you know slam denounced it admitted and then the how we tackle it or how we eradicate it comes from up all the way down to us within the our management we didn't we don't have anyone from let's say hoja community right why i'm not in the hoja communities uh management for example why so if the the our let's say hi marja comes and admits and then provide a solution for he knows it with regard to islam ahlul bet haluma salam quran and so on and all a step by step comes down to to us then i think it's easier to to know it because now i'm i'm saying in here said i don't see racism in here but there is a racism i admit it but i'm not going to change any so i can't change anything but i think where you can make a start is to call it out of course it begins at home and this is the point of all it begins at home this is this is you know spot on the point of having a show like this and inshallah it gets the exposure that it deserves so that we can't change the world with this one show but what we can do is we can put the we can get the ball rolling plant the seed we have a question from esteemed guest as well very well-renowned khateeb from what i know from him i can see from here samahat say the alina wab salamu alaikum salamu alaikum rahmatullah first of all i would like to congratulate imam say on tv and you yourself for organizing this very well presented and organized program inshallah continues uh there are two points i wanted to clarify as an individual who studied in the seminary and who's experienced the environment of the seminary up close front the fact that we don't have an african merger because this is one of the comments unfortunately that i heard in this program today and it's very well sitting here in the furthest point of the world away from the hausa in najaf or in qom and to come and say that we don't have african merja and our hausa system or merja or racists and this is a very big claim in the current climate we are having problems and we are having issues inviting the youth to come and follow our merja and do take lead of the maraja and for us to come and claim or come and say without any solid rock evidence that that our marja or our hausa are racist that's a very big claim to say without evidence the fact that we don't have african merja doesn't mean that the hausa is racist we have one of the most senior maraja that the world of tashayi had ever seen was a turk he was turkish right we have pakistani maraja who are currently in iraq and who've contributed greatly in the success of tashaya and the saving of tashaya we have alama and maraja who are currently leaving their family and children and their friends back home and staying all their life in najaf just to protect the science of alilbayt who are from afghanistan of course we have alama and maraja who are from bahrain and lebanon and other parts of the world so claiming that we don't have african merja doesn't mean that the hausa has not opened opened its doors to people is the merjaeya needs an individual who sacrifices his life for the sake of merjaeya there are individuals who left the world and the desires of the world to come and reside in the qabrestan of wadi salam for a big part of their life as poor individuals not having any water or food to eat and drink just to become meraja these are individuals who they sacrifice their lives we have individuals no doubt that come to najaf or go to qom or go to say desainab to study from the brothers from the african communities and they decide they themselves decide to go back home to continue educating their family and communities merjaeya needs individuals to continue their studies until 50 or 60 or 70 years and regardless of that the imam of the time helps an individual to become a merja an individual can become they study all the required sciences of merjaeya but at the same time you don't see them having the support and the help of the imam of the time it needs personal elevation for you to become a merja and to reach that higher status thank you very much 100% agreed i think um in when it comes in regards to be fair and to put closing statement to this as well so we can wrap up our segment for today is that it's fair to say that on this uh uh you know on the issue of um racism when it comes to the merjaeya in the event that um you know in the event that uh evidence is found clearly you have evidence that you have suggested to words or whether evidence is found or not one thing that is absolutely important for us to understand is that the hausa ilmiya as an institution and the values of the hausa is one thing and the actions of individuals who claim to be within the hausa or within that hausa circle the action of the individual is different than the the values of that actual institution just like the way we say islam is one thing and muslims is something else but inshallah hopefully i never said the merja are racist no no of course i said institutionally institutionally understood there is a big difference in that of course one more thing before you close um one of the things we can do we have welcome to our mors day yes we can have a day where we have an anti-racist day no one community has a day which is dedicated in our centers to a day of non-racism or anti-racism to stand up against racism football has campaigns kick out racism every sport every corner has do you know what even during shah al ramadan even during shah al ramadan we have the interfaith iftar what if there was supposed to be an iftar one day just for all shears from all different communities to sit down and break bread together i love that that's a fantastic association just to bring in black people white people to our community to see we are normal people that we should have a kick out racism day of course within our community and for people around us as well 100 percent i agree with that i think this is going to be the last question that we got to take and we got to wrap things up for tonight uh christia for the is it from the brother side the sister side brother bismillah so i come to your brother panelist and sister rebecca um it was a quick question to say i mean we have two cemeteries in london one in south one in north two cemeteries uh yeah two graveyards where um shea brothers are buried we'll have a number of graveyards yeah we have a number but there's there's two that uh apparently uh it was a question to say i mean john bin hawai was an african uh christian who who was buried with in in karbala with imam hussein right there was a uh a 16 year old brother and i think abu shahbaz uh had um had mentioned uh just now earlier um who who was rejected from being buried in this graveyard here in london um because they were not from a from a hodja background uh if we can't if we can't get this done here in london in the uk where we say racism is is against the law and it's it's it's something that's as big if we can't start that from here what what are your what are your thoughts on that shea understand let me just say things um as well over here not again to sugarcourt in the words of abu shahbaz but let me let's just get lines before we dive into this let's just get some lines and some ground rules over here um number one as a presenter or in the channel we don't want to end up where certain centers or certain races or ethnicities feel that they are being targeted and this show is there to bash them no we're trying to understand the situation and uh if there was a marcas for example there was involved i think in my humble opinion it would be best to get for example an official answer from somebody within that marcas so that you get two sides of a story taking things on face value taking things on face value and um it's a very sad event i mean when you look at things and this is where it points down to habibi when you run your center as per the teachings of ahlul bait you open the risala amalia for any marjad teklid baba