Marriage events and the elephant in the room
The gender wars, red pill discourse and just overall confusion leads the Muslim Community into a tricky problem.
With the escalation of the gender wars and the introduction of the red pill to Muslim circles, the elephant in the room has finally been revealed. We have a severe crisis of marriage in the Muslim community. Now, rightfully so many masajid and organizations have started to pay attention and are attempting sincerely to bring about positive change.
For starters, I'd like to say that I think the people putting these events together are working very sincerely and honestly doing a great service to the community. May Allah reward their efforts and my intention of writing a post like this isn't meant to throw shade at organizers or belittle the work that they're doing.
However, I've been seeing a lot of these marriage ads and posters for various events at masajid and Islamic conferences both local and online and they have the most ajeeb age ranges involved that perplex me.
30-45 only.
There are no differences in age for men or women and no other qualifiers or differentiators.
This is a hard pill to swallow for most people today. And it’s not red pill talk, it’s real talk.
33-year-old men in their prime making $100k generally don’t want to marry a 30-year-old woman.
I’m not being callous when I say this btw, I have two daughters, I get it. But life has realities and we need to accept them.
We can simultaneously acknowledge two things.
One is that we have sisters in our community who are older and unmarried and still need spouses. We shouldn’t treat them poorly or negatively and we shouldn’t leave them to the wolves and not find them suitable spouses. No, we should spend time, effort, and resources to help the sisters in our communities. It is a fard khifaya upon the community to solve this problem and I'm really happy to see more potential solutions coming about.
Two is that just because the first point is true, doesn’t mean that we need don’t need to also be realistic about the realities of life and biology.
This idea that a 33-year-old Muslim man and a 33-year-old Muslim woman are the same is a new concept that goes against biology and how we are made. This was a known fact to everyone in the world just 20 years ago. It’s a known fact to this day amongst Non-Muslims and for some strange reasons, mostly emotional, Muslims, outright ignore this reality.
A 33-year-old man making good money, who’s relatively good-looking, would be able to find any 22 year old Non-Muslim to date with relative ease. And yet, when it comes to the Muslim community and marriage it’s like “omg age gap”. Meanwhile, the women are thirsting after 55-year-old Shah Rukh Khan. It’s quite perplexing really.
This is a hard problem. And it requires even more difficult solutions. The marriage market is extremely tough out there and with the culture and gender wars, the conversation becomes that much more difficult. However, what doesn’t help is that when these events take place, they ignore realities to shield a minority of people from feeling sad, and so, people get frustrated. This is why many of these events fill up with women but are always looking for men to fill up the headcount often asking, “why don’t the men sign up? We don't understand, we're doing everything we can.”
I’ve heard many women say, “why don’t 32-year-old men want to marry 32-year-old women, aren’t they the same?”
No, they are not.
In many ways, and not just biologically. A 20-year-old Muslim man sets his pursuits on becoming a Rijaal, a man, and fulfilling the duties enjoined upon him by Allah Azzawajal. A responsible son to fulfill Birr Al Walidayn, a husband who can provide and take care of his spouse(s) and a future father. He desires to set up foundations for the people he loves and will come to love, so that he may be amongst those whom Allah Azzawajal loves.
So, he builds a successful life, and in addition to building this life, he's kept halal, followed the rules, and made something of himself. (I know a lot of people will say, WeLl nOt aLl gUyS aRe hAlaL, a gUy I kNeW wAs SLeePinG aROund, hE WaS a SnaKe aND a sCoUNdrel! I'm not talking about you. We are talking about a happy day scenario here.)
This young man is now in his late 20s, or early 30s and is now looking for a wife.
To quote Pride and Prejudice, a book most women adore, “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.” (Jane Austen)
Now he's at his prime and he has worked hard for it and wants to get the best he can get and let's be realistic. For a man, a young beautiful 21-year-old girl is more attractive than a 30-year-old, this is just the reality of life. There's absolutely nothing wrong with this desire. And if this person wasn't a Muslim, they could very easily go to an app like Tinder and date a 21-year-old and if they're Non-Muslim, probably even marry them.
The funny thing about women's love for Pride and Prejudice is that they love Mr. Darcy but the modern woman often forgets that he was rich and almost a decade older than Elizabeth. I digress.
Now not only is this 32-year-old man going to have to pick someone to whom he is attracted which usually happens to be younger women, not including the ease by which a younger woman can have children, but he also has to be even pickier for several additional reasons such as:
Divorce laws vary strongly favor women and the horror stories of what happens to men scare them.
See Helen Smith’s Men on Strike
This episode of Institutionalized also covers this topic well:
Polygyny (a husband marrying multiple women) has functionally been made haram today by the almost universal discourse of imams and speakers in addition to the overwhelmingly popular quote, “I have no problem with polygyny, I just don’t want it for myself.” Thus, this is the only woman this man will ever get. He needs to be extremely careful concerning the person he picks.
It’s extremely expensive to get married, so you have to make this one count. The mahr amounts are high, a ring is a requirement now for most marriages, and in addition, you have to pay for lavish functions.
Many women now bear student loans and massive debt which now he has to manage whether he likes it or not. Her loans automatically become his problem mentally even if she doesn't want them to.
Many women now have a corporate career or business and a set lifestyle that is not so easy for a man to adapt to.
Many women don't want to move far from their families, limiting it to an easily drivable distance from their friends and family
Now, why would a 32-year-old man who's now at the peak of his life and career want to deal with all of that? The stakes are not in his favor.
This a reality that organizers of such events need to understand and take into consideration. Principles and realities have to be upheld otherwise we will just deepen this marriage crisis. Let me be clear, this is not red pill discourse even if some things I've discussed here are also discussed in red pill praxis. We've had these truths for 1400 years and they were acknowledged by every single human on this planet less than 20 years ago. We aren't snowflakes who need special rules and accommodations.
I’m sure I could write far more on this topic and I don’t mean to disparage women, there are a lot of good pious Muslim sisters who are struggling due to no fault of their own and I make sincere duaa for them and pray that Allah Azzawajal eases their condition and helps them find a spouse. But we have to be practical and simultaneously solve both problems.
And Allah and his Messenger ﷺ know best.
~muin
Marriage events and the elephant in the room
No one wants an old woman. They will need to offer more, i.e. obedience and resources/status. They won't/can't. Spinsterhood or de-facto leaving the religion is their future in the West. Nothing can stop this.
Westernisation is not piecemeal. You don't get to pick and choose.
The reason the traditional system works in the middle east is because there is patriarchy and patriarchal inspired family law. You have none of this in the West. ZERO.
Even in high income islamic countries you have rising spinsterhood because women spend their prime years in college and then at work/careers, but at least you have some semblence of traditional family law.