She was doing a piece on how Muslims may tend to use social media sites differently, particularly when it came to posting pictures.

I saw the article titled, “Is Facebook a Sin? Some Muslims Think So” a few days ago. My initial thought was, “Oh no she di’intt!” For indeed, I never once became a mufti and stated that it was haram to use Facebook.

However, to her defense, I know the pain of having a misleading headline – it used to happen to me as well during my time writing for The Daily Reveille.

Reporters  are encouraged to suggest headlines for their articles, but when the layout team goes to work trying to fit your headline in the amount of space available- a lot of times our headlines are either changed or completely rewritten by them.

*Advice to layout teams – please, we know you are busy, but please skim through the article to write a proper headline.

Before I comment further on the piece, I’ll post it here for you to read first. Article and picture were taken from huffingtonpost.com You may recognize some people’s names you may know in the article as well:

————————————————————————-

By Ankita Rao
Religion News Service

(RNS) Do a Google search on Shirien Elamawy and you’ll find her Tweets, her Egyptian Gumbo website, her college newspaper columns, and the beginnings of her Muslim children’s book.

What you won’t find anywhere is an image of Elamawy herself. It’s not attached to a screed she wrote against Oprah Winfrey, nor a speech she gave on Allah, and definitely not on her Facebook account.

In an effort to be modest in both real and digital life, the 23-year-old Elamawy doesn’t post photos of herself online, and is careful of her interactions with men on the Internet.

“If I could go back in time and not take yearbook pictures, I wouldn’t do that either,” said Elamawy, a marketing consultant who lives in Paramus, N.J.

In the right hands, Facebook can be a powerful social networking hub to keep tabs on far-flung friends, find a job or push a cause. In the wrong hands, it can reveal a treasure trove of dark secrets–photos of drunken coworkers, confessions of stoned preteens, and clues to an unfaithful spouse.

Some Muslims, like Elamawy, also worry it runs afoul of Muslims standards of modesty. Others see it as a home to offensive images like depictions of the Prophet Muhammad, and have personalized Facebook to fit their Islamic beliefs.

“There’s such a thing as virtual modesty,” said Shahed Amanullah, editor-in-chief of altmuslim.com, a popular online magazine. “If you’re modest in the real world, you can be modest in the virtual world.”

While Amanullah says only a minority of Muslims would go as far as Elamawy and remove photos from websites, he said “the best way to gauge how Muslims interact in social networks is to look at Muslim responses to Facebook.”

Online debates ask if Facebook is haram, or forbidden. Facebook has deleted numerous anti-Islam groups; most recently, Facebook was banned in Pakistan and Bangladesh when a group promoted prohibited depictions of Muhammad.

A Pakistan-based website, MillatFacebook.com, cropped up in May as a possible Islam-friendly alternative. Yet despite the controversy, Amanullah said Facebook continues to be the social network of choice in Muslim countries like Egypt and Pakistan, and in the wider Muslim community. He pointed out that some imams even break the 5,000-friend limit and have to switch to fan pages.

Photos of the Canadian comic Hamzah Moin are easy to find online. He’s the funnyman behind the comedy website Maniac Muslim, as well as the “Poking Feels Haram” T-shirt, a reference to the Facebook feature that users love to hate.

While Moin, 25, sees Facebook as a valuable tool for networking and discussion, he also recognizes that it can lead to tainted reputations and bad judgment.”You put the wrong person in front of a car, they can do a lot of damage,” he said.

Farrah Hamid, the editorial director for Elan magazine, agreed that Facebook can be a valuable tool for fostering a conversation between readers and editors, and connecting Muslims around the world.

“It’s kind of like bringing together global voices on a platform where you don’t risk being scrutinized by your government or society,” Hamid said.

But for modest-minded Muslims like Elamawy, it’s the images–not the voices–that cause concern. She’ll browse her friends’ photos and e-mail her photos to friends, but said there’s no way to guarantee privacy once something is posted online.

“You don’t know whose hands they’re going to be in later,” she said. “You don’t know if there’s a guy who is going to be looking at you all decked up, dressed for a party.”

Elamawy’s friend in Dallas, Mehanal Begawala, doesn’t post photos of herself online, and even asked guests not to take photos at her wedding. Begawala allows friends to share pictures where she is wearing a headscarf or full-face veil, like she would in public.

“I’m not sure whether it’s personal or related to my religion,” said Begawala, 28. “I don’t prefer to broadcast my life to everyone or anything.”

