The Pakistani Spectator

When mullahs said that women should not be educated, we raised our voice. When psychos started burning girls’ schools down, we raised our voice. In favour of female education, we raised our voice. All this only to see that women, after gaining education and independence, do nothing about abusive husbands. I used to think it may be because women get used to financial security from their husbands, but there are women who are financially independent and do nothing about abuse. It can be concluded that women don’t value themselves. And then they give lectures to men on how to value them.

Abusing one’s wife has become a daily routine for some men. However, they don’t realize how much it affects children. Lets keep in mind that a taunt or verbal abuse is in no way less than physical abuse, as the former scars the soul just as physical abuse scars the body. When a person abuses his wife, children take notice. There are many people who like to order their wife around as though she is a servant. Children take notice. There are many people who think that a wife is a slave for their parents, which often happens in joint families. Children take notice. There are many people who make their wife beg for money, which is actually her right. Children take notice. What do fathers then expect their children to do after they become independent. Worship them? Of course no sane child would ever like to see his father again.

These fathers wonder why their children don’t want to see them. Obviously, the days when they taunted their wife are forgotten, when their child took notice and did not say anything, only boiling in rage. The days are forgotten when these fathers were too busy showing authority. The days are forgotten when these fathers would spend luxuriously on their nephews and nieces, and would make their children beg for even their necessities, only to tell them a no. While they give gifts to nieces and nephews, spending on their own children gives them digestion problems. Fathers talk with utmost politeness to other people’s children, but the moment they are inside the house they talk to their own children as though they are talking to dogs. It is as though one’s children are exempt from kindness.

Many people don’t know that children in Islam have to be treated equally in terms of money. I was horrified to learn about a girl mention that her father brought her sister a 7 lakh car but does not want to spend a single paisa on her university education. Here is a father spending on one daughter’s luxury but does not spend on another’s necessity. There are many fathers like this. Obviously without any knowledge about Islam. While one child is favoured, another is ignored. This is a sin and completely un-Islamic. This applies with sons too. All of them have to be treated equally.

Spending equally on children applies with inheritance money as well. It has to be distributed equally as Islam has outlined. Many people don’t give daughters inheritance money with the thought that her husband will spend on her. What is even more surprising is that brothers gladly accept the money which includes their sister’s right. This money is haram on the brothers, and haram money can take the shape of any problem, misery or disease.

There was a man who came to Hazrat Umar complaining about his son’s disobedience. Upon inquiry from the son, it was found out that the father did not fulfill the son’s rights. Hazrat Umar told the man to go away. Just today I went to the Friday prayers, and the topic was on akhlaq. The preacher talked about showing good akhlaq from everyone to neighbours and strangers, but he missed out on wife and kids. Another example that comes to mind is tablighees Ikram-ul-Muslimeen. Tablighees don’t seem to know that Ikram is for wife and kids too. When was the last time a tablighee preached kindness to wife and kids. Apparently, good akhlaq is only outside the house.

Politeness should be for one’s own children before anyone else. Children also desire to be treated with the same politeness and respect that parents want from their children. In our society, fathers demand respect. Be rude to children and then expect them to respect you. Fathers don’t ever listen to their children’s views and force their own opinions down their children’s throats. Some fathers want all their children to be the same without understanding that every human being is different.

Many fathers are inferiority complex suffering losers could not achieve anything in life and their perverted satisfaction that comes from ordering their family around. This only lasts until their family is with them. The moment their children leave for college and then get married, these fathers beg their children to see them. When these children never come to see their father, reality slaps them in the face and they find out that they were never a father, only a dictator and a loser.