Sunnis on Social Media

[AlialHanafi]

Refuting and responding on Twitter is putting the heretics (devbandis or others) in the driver seat. Even if you do a thorough refutation one time, in just a week, you'll have to honor a new idiot by reusing and rehashing work you already did once, and the cycle repeats. My suggestion is we stay in the driver seat and just focus on newer and newer content as and when we see fit, and not worry about replying to zombies.

While all others are rampant on social media and slandering the Imam, influencing Sunnis outside the subcontinent on their views of the dispute, you're suggesting Sunnis (who are already doing very little) focus on something else?

Rather more should be done on social media. Every group has notable individuals representing and defending their creed on there except for the Barelwiyyah.

So when groups are misguiding laypeople from Sunni households or elsewhere and slandering Imam Ahmad Rida Khan, and responses are encouraged, it definitely isn't putting others in the "driver's seat"

 

[AbdalQadir]

you're suggesting Sunnis (who are already doing very little) focus on something else?

you should learn to read and comprehend properly. don't try to be an overzealous defender of the Sunnis. if you are that zealous, become a Sunni influencer and do something yourself rather than directing the rest of us.

see the thread title. we're talking specifically in the context of twitter.

i didn't say we divorce ourselves from social media

i said we focus on newer content because

in the context of twitter - due to the nature, functionality, and user experience of the platform - it calls for more work again and again and again on the same topic, thus wasting time and energy of people who are doing something

i didn't say we focus on something else. i said we focus on newer content (in general but twitter in particular) rather than losing time with replying to zombies on twitter who bring the same objections again and again. in any case, even if doing something else was implied, common sense and context dictate that it would have been something else would within the context of Sunniyat

it's actually good that you said what you did, because i was thinking of expanding on that newer content part myself.

---

we Sunnis are quite limited on content in my opinion. we are defensive, reactive and offer rebuttals, and not proactive, and we don't understand the concept of trojan horses. and in this case the trojan horse is legitimate. i've lamented about it in the past too. other sects do it and we still haven't learnt it.

you don't have to call people to love the Sunniyat or Imam Ahmad Raza just by refuting deos and overzealously trying to defend disco naatkhwanis with half baked ratta-fied daleels for actual naatkhwani, that maulwis don't remember well in any case

What IS our content?
Anyone can count it on his fingers
1. Naatkhwani
2. Radd of devbandis and wahabis (not done properly, mostly just shouting)
3. Milad, 11win mahafil
4. A3ras of great people where their karamat and fazail are passed off as OUR knowledge
5. Offering our ratta-fied daleels/refutations AFTER the devs/wahabis attack us on a topic

in the twitter context, you too are only asking us to focus on # 5.

---

how about we think about fresh new content and bring people to Sunniyat and love of Ahmad Raza through THAT route. i assure you, you will find plenty of gold on just about any topic

this is just a glimpse into the daily relevant talking points that the devbandis use as a trojan horse to lure innocent Sunnis into their side

you can firstly focus on Quran and Hadith classes (Sunni ulama delivering them from SUNNI perspectives)
where are we with tafsir, hadith, shuruh etc.?

Tajweed (sorry but we are hovering around zero in this field. i hate the average Sunni condition in tajweed from the bottom of my heart. if someone brings in the desi/ajami excuse, i will tell him have you seen the Urdu/Punjabi speaking devbandis and their tajweed?)

How about Salah? Somehow our people believe straightening the rows is a wahabi/devbandi thing and we have the license to leave as large gaps as we want, this was the way pre covid and post covid. now couple that together with tajweed, and you can see why the average youf detests praying with/behind Sunnis. we haven't even started talking about internal ahkam of salah and other details.

Purdah - Quran and hadith based daleels. wahabis/devs teach it with daleels in their ijtemas and it works wonders for them in recruiting sisters who can then bring their husbands along

How to deal with in laws - rights and duties of every side

Raising kids

I know tablighi jamat have seminars and lectures against dowry in india. Can't our mawlanas find any content on that in the Imam's works? it's directly relevant to desi culture.

