Brother Shariff

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Islamic gurus (aka guys in robes) are not relatable.

They talk from a place of superiority - not of vulnerability & authenticity.

Why?

Out of fear of revealing their own deficiencies (which they all have).

Make being a normal human great again.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

When all you have is a “religious hammer” - everything looks like a “religious nail”.

Not every topic needs to be squeezed into your religious worldview.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

I have no issue with religion itself, my issue is with the puppets who weaponize beliefs and narratives to manipulate and persuade.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

The logic is: “see, if they can eat in such hunger, we should be able to eat also”

No, it’s actually more difficult to eat when you’re not hungry.

So why is it such a shock when people in extreme hardship are also deeply devout? It’s not surprising.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Having faith in religion during hardship is not a holy sign, it’s human nature.

Religion is a useful tool for coping.

It’s a weak argument to employ such tactics to persuade someone to increase their faith.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

When someone is hungry, they need food to curb their appetite.

Religion curbs emotional difficulty.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Then those generalizations are turned into dogma you cannot question. The tradition of how it must be.

You literally backflip hallucinate yourself into rules for life (not based on reality).

Example: 2 witnesses for nikkah.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Harmon Circle & Hero's Journey is the perfect example of "pattern matching" in Institutionalized Religion.

There is reality (what happened) and then there are people obsessing on projecting meaning to what happened. - "it must mean something!"

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Through pattern matching, arbitrary rules are created and then generalized upon everything.

Event / Story (hadith) > insistence upon meaning > made up ruling

"insist on seeing something and you will"

Extrapolation and interpretation - very little clearly stated.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

It’s why so many imams struggle when they come face to face with the reality of life - because their skillset of manipulating masses using religious evidence does not translate to reality.

Health?
Wealth?
Relationships?

Nope. They live in a made up world instead.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Religious spit balling education is pretty easy.

You just make up a bunch of stuff within the framework of evidences.

Other than that, real world reality does not matter. No consequences based on physics.

Just make it up as you go.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

The “all or nothing” approach of institutionalized Islamic gender mixing has its pros and cons.

Makes navigating the start and end of relationships extremely high stress.

Sometimes unnecessarily high stress.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Institutionalized religion = human change problem + bunch of robed puppets making stuff up on the fly

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Sharia and Fiqh is a great tool to abuse power.

Nothing like having the Creator of Mankind and the Universe to sign off on your opinion when it serves you.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

“Getting rich would be easy if we could use riba, that’s why Dunya is a test for us, can’t do haram”

Oh really? So the rest of the 70% of the world that uses interest are all deca millionaires?

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

“From the protection of my parents to the protection of my husband”

- An entire generation of weak Adults under the excuse of “protection”

Counterintuitively actually harms them more over their lifetime - not prepared to handle the difficulties of life.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

The week of ovulation (or week before) - her mood and outlook of life would be so much better - she’s be better suited to handle the stress of moving and divorce etc.

No wonder most of the Muslim world has disregarded these Iddah / divorce rules - they subconsciously know.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Having a woman become immediately non-mahram and move out post-period… and the last week of Iddah being her period week — is silly to the max.

She’s going through such difficulty while her hormones are upside down - causes undue stress and is unfair to her.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Who the heck is keeping track?
Human memory?

So if you’re legally divorced and just forget if you are religiously divorced or don’t care —- who cares?

The system was designed to provide legal framework for old ages but now you can’t be double married or you commit a crime.

[Brother Shariff @BrotherShariff]

Managing a national system and a religious system while living in the country as a Muslim is redundant

Example: Islamic nikkah and Legal marriage.

How do you keep track of both? So I’m legally married but not religiously?