Living in America vs living in a Muslim country

[curious-traveller]

I'm considering staying in America, but moving to California

Are you a new Muslim ? Moving out of USA depends a lot on your personal background.

[alfulani]

stick with the yanks, whilst loads of em may claim to hate muslims, thats only a tiny extremist minority, theyre mostly an uneducated lot that need educating about foreign cultures, and are really friendly and generally pretty cool once you get to know them.

Qatar, however, is still my all time fav country because its rich and muslim but not a cultural sell out like a certain emirate in the UAE..

[curious-traveller]

Bismillah


I would either go to Canada, Australia, Newzeland, Turkey, Malaysia and UK& US being the last on the list. One key point is if you want to safeguard your deen, it is almost wajib to 1.connect yourself to a seassoned reputable scholar from any of islamic seminary and 2.be involved in dawah organisation that focues on the self betterment and the wider community. 3.For some I would even add a shaikh of Tassawuf with grounded in shariah.
This is where most people go wrong by ignoring this steps and later on their family and deen suffers. Of all the people I have known most of their family problem is due to being apathetic to the trend outside and taking appropriate measures. It is unlikly things will go wrong if one is sincere in their venture and do not adopt a self righteous arrogant know it all attitude.

As for qatar or UAE, these countries are fine for medium term stay. We can't become citizen of these countries and I agree with this policy unless you want these country to follow others in loss of their control over their countries. One can do whatever you want. If you want relegious knowledge, you have to work a bit harder unlike in the west. The above mentioned point still need to be adhered to as much as possible.
Allahualam

Situation in the UK is deteriorating quite fast. Soon , there will be discrimination along ethnic lines. This message from a British govt offcial portends a bleak future.
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http://uk.news.yahoo.com/minister-ur...075117373.html

Businesses should recruit more young, unemployed Britons rather than taking on migrant workers, the work and pensions secretary said on Friday.

Iain Duncan Smith said more than half of the new jobs created in Britain over the last year went to foreign nationals.

One of the British government's key strategies in its drive to cut "painfully high" unemployment is to get immigration under control so that British workers face less competition for jobs from migrants, Duncan Smith said.

But he called on businesses to play their part by giving jobs to unemployed British youths rather than recruiting labour from abroad.
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[mikail2]

is there any difference in your recommendations to do hijra or not if the person involved is young versus retired and older?

if you are older, it might make more sense to move to Muslim country if you are living on savings or pension, then you don't have to work in foreign environment and can just do ibada?

[curious-traveller]

Just to let you know, you can't actually become a citizen in most of the Gulf nations such as Qatar or the UAE. They give their native citizens considerable benefits, and as such, do not allow foreigners to become citizens except with the explicit permission of the royal families--which usually involves wedding a citizen (which you really do not want to do--Gulf women require MONEYZ!!! )

My advice, if you're seeking to do such a thing, is to move to Turkey. The country is quickly becoming an economic powerhouse (which means you'll be highly appreciated as a western educated individual), and the country and people are very nice. Istanbul is simply amazing.

Regarding Turkey , you should not be too much optimistic , if you are a practicing Muslim brother keeping beard. I mean, in Turkey many companies are owned by secular elite who do not allow the employees to keep beard. However, if you start your own business there , or find companies owned by religious minded people , then you may have a good chance to do work without shaving your beard.

[Wolf]

Are you a new Muslim ? Moving out of USA depends a lot on your personal background.

I'm a white-looking convert to Islam

[London786]

Nomadic saab....you mention turkey? Try getting a job in Turkey with a beard. Newzeland and Malaysia have their fare share of problems. UK is a lot better than these countries in my own humble opinion. For a white guy UAE and Qatar are very good Wolf Man. Same as Saudi Arabia. As a white man you will get respect so don't worry. Your presence could be a form of dawah to the people.

[seeker_ikb]

Nomadic saab....you mention turkey? Try getting a job in Turkey with a beard. Newzeland and Malaysia have their fare share of problems. UK is a lot better than these countries in my own humble opinion. For a white guy UAE and Qatar are very good Wolf Man. Same as Saudi Arabia. As a white man you will get respect so don't worry. Your presence could be a form of dawah to the people.

I think, the core issue of widespread sick mentality of the Arabs in the middle eastern countries originate from the lack of spirituality. So, we need to promote spirituality in those countries in a large scale.

Since white Western people are highly respected in those areas, we should use them to promote Sufism ( Islamic spirituality) in those countries. I mean , our dawah brothers in the West should encourage the white Muslim brothers to be well trained in Tasawwuf ( Islamic spirituality ) . Then if they come to the Gulf countries , they can promote Tasawwuf to the local and other arabs !!

Sadly, at present, most of the white revert brothers in the West fall in the hands of Salafi brothers !!

[Salman_Hanafi]

....sorry am asking it on this thread, does UAE in general discriminate on the beard when it comes to jobs??

[London786]

It is not due to a lack of spirituality. It is a huge social phenomen even prevailent amongst some people of taswuff. It would require indepth analysis. The best means of countering this on a large scale in my humble opinion is 1 of 2 things. 1. Revert shaykhs coming to gulf. 2. Revert brothers joining tabligh work and showing practically that we muslims are 1.

I think the best solution would be some grandscale tabligh jamaat effort. This is the only way of eradicating the problem in my opinion.