Do we know how taboo desi women consider widow and divorcee re-marriage? Do we know that we can make a full one weeks worth of lectures from Ala Hazrat's works on it, giving a well balanced and fresh perspective that would even pleasantly surprise many modern pro-feminist folks?

Marriage advice and courses for the unmarried (see just about every modernist, wahabi, devbandi or heretic has a marriage course, or a course on the rights of husbands and wives - they sell like hot cakes with the youth. there's a good reason for it. we are humans and young folks are looking for partners and love and they are eager to do it in halal way if they can help it. marriage is a perfect trojan horse to pull these people into their manhaj and spread their misguidance. we watch while heretics pull our youth away)

Other Fiqh - Employment contracts, business and Islamic finance are good starters

OTHER refutations - we don't need to reinvent the wheel on the defense of Mawlid and 11win every time a jahil proffers his point of view. all the for and against arguments are out there for anyone wanting to delve into it. (for the last 250 years wahabis have been regurgitating their same jahil objections, and Sunnis have been refuting them)

How about we try to scour the imam's work to refute the firangis on issues like feminism - you might not find it under a subject heading of feminism, but i assure you, you will find it there - just is hard work! Let's say you manage to extract a lot of material from Ala Hazrat's works refuting feminism, and you propagate that to woke men and women, and they are attracted to Sunniyat and Ala Hazrat, would it cause you a heartache that they didn't come to Sunniyat through the "traditional" route of chanting aloud "Ishqo Muhabbat Ishqo Muhabbat Ala Hazrat Ala Hazrat" or the after-Juma Salame Raza?

How about telling the truth about devbandis from their own works? They lie about our imam with fabrications. we can show them their akabir's track record in adult-rated content, hindu-nawazi, and much more.

why do we have to be reactive and defensive? we can be proactive and offensive.

i promise you there's enough material in Fatawa Ridawiyyah that you can very well make people love Sunniyat and your imam dearly without doing any of the things we're currently doing or without propagating the limited content that we do propagate

hope that puts my posts # 104 and 108 in context.

 

[AlialHanafi]

you should learn to read and comprehend properly. don't try to be an overzealous defender of the Sunnis. if you are that zealous, become a Sunni influencer and do something yourself rather than directing the rest of us.

Perhaps work on your own comprehension skills, when all I pointed out was your idea that responses puts others in the "driver's seat" and how laughable and ignorant such a take is when responses to slander and lies which are rampant on the platform are helping people clinch onto or stay leaning towards Sunni creed.

Nowhere in my comment did I imply that newer work should not be supported and worked on. Not entirely sure where you pulled that one from, but if anything the points you suggested that need to be worked on would be agreed by all members here

This thread and it's title as you may be referring to was created primarily for responses to be given, considering it's an issue that was raised before. So commenting on it and saying that we should not refute Devs or their likes because of some "driver's seat" is quite counter-productive in itself.

If you want to promote new ideas like you have, go for it. But clearly an issue of laypeople being affected and swept away from Sunni creed that their family has held onto since the time of the Imam solely because of the sheer amount of attacks against the Barelwiyyah should be addressed, and that is done by responses to these threads.

Your whole initial comment suggested that the focus should not be on responses. I did not at one point say you were suggesting to look past social media, but instead a vocal and important point, which is refuting lies and slander.

"My suggestion is we stay in the driver seat and just focus on newer and newer content as"

Not quite sure whether you remember what you wrote yourself and whether you grasp partial context or none at all from my reply to you from before. But putting words in my mouth isn't productive.

No one is even suggesting responses to mawlid here. What is the point of you commenting on this thread and the required refutation when they go beyond small fiqhi issues and rather have to do with kufr and aqeedah? Who even comes to a thread all for refutations and says: "You know what, why are you doing this? We need our people to learn tajweed properly"

No one disagrees with that. But time and place.

