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Fatwa CenterWhat to Do When Seeing Backbiting on Social Media
Question
What do I do if I see backbiting on social media/news. Do I take the matter into my own hands and defend the person, even when they are a celebrity, a person I don’t even know, a non Muslim, etc? Or do I just ignore the post completely, skip it, and move on. For example, i see someone backbiting a random celebrity on YouTube, do I have to take the time to comment on that post and defend them? Or do I just ignore it
Answer
All perfect praise be to Allah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allah, and that Muhammad 
is His slave and Messenger.
As for those who are famous for their immorality and openly speak about it, there is no backbiting for them, and the Muslim is not required to deny their backbiting.
Noting that it is not permissible to follow this type of people, or like their pages, because it will lead to see their evils, and increase the viewers (followers), and advertise for them. In addition, following them is also a sign of love to them and admiration, and in fact they deserve to be hated by people for the sake of Allah the Almighty.
As for the Muslims who are not famous for their immorality and do not openly speak about it, then backbiting them is forbidden, either in writing, audio, or video. The view that we adopt here in Islamweb is the prohibition of reading what was written from the forbidden backbiting.
Al-Bajirmi from the Shafi`i School of jurisprudence, said in his footnote on Sharh Al-Khatib: “What is forbidden in itself is forbidden to watch it, because this is being pleased with it as Ibn Qassim said in his footnote on Al-Manhaj.” [End of quote]
In principle, it is obligatory for whoever heard his backbiting or read it, even by commenting on the clip in which there is backbiting, to deny his backbiting.
If the matter becomes widespread and it is beyond the limit of ability, then Allah does not burden a soul beyond its capacity, but one does not see the clips in which he knows that there is backbiting, because this is like leaving the place of disobedience.
Allah knows best.
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