The issue of proper attire or image isn’t just a concern for women. Seeing a man in a tank-top and shorts could have the same effect as a woman in a miniskirt, she said.

Begawala worries when she sees Muslim friends post photos in less modest clothing than they would wear in public. That double-standard, along with risqué status updates and photos, can stir gossip in tight-knit communities.

Citing broken marriage proposals and threatened careers that were prompted by Facebook revelations, Moin said “now more than ever,” Muslims should post photos that reflect their personality and values when using Facebook.

“If we’re going around flirting online and in real life we are shy and quiet, it’s kind of a mild schizophrenia,” he said. “As Muslims we should be consistent in how we act.”

(OPTIONAL TRIM FOLLOWS)

Elamawy insists she has no problem with self-expression, but rather with propriety. While her opposition to female hymen surgery and thoughts on Jesus are fair game in a public forum, her face just doesn’t mix with Facebook.

“People often think that when you’re covered, your personality and your voice is covered too,” she said, “but that’s definitely not the case.”
—————————————————————————

Oprah, if you are reading this I don’t hate you (I just wish you’d become Muslim) . But to clear that up, I was actually disgusted by a guest appearing on the show – rather than Winfrey herself.

Also, who are these people saying “Few people would go as far as“ me in my decision to not post my picture online? That’s just sad.

My only other objection is that she picked every single “controversial sounding” post on my blog and made it sound like I was full of scandal or something.

Anyway, I just felt the title of this piece was very misleading and hope that it doesn’t deter people away from realizing Islam is a religion of moderation. May Allah accept it from us all, ameen.

Overall, I’d like to thank her for the article; it was a fun read and she was very pleasant and nice to talk to.

Well it’s been a few days since I came out with my very first kids book “Aliyah’s First Ramadan.” It’s been a bag of mixed feelings; I’m over joyed the project is done, alhamdulillah, but I also realize that writing the book is the easy part – marketing the book will take its time. But all in all I’m happy to do it – and I hope that everyone can at least see the khair  (good) in making these projects.

Abdullah the puppet asked me if he could read and demonstrate the book online – for those kids who buy the book to read along and learn. At first I was weary – after all I did just spend a few months putting this thing together! But after thinking about it, I thought it was a great idea.

Kids often go up to their parents and ask them to read their favorite book over and over again. Now, when the parent is busy they can put on the video and the kids can read along.

Also, the style of the video is meant to be a little more eye-candy for the kids.

So without further adieu, I’d like to present my book, “Aliyah’s First Ramadan” read by our friend, Abdullah Puppet.

If you like the video, go ahead and buy the book- even just the PDF version for your kids/nieces/nephews/cousins/etc.

Of course you don’t have to only go to Abdullahpuppet.com, you can simply click this button below:

Finally, if you liked the video – please share it with all the kids you know as well as their parents!

After many months on planning and revising, my first-ever kids book is finally available to the public: “Aliyah’s First Ramadan.”

( This is the back cover- the front cover can be found on the right side bar)

This is a story of a young girl, Aliyah, and her first time fasting Ramadan. Conflict ensues when she is at school and the teacher yells, “SNACK TIME!”  Find out what happens in this fun rhyme book!

I’m really excited about this book because it’s so fun to read out loud to kids. The illustrations were wonderfully drawn by Br. Mohamed Qovaizi, and the final product really exceeded my expectations, walhamdulillah. I can honestly say I did my best to publish this book with ihsaan.

My appeal to you, the reader:

If you have kids of your own, younger siblings, nieces, nephews or even friends who have kids — buy this book and send it out to your email lists.

Any profits from this book will, inshaAllah, HELP FACILITATE HAJJ for my husband and I. So this project is extremely important for so many different reasons.

This book is for kids ages 4+

Two Formats of the book to chose from:

1. You can purchase the PDF online version of the book for $11.99 or

2. You can purchase the physical book to be shipped to your home for$19.99 – inshaAllah.

I really recommend the physical copy of the book, because it’s a lot funner for kids to actually hold and filp through the pages, not to mention it’s easier for reading at bed time .

May Allah ‘az wa jal accept this from me and from you, ameen.

Wassalamu Alaikum,

Shirien

My illustrator, Br. Mohammed Qovaizi just finished all the drawings for the story book. “Aliyah’s First Ramadan” is now being finalized.

Take a look a sample of what’s inside

Image 1:

Image 2:

A few days ago, I contacted a publisher to see if they would be interested in publishing a few books with me geared toward trying to create cultural-religious understanding at an early age.

The publisher expressed some interest in my ideas and said they are willing to work with me – but they wanted to see a summary of a story the next day.

I spend a good few hours writing my kids’ book and alhamdulillah, it came out quite cute. It’s a story about a girl named Aliyah and her first time fasting Ramadan- with illustrations it will be a perfect picture book for your elementary school child, inshaAllah.

I got to thinking ,and decided it would be really nice if we could also couple our kids’ show DVD with a nice book about “Abdullah” as well.

I found a great Muslim illustrator who will work within the guidelines of drawing, now all I needed was a story “Abdullah” would go through and I was set to write. He drew the picture that goes along with the post, and a few modifications to the beard, erase the ears and maybe the shape of the head – and we’ve got ourselves a “Abdullah” cartoon!

My husband suggested that I write the book about cheating — kids go through this at school all the time. So I agreed and started writing. After I had finished, I realize that a picture book that had to do with cheating may not be ideal. Afterall, who reads picture books? Three to seven-year-olds? They typically don’t have to deal with cheating at those ages.

And why teach them a bad concept they may not be aware of yet? Fail Shirien, Fail. Not to mention I used a stereotype in my story lol.

I spent a lot of time with it, so as to not go to waste, I’m posting the words to my would-be-book here, so that maybe your older kids might find amusement and lesson in it. Enjoy!

__________________________________________________________________

Abdullah’s Test Isn’t His Best

*****************************

It’s  Abdullah’s first day of school

Prepare the books and colors too
–

“Hello there Abdullah”, his teacher said

Her name’s Mrs. Janet – dressed in red
-

History, Science and English too

But math was his favorite – the time just flew
–

The kids had so much fun as weeks went by

But now it was test time- Abdullah, don’t cry
–

“I’m no good at English!” Abdullah said aloud

“Just do your best” The teacher said proud
–

“If I make a bad grade, my mother might fuss”

“Maybe I should cheat,” he thought on the bus
–

Ali is smart but so is john

I’ll stick to the smartest – that kid from Taiwan
–

Exam day was here and he feels kind of nervous

After all, this test was Ginormous
–

I’ll look on his paper when she turns away

A, B, C, D the answers were displayed
–

“Time’s almost out,” the teacher explained

“Give us ten more minutes,” the students exclaimed

–

The test was over –” I hope I passed”

“Abdullah and Tim, can you stay after class?”
–

“I want to know what’s going on”

“Your answers are the same – and most are wrong”
–

“I swear I didn’t cheat! Tim said quite sad”

“I just couldn’t study, my tummy hurt bad”

–

“Abdullah, I expected more from you”

“I’m calling your mommy and daddy too”
–

“I’m in trouble now, ” Abdullah said worried

Time to go home and face the fury
–

“Abdullah, you have never done something so bad

We’re willing to forgive and not be so mad”
–

“I’m not good at English!” Abdullah exclaimed

“No one is perfect!” his mother explained
–

“Muslims are honest and we try our best”

“It is much better to do so-so than to cheat on a test”
–

The next day at school Mrs. Janet called him aside

“Abdullah, I’m willing to give you one more try”
–

“I really feel bad, I won’t let you down

I’ll study and study, even my nouns”
–

Two days went by and now it was time

Abdullah was confident he’d do just fine
–

He put all his studying into a rhyme

Nouns, verb, adjectives were now all defined
–

Nouns were persons, places or things

While verbs were actions like kids who would swing
–

The exam was over at a quarter past three

“Abdullah, Congrats! You got a B”

(www.abdullahkidshow.com)

A few months ago I was feeling a bit crafty. I hadn’t worked on a project in a long time “just for fun.” So I decided to go to the local arts and craft store to pick up some supplies.

As I was walking past the painting section, strolling past wood arts and gliding past the coloring section I was trying to decided what creative project will I invest the next few hours of my time on. I thought about a project I have been wanting to begin for about a year; an Islamic kids’ show.

“I’ll make a puppet,” I told my husband.

By the time I started, it was pretty late at night. My husband was fast asleep and I was working hard. About three hours past and I was finally done.

I’ll be the first to admit I’m not a creative, artsy person. In fact I’m just downright horrible at it all. And this puppet did not turn out any different.

There comes a time after you start working on something so intently that when you’re done and you sit back and see your final product, you realize the reality of what you just made- good or bad; only this time… it was bad.

So after seriously working on this thing for about three hours, I finally burst at laughing at the thought that I had “wasted my time.” It turned out to be very ghetto.

My husband woke up to my laughing and when he saw my final product he got terrified. “That thing is SCARY!”

I began taunting him and asking him if he’d make a video of my puppet. He finally gave in. We obviously went unscripted just playing around with the thing, and we decided to put it online because we had a lot of fun doing it.

We made two videos:

“Do something productive:”

“Abdullah works on a theme song”

We got people sending us messages and emails asking us to make more videos of “Abdullah.”

After seeing my poorly-made puppet I was not really intending on using him for anything other than scaring my husband from time to time. But after seeing peoples’ responses, we both agreed “It doesn’t have to be perfect, it just has to get going.”

So that was the starting point for producing our Islamic kids’ show. We are hoping to get a DVD out by the end of the summer.

After six weeks of production and post-production we are happy to present episode 1 of “Abdullah.”

If you would like to see the FULL EPISODE, since it’s not on YouTube (over 10 minutes) go to www.abdullahkidshow.com

I’m the type of person who’s always on the lookout for the next project I want to complete. I find something I believe to be beneficial, fun and challenging all at the same time.

So what’s my next big project? Producing an Islamic kids show.

After doing research, I decided to see where I could cut costs for production. After seeing where all the costs would be coming from, I determined the best way to save money would be to make the puppets for my show myself. Typically, a custom-made puppet professionally done cost around $1,000.

I went to an arts and craft store yesterday to pick out my supplies and while my husband was asleep, I spent a good three hours working so hard and so diligently.

I had to figure out how to make the mouth part to move and somehow put it all together into the puppet. And after all the gluing, cutting and planning I take a good look at my final product and…. I BUST out laughing.

I couldn’t help it. The puppet was just so pathetic. My husband had awoken to my laughing and I showed him what I made — only for him to cover his eyes and tell me how scary it looked.

I asked him to take a picture of it and put it on his Facebook and his reply was, “I don’t want to for the safety of the people.”

Anyway, after much convincing he reluctantly decides to make a video for fun of my masterpiece and this was the result:

We decided to use this as a means to raising funds for our REAL kids show (which I’m happy to say will NOT have beat boxing, and will not feature a character such as Ghetto Abdullah).

Find out how you can invest in our project soon.

Let us know what your thoughts are.

Tortoise gets Alzheimer and speaks to everyone in an incoherent fashion, and makes his way across the finish line drunk.

“Where the Wild Things Are” is a movie I wish never existed. If you are even thinking about going to see this movie with the hope of reminiscing on the enchanted nature of one of your favorite childhood books, DON’T. It will kill your childhood memories.

The film was certainly not for kids — not because of any obscenities but because of the dark, depressing nature of the film and not to mention the scariest looking monsters ever.

CNN and USA Today both examined the reactions of parents who took their children to see the movie. One reaction from CNN:

“[The film] was joyless. There were maybe 15 minutes of the hour and a half that my kids were into it,” said James Griffioen of Detroit, Michigan. His 4-year-old daughter asked, “Why is this movie so sad?” in the middle of their family’s matinee viewing, while his son, a 20-month-old who normally can’t get enough of the 1963    children’s classic, was simply bored, he told CNN.

The main character in the movie was a boy named Max. He is a lonely boy looking for acceptance and has some rage issues.

The kid is just as weird in the movie as he was in his interview on Conan. But than again, I’d turn out weird too if my real name were “Max Records.”

In one scene he actually bites his mom out of anger and runs into the forest, onto a little boat, crosses the ocean and lands on an island where the “Wild Things Are.” He thinks he is a wolf and howls and growls a lot in the film which is all pretty annoying. Everyone in this movie, including the monsters, are either suffering from loneliness, feeling different, sadness or anger. The mother in the movie is losing her job, the older sister cares more about her friends than her little brother Max and at one point in the movie the “wild things” ask the boy, “Can you make the sadness go away?”

It was also very incoherent and had the worst story-line and dialog ever. Nothing made sense in that movie. It was so boring and finally when you think the conflict is finally here, it just becomes more disturbing.

Throughout the whole movie you are trying to understand where the conflict is and what the real story is. Finally, when the real conflict comes in it’s about the boy not being able to keep the “sadness” away, and thus out of his anger, one of the “wild things” rips off the arm of another monster.

When the movie ended I turned to Belal and said, “I want two hours of my life back.” The guy walking out behind us told his friend, “This movie was so depressing I feel like committing suicide.”

It’s like they always say, the book is always better than the movie.