How about telling the truth about devbandis from their own works? They lie about our imam with fabrications. we can show them their akabir's track record in adult-rated content, hindu-nawazi, and much more.

This is literally what we are calling for as well. And guess what? When you tend to post these topics, they are very often countered with responses from that side. The Barelwi laypeople are already doing much of this, and can't answer back when they are quoted. Now you may surely suggest that if you can't answer, don't post. Which is the WHOLE REASON we are requesting others with 'ilm and the capabilities to focus more on platforms like Twitter.

So no, I am not "only asking you to focus on #5", instead calling on people to help with #5. So please, read my reply again and stop with the red herrings.

 

[AlialHanafi]

And the request for help on social media was for those willing. If you don't want to, don't, if you see no importance and rather it being counter-productive seen as it's putting others in "driver seats". Lol.

 

[HASSAN]

Let me go on a tangent.

It all boils down to Sunnis having terrible social media presence; the average Deobandi student (of which there are many) has tens of thousands of followers on Twitter whereas a Sunni/Barelwi scholar (of which there are probably under a dozen who actively tweet) barely reach 5,000 followers. Furthermore, Salafis trump even the Deobandis in numbers.

You can moan about the UX/UI of Twitter all you like, but the fact of the matter is that the majority of the youth are on social media and are learning their Dīn through social media. It is undeniable that Twitter serves as a platform where thousands of Muslims actively engage in daily discussions, fostering ample Islamic discourse. Therefore, it is only logical for Sunnis/Barelwis to establish a strong and active presence on Twitter. The dynamics of Twitter differ from other social media platforms like Facebook; on the latter you may receive 200 likes but all them likes will be from your close circle whereas on the former, you may get 50 likes but with 15,000 impressions from people from all backgrounds.

Sunni/Barelwi scholars barely scrape 50 likes on their posts whereas a Salafi quote by Ibn Uthaymin or Albani will often bang 1000s of likes.

And make no mistake, in an algorithmic world, numbers do matter. To an unwary teen, the number of likes correlates with the truth. If he sees our group with a handful of followers against the big groups with hundreds of accounts and astronomically more reach, he will not side with us. When this unsuspecting youth sees a hoard of tweets against Barelwis daily with hardly any response from us, is it likely that he will side with us? No. This is one major way how we are losing youth to the Wahabi ideologies.

Then comes the matter of refutation. Yes, Sunnis/Barelwis may have refuted these age-old claims but are they in a format that is easy to access and at hand? Or are they pages deep in a website? If it is the latter, then that's another big problem.

Salafi accounts are bashing Barelwis daily. Deobandis bash us quite often too. The worst thing is that most of the stuff they bring up against us are misconceptions: grave-worship, Nūr, Hazir Nazir, istimdad etc. Our responses would be would be significantly more advantageous if they were conveyed on the same medium where the refutations are being presented.

In this thread, there was a comment suggesting that continuously reiterating our arguments requires excessive effort - I totally disagree. The beauty of Twitter is that threads can be shared very easily; it doesn't even have to be the author of the thread, anyone can link a Barelwi-defence thread under a Barelwi-attack tweet. Yes, if there are new points mentioned, then add the new points to the thread, and then share the thread with the attacker. Once again, having a larger following would greatly facilitate our efforts and potentially render the continuous restatement of our views less necessary. If our perspectives were actually widely recognised and well-known among other sects, it could actually eliminate the need for constant reaffirmation and explanation.

As for other points mentioned recently, I concur that it is important for social media accounts to address a wide range of topics rather than solely engaging in repetitive refutations. However, when we choose not to respond to a refutation, it can create the impression that we lack a counterargument to their point. So lets be in the driver seat but lets also respond. It is entirely feasible to strike a balance between leading the conversation and actively addressing opposing viewpoints and it would help, again, if we had more numbers.

In conclusion, I firmly believe that it would be both imprudent and myopic for capable Sunnis to overlook the significance of engaging on social media platforms. By abstaining from these virtual spaces, we are inadvertently surrendering ground in an ongoing struggle, both in the physical realm and in the digital domain.

With all that being said, I have a friend who would be delighted to cover the expenses of Shaykh Abu Hasan's Twitter blue subscription; this adds a blue tick verification badge next to his username, grants him the ability to edit tweets, and removes the dreaded character count.

 

[HASSAN]

Another point to mention on the topic of refutation from the Sunni/Barelwi - Deobandi dispute that I think is rampant especially on Twitter is the phenomenon amongst Desi Sunnis/Sidi types who think 'we're not Barelwis so we won't get involved'.

Another one I think is that 'We're Sufis, we don't refute'.

This further reduces our numbers in countering the arguments put forth by Wahabis/Deobandis

 

[HASSAN]

Twitter stats:

Mullannee - 53k followers/25k tweets
Hasan Ali - 65k followers/2k tweets
Menk - 10 million followers/12k tweets
Tariq Masud - 131k followers/7k tweets

Shaykh Asrar - 5k followers/800 tweets
Mawlana Ilyas Qadiri - 193k followers/10k tweets
Mufti Asjad Rida - 58k followers/1k tweets
Shaykh Munawwar - 3k followers/1k tweets

 

[AbdalQadir]

@AlialHanafi - your post (#111 #112) is incoherent, at least for me, and maybe we missed each other's points. let's not waste each other's times. saying nicely with clean heart.

@HASSAN - you raised some great points (#113 onwards) from a strategy point of view and in sha Allah let's discuss them.

 

[HASSAN]

The Anti-Salafi rhetoric on Twitter is headed by Deobandis, Deoband-affiliates, or Deobandi admirers.

Sunnis/Barelwis, as usual, tend to discuss/fixate on inconsequential topics (which probably stems from being detached from the real world).

 

[HASSAN]

@AlialHanafi - your post (#111 #112) is incoherent, at least for me, and maybe we missed each other's points. let's not waste each other's times. saying nicely with clean heart.

@HASSAN - you raised some great points (#113 onwards) from a strategy point of view and in sha Allah let's discuss them.

I think we all agree with each others points for the most part.

The contention lies here:
Ali says Barelwis should respond to the slander against them;
AQ agrees but says focus on new content. Responding to refutations will get quite repetitive and most stuff has been answered already.

I say, Sunnis join Social Media esp Twitter. Put the refutations on an accessible medium - this could be wordpress, twitter threads, blogs etc. Let the scholars answer and let the awam spread far and wide. Inform the scholars when there are new arguments from the other camps.

 

[Aqdas]

A lot of Sunnis are busy promoting their pir to bother about anti-Sunni rhetoric online.

A good start would be for every pir to tell his followers that they're Sunni first and to not worry about recruiting for the silsilah but rather work for the wider cause.

 

[Alf]

I say, Sunnis join Social Media esp Twitter.

I don't have a twitter account but from the little exposure I have had of the thing, it's not very effective, as whatever you tweet gets buried under newer tweets. If I'm not mistaken twitter has a word limit for each tweet, so how can we expect a scholarly piece or refutation within those word limits? I guess we need some sunnis engaged in that too, but would somebody with real ilm get involved in that? I would say having more websites with easy access to material is a better approach: websites that cover all the important topics on which we have dispute with the wahabis( example: sheikh Abu Adam's sunnianswers). Youtube is effective too, but I get the impression that merely posting videos won't do, you need capable orators to attract the masses. Mufti Rashid Mahmood Razvi is one scholar whose videos on youtube are very impressive and we ought to promote his work against wahabis.

 

[Khanah]

A lot of the time, you don't need to write fresh tweets as a response. I've noticed people sometimes link to a YouTube video or an article as refutation. Alternatively, you can post screenshots. So the issue then becomes knowing where to look to find the necessary refutations and if they're not available in those formats, to produce them.

I do think there is an issue with the lack of engagement by barelwis on these apps. Look how low shaykh asrar's numbers are even though he's head and shoulders above most other barelwis in producing content in the English language. Whether he calls himself barelwi or not. There are a few reasons for this:

1. Barelwis as a group just seem less inclined towards religious knowledge and so the average Barelwi ain't following shaykh so and so on twitter whereas the average deo will do so. Just my observation. Look at our masjids at asr time and look at a salafi masjid, night and day difference in numbers.

2. The salafis like Muhammad Hijab produce content in an entertainment like format (debates in Hyde Park etc) which is more likely to be clicked on by the average Muslim because they're seeking entertainment as much as knowledge. Then if they follow him on YouTube, that translates over to following him on twitter. Whereas if shaykh asrar is focusing more on academic type lectures (which is what he should be doing btw, since he's one of the very few on our side doing this), that naturally generates less clicks.

3. One of the main reasons why someone like menk or Ali dawah have so many more views is because they avoid sectarian disputes which the average teenager is not interested in, largely. They essentially appeal to a broader audience in the first place as a result. Now, our guys start off by refuting; rather than giving general knowledge, building up a base and then refuting where necessary every so often.

4. I think being boxed in as barelwis is an issue because the average person doesn't know that we're just sunni. So let's say there's a Maliki in Morocco on twitter- why would he wanna follow a Barelwi when he just wants to follow traditional sunni islam? The deo's online might mention deoband occasionally, sure. But it's just thrown in there after they first portray themselves as hanafi sufis, thus the non desi sunnis listen to them happily.

5. I've mentioned this before elsewhere but we suffer from a type of brain drain in the barelwi community. Anyone with potential and intelligence, who seeks to become more religious, gets taken in by deo's or salafis a lot of the time. Their talents are then used by these groups as they're better at recruiting because they fulfil the needs of these people by speaking about topics that concern them, providing translations, providing lectures and access to English speaking imams and the rest of it (see AQ's post which is relevant). And then we're left with either the irreligious or the religious but not necessarily intellectual or at best a few people with potential. Whilst the guys with potential change sides and set up websites or YouTube channels for the deo's and salafis.

 

[Hanafi Sunni]

3. One of the main reasons why someone like menk or Ali dawah have so many more views is because they avoid sectarian disputes which the average teenager is not interested in, largely. They essentially appeal to a broader audience in the first place as a result. Now, our guys start off by refuting; rather than giving general knowledge, building up a base and then refuting where necessary every so often.

Nah
Dawate islami and SDI are quite silent type, yet their views on youtube aren't that great either. So it's not even about refutation.

Generally sunni Ulama have less views. You can even look at Shaykh saeed fodehs twitter. There is barely interactions from Arab sunnis there.

We are close to end of times and people are simply running toward deviance. I'm not saying nothing should be done for the situation where we just sit back and do nothing. We should always be proponents of good ideas notwithstanding the reality.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1658512739113791489

Barely interactions on this tweet. This is just one e.g.

Lately some sunni Ulama are actually getting good views. The likes of pir Ajmal, saqib raza mustafayi, mufti salman azhar et al. However we don't have anyone (apart from pir saqib shami) who does general tableegh videos in English.

Protecting your imaan is the most difficult thing. Shaytaan always whispers in our ears toward deviance more than doing good a'amaal.

We can boast about deo masajid being full compared to ours. Yet most of them don't even know how to pray namaaz properly. I seen this first hand. Issues like folding their pants and praying salah. Toe fingers not facing toward qibla in sujood and jalsah. Many of their imam don't have beards and many other acts that would make their salah wajibul iyadah to repeat. Nonetheless despite the above their zest to pray is commendable when compared to a sunni.

I would say sunnis have come a long way. The subcontinental Ulama have done their job and continue to do so. E.g. mawlana muzaffar shah sahib constantly refuting deviants. It's time for the English speaking Ulama to shine and do their part. Yet unfortunately, they too busy gaining popularity by either uploading their naath recordings (studio versions) in English or answering qna on Instagram.

 

[Ali_Bash]

I think the problem might be is that we are fighting a battle on many fronts, we have the deobandis and salafis and shia to deal with alongside that the closet tafidlis and shias, on top of that liberals, athiests christians. There is a time and a place to fight against all these groups, but for me right now the biggest problem we seem to be facing are athiesm and liberalism. One of the biggest problems us sunnis seem to have had is (from my perspective) is we joined the dawah scene WAY to late. The likes of the salafis e.g Hijab and his ilk started their refutation of these groups along time before we did through debating them in speakers corner on Youtube so when many of the lay people do see these videos they get influenced by them and start following their paths.

 

[Noman Farooqui]

I think it has much to do with what the audience is interested in as well. If a Sunni Alim were to make a post on basic fiqh for example, it would hardly garner 50 likes. If he were to trash deviants, he would get 1000s. The public needs to shift their focus from just edutainment to actual beneficial knowledge.

For example, there are hundreds of lectures available with Shaykh Salek teaching timeless ilm, but it hurts my heart to see that the views are below 100. One of the things on us sunnis could do is clip those videos and post them on our social media for the people to benefit.

Sunnis also have a very defensive outlook on everything. Notice any lecture that any speaker says anything about wahhabis. They always say that they are trying to "keep people sunni". Don't get me wrong it is very important to safeguard the iman of Sunnis, but you dont see the deviants talking in this way. Why? Because they are focused on bringing new people to the fold. They're not just interested in keeping wahhabis as wahhabis, they want to increase their jama'ah.

Contrast this with Sunnis who have no interest in tableegh. I remember I visited a dawat e islami masjid in chicago a few years ago, and I have to say, I was very disheartened to see the way the brothers behaved. Didn't give salam unless I gave it first, no smiles on their face etc. Whenever, I was a kid, I would visit masjids, where tablighis would be present, and I have to say outwardly they would try to be the friendliest people ever. They would come and give you salam first, and compliment you as well as make small talk. This is unfortunately something, that is lost among sunni masajid.

Anytime we see someone new, we immediately assume that they are a deviant until proven sunni. This is riduculous. Perhaps if American sunnis focus on talking to anyone that is Muslim, as long as it is not proven that they are a deviant we will see people opening up to us and be more receptive to our dawah. Look at the example of daniel haqiqatjou. There is not a dearth of sunnis in america. There are plenty. If we focus on making good ties with him he could be a good asset for us.

We need to focus on being active bringing people to the fold of Sunnism, not just keeping sunnis as sunnis.

 

[Noman Farooqui]

Btw replying to khanah. Hijab is not Salafi. I've seen him talk about the Sifat of Allah and he thoroughly rejects the Salafi beliefs.
He has also been on dilly hussains podcast and said he does not take from Ibn Abdul Wahhab at all and that he is not an authority in the Hanbali school.

Jus look at these videos for example, its obvious hes not a salafi, and he identifies as athari, hanbali, sunni

 

[Ali_Bash]

Btw replying to khanah. Hijab is not Salafi. I've seen him talk about the Sifat of Allah and he thoroughly rejects the Salafi beliefs.
He has also been on dilly hussains podcast and said he does not take from Ibn Abdul Wahhab at all and that he is not an authority in the Hanbali school.

Jus look at these videos for example, its obvious hes not a salafi, and he identifies as athari, hanbali, sunni

He might not be a Salafi wahabi, but he des follow Taymiyyan ideology in most part and considers him to a from the prominent Ḥanbalī scholars although he deviated from them in major issues

 

[Noman Farooqui]

He might not be a Salafi wahabi, but he des follow Taymiyyan ideology in most part and considers him to a from the prominent Ḥanbalī scholars although he deviated from them in major issues

Tbf there have even been many old time sunni scholars that have praised ibn taymiyya and called him shaykhul islam so its not fair to use this against him unless its proven that he follows ibn taymiyyah in his mistakes.

 

[AbdalQadir]

Along with the rest of their content, devs do comedy skits too

https://twitter.com/x/status/1658833735259750402