Not all non-marital relationships are "slutty"

Suroor (Achelois) and PM are discussing issues on their blogs which have brought up the concept of "sluttiness". If I knew how to do that spiffy linking thingy with their names, I would but being a computer idiot, I cannot, sorry. But I do have links to their blogs on my sidebar.

There has been a lot of talk about sex outside of marriage. Obviously all sex outside of marriage is not ok according to Islam, but this doesn't mean that it is always slutty and meaningless for the people involved. There are plenty of people who have very committed long-term relationships without getting married. They may choose not to get married because they do not believe in it as an institution, they may not feel that they need the state to endorse their relationship. This does not mean that they are promiscuous and superficial or irresponsible with no concern for their families. It may mean simply that they see their relationship as valid in itself without needing to be propped up by the law of the land.

What we need to remember is that the validity of an Islamic marriage comes from it being a commitment between a couple to conduct their relationship according to the laws of God. People who have no religious belief obviously cannot marry in this way, but would a State marriage be any more acceptable Islamically? There is no consideration of Allah in a State marriage. I have no idea about the legal considerations of this, my point is simply to remind people not to be judgemental. Yes, there is plenty of "sluttiness" in the world but it doesn't always come from non-muslims. The behaviour of many young Muslim men in my own community is far more slutty than the behaviour of many people I knew in my non-muslim past.

This is not an endorsement of Godless marriage or de-facto relationships, I don't want to suggest that there is not a problem with non-marital sex in the West. I just think it's important to make it clear that statistics which state the amount of people involved in non-marital relationships, cannot be used as examples of sluttiness, because there are plenty of de-facto relationships that could not in any way be described by this word.