Gender Interaction

Interaction between the genders is inevitable – but everyone needs to adhere to strict protocols, otherwise it will lead to inappropriate things.

I don’t agree with women putting up their pictures on social media, but this is my opinion, I’m not saying they are sinning if they don’t display their awrah. The reason I hold this view is because there are a lot of perverts online and pictures of Muslim women have been photoshopped and have ended up on immoral websites. Other women have been blackmailed…

However, if they do display their awrah and is provocative it’s a sin. But for men to go around and harass women is also a sin. There are so many complaints. I read that some men go onto a females profile and go to their photo albums – they start liking images from many years ago!

How perverted is that….

So I urge everyone to adhere to protocols and treat the other gender online respectfully – as you would like others to treat your sister or brother or husband or wife.

Interact with others formally, as you would if their maharim were sitting right in front of you. Unnecessary talk, giggling, jokes, love reacts and flirty comments between the genders is not appropriate.

It’s also inappropriate to interpret every comment or like reaction from the other gender as a marriage proposal. That’s not the case. The two genders can interact with each other if the Shar’ii protocols are adhered to.

If the interactions are without those evils we mentioned, men and women can interact and discuss knowledge formally among each other:

Ibn Hajar says:
وفي الحديث من الفوائد.. المناظرة في العلم بين الرجال والنساء
“And from the benefits we can derive from this Hadith … the [permissibility] of discussing knowledge between men and women.”
[“Fath al-Bari”, 5/142].