Last week, we read an article on MuslimMatters together which got us tossing and turning at night. “Surely we cant just let it go, can we?” We’ve debated with this question for a while, and the result is, yup — this blog post. We couldn’t let it go. So MuslimMatters, this one is for you:

This is specifically in response to part three of the Islamic marketing series, which is written by ibnabeeomar.

We’re sorry for having to do this, but there are some major mistakes in the article.

Let’s start with the basic understand that public relations and branding are two completely different facets of marketing.

The article states,

Marketing is also closely tied to branding – or the perception that people have of your organization

For example, if you run an organization closely tied to youth activities, people’s perception of you will always be of being youth focused. Even if you later try to brand yourself as something tailored for adults, it is hard to shed that reputation.

Just like Nike may brand itself one way, but people invariably associate its “brand” with sweatshop abuse.

The reason this is important to keep in mind is because I strongly believe certain types of marketing practices can brand an Islamic organization one way or another (most often in a negative fashion).

Branding has to do with the image in the minds of the people that has been built over a period of time supplemented with symbolism, colors, and emotions. Its a one-way communication from the company to the masses.

PR has to do with managing the communication between the company and its publics, therefore it’s two-way communication.

Let’s give the example of a company’s “image.” More specifically, lets look at cars since that’s the example you used in your article.

You posted these four videos —

Two of the videos were straight branding and the other two were straight sales — no PR or branding involved.

If we’re talking branding with the Infinity and BMW commercial, the branding is PURE, FAST, SPORTY, and THRILL.

Notice the white background in both videos. Notice the focus on speed and sharp turns.

How do we turn that into PR?

Lets say one of the cars has a transmission problem and people are questioning the quality of these expensive cars. A PR rep might hold a press conference assuring customers the vehicle is safe. Also, PR reps could recommend the company extend its warranty on the transmission — sort of like what Acura did with the CL and TL models from 2001-2003.

Another PR stunt would be to get reviewers from car magazines to test drive and give their thoughts on the different facets and benefits of what this car has to offer in comparison to the others in its class.

By the way, Nike didn’t have a “branding issue” with the sweat shops. They had a PR issue. No one questioned the quality of Nike shoes. They questioned ethics which is a PR issue. If Nike hadn’t taken care of the issue, over an extended period of time it would eventually turn into a branding issue.

To an extent, branding and PR are closely related, but we cannot mix the two and say they are the same.

– –

Strategy vs. Tactics

Throughout the article the word “strategy” was used in place of the term “tactic.”

Every single Islamic program nowadays is doing the best it can to showcase itself as the best program on the planet, being as flashy as possible, and utilizing whatever strategies are at its disposal to convince people to attend.

Sometimes out of our zeal to get people to attend programs and benefit from them, we sometimes use strategies that can degrade the noble thing that we are calling to.

You followed the last statement with what Seth Godin is describing as specific tactics.

What’s the difference you might ask?

STRATEGY itself isn’t an action plan or a formula. Strategy is simply the evolution of a core idea within a company that is operating within changing circumstances.

An effective strategy comes with understanding several things:

• What advantages your company has on the ground?

• What ways you can suprise the industry?

• What are the different approaches one can take to attack an industry?

• Who are the people that one can team with to assist in that attack?

• What moral forces will come into play?

• How you’ll bear focus on a single point within the industry itself?

An effective strategy has to do with having an understanding of who you are and who/what the centers of power and influence are within a given industry and knowing that those are the power centers one has to attack.

Another way you can define strategy is the understanding of:

• What is the overall impact that your organizations long range goals will have.

• What is the ultimate accomplishment and ultimate position – the perception in the minds of people – you want your organization to have in the market

TACTICS are the specific actions you take to fulfill your organization’s strategic objectives and support the position that is being targeted and knowing that those specific efforts are fulfilling the strategic objectives of the organization individually and together.

– –

As you can tell, that section on strategy was clearly written by Belal alone and I was unsuccessful in Gumbofying it. I gave up. He talks too technical. So to that I say, “Batatis.”

– –

Ibnabeeomar had good and valid points in his article and by no means is this undermining his general thoughts. We agreed and disagreed with him on some issues but we decided not to comment on the main theme of the article but rather the nitty gritty things that may not seem so big or important to most people.

We felt it is important for most individuals to understand the nitty gritty details because whether you are a volunteer or and admin planning events with MSAs you are responsible for marketing just as much as the marketing director.

These things are essential to execution and success after the tawfeeq of Allah ‘az wa jal.

This article is a joint effort of Belal Khan and Shirien Elamawy.