burying a dead person is wajib kifai wajib kifai regardless of your whether you come from this background or that background so if our centers or the people that are in charge when it comes to burials and things like this if this is our criteria then you know it makes things simpler now i understand there is finances and the cost of a grave involved and so on so forth i can i can i don't think it's fine if if if i can elaborate on this um there was no refusal to bury the first thing okay um the community did offer to bury they offered to the gussel coffin the hearse the burial just not in a particular part of the graveyard not in a particular part there are issues behind that because there is a sizable community they pay a monthly subscription if you're part of the burial committee uh sorry about part of the burial fund so you must understand if there's a hundred graves and 200 people um there's already a problem so it's the fact that the kid was 16 is very sad um there were ways around it but no one was prepared to do that this is number one number two you must understand the community and people who run the community are two different things the community was never never against burying that kid in fact i don't think these are communal decisions as well but but there was within the same graveyard there was offers to bury but there was a but there are always people who want to create an issue and there was a couple of people within our own community who were like well not there it's got to be right here sorry it doesn't work like that if there's an offer and acceptance um things were all fine until a certain morning a certain person decided to cause more problems than necessary then the whole thing blew out proportion and everyone got very upset sorry to cut it off had you asked about sister do you want to say something i thought i was also involved in that um because and this isn't you've been talking about the generational differences um in the communities and um i ended up getting involved because i noticed this boy's friends um were running a petition to for him to be buried in the graveyard so i just kind of shared it without thinking too much about it but it ended up um like you say getting very complicated but from what i learned after also speaking to uh certain community members was that there's a two tier membership system so um to be buried in that graveyard um you must be a member of the this particular gem art but to be a member of this gem art you have to belong to one particular ethnicity so the issue of ethnicity is that is built into uh the rules and regulations as to whether you can be buried or not sure and and i and i asked to see the constitution and i saw that you know i mean the argument coming back was oh well it's because the family they hadn't paid any membership they weren't members of this of this community but what people were not saying is that in order to be a member of this community you must belong to one ethnicity an ethnic group we have had a golem who's part of a burial committee yeah just to put you on the spot over here what's your before my time before your time we literally need to wrap up guys um uh the producers been making a couple of comments in my ear as well um you know one statement response how do you deal with issues like these being part of a burial committee wajib kifai yeah and you've got all these constitutional issues that are over here yeah what do you think is the way forward to ensure that an issue like this doesn't happen again well first of all it was unfortunate that it happened but it happened and we must learn from it and in order to learn from it we also have if i don't know if sister rebecca is aware that we are actually going through the process our gem art is going through the process of having a new constitution right um and uh i believe there are obviously constitutional review to ensure that absolutely yeah i'm gonna stop you over here um for the remaining couple of minutes we really need to end this show um we have gone over our time by quite a bit this being a pilot show the fact that we've been afforded more time shows the uh um how well the topic has gone it's a very sensitive topic um it's a very heated debate as well but at the same time there's hopefully there are more occasions for us to get together inshallah on this however to close i think a couple of things that we need to take home over here is in understanding um the manner and the circumstances the mentality which allows uh racist behavior to be to prevail or to occur within our societies the first thing that was recognized is a lack of spirituality a lack of taqwa if we were to put our full belief and live our lives as but the pure teachings of the quran and the ahlul bayt with the agenda of ahlul bayt an agenda of quran coming before any other agenda we would not be dealing with all these issues over here it's one thing to be shared by name and it's something else to be shared by action number two what is uh apparently also what is also very apparent is our affiliation with culture there is a fine line that needs to be drawn over here it's not wrong to be cultural to a certain extent Allah swt also points that out within the quran that we have created you from different tribes so having your culture and having an affinity towards a culture per se there is nothing wrong with this the problem is that when this culture now becomes a reason to start practicing and start behaving in a prejudice manner towards other people be it at a communal level at an uh at a personal level or even at an institutional or governmental level let me leave one thing over here because there is one thing that brings all of us together and that is imam al hussain say the shuhada you come into the haram of imam al hussain yawmun arba'in you see flags from around the world this imam al hussain is this mantik that brings people uh regardless of their ethnicities regardless of their colors and even their sects under this domain of love let me end with this anecdote and this incident from the day of ashura as something for all of us to ponder upon Joan as was already mentioned Joan was an abyssinian slave from abyssinia present day Ethiopia when he was martyred on the day of ashura imam al hussain goes and puts his cheek on the cheek of Joan and he kisses Joan on the forehead this is a master imam al hussain dealing with his companion Joan the same action imam al hussain performs for aliyun al akbar his son flesh and blood bani hashim when aliyun al akbar fell on the battleground imam al hussain goes up to him before he says after the battle he sat down by aliyun al akbar and he put his cheek on the cheek of aliyun al akbar the same action of imam al hussain for his son aliyun al akbar the sayyid from the sadat of bani hashim imam al hussain performs the same act for Joan how he treats his son and how he treats this person from abyssinia one of the lead lessons of karbala is that there is no room for racism within tashayyu and if we were to embark upon the lessons of imam al hussain with our actions through grassroots movements i'm sure inshallah the next time we'll be sitting on this panel there will be much more pleasant things we'll be talking about inshallah together with arisala amalia of a marjad takleed inshallah from africa inshallah and with this i would like to thank each and every one of my esteemed guests on the panelists thank you very much for your expertise and um for a very lively debate inshallah i pray to allah subhanahu wa ta'ala by the sake of imam al hussain that you are all successfully and all your individual endeavors in serving ahlul bait a big thank you for the audience that is here and for our viewers inshallah join us next week on thursday night talk as we take on another contemporary topic are for you to benefit from wassalaamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh