Changing Munkar vs Taqwa-signalling

You know the hadith about changing evil by your hand or by your tongue or to at least hate it in your heart? Of course you do. We all know this hadith. I'm someone for whom this hadith weighed very heavily upon my head from the first time I ever read it. And I can honestly say that trying haphazardly to fulfill this hadith has gotten me into an inordinate amount of trouble in my life.

It's a dangerous hadith if you take it at face value because it appears to deputize every individual with the right and the power to intervene and interfere in other people's lives by force if necessary. But, of course, this is not what it really means. Changing an evil by your own hand if you can presupposes that you are authorized and capable of doing so. That's what the if you can part means. And the same is true for changing an evil by your tongue, speaking out against it.

It presupposes that you're in a position to do so and that your words will carry the weight of knowledge and authority and be communicated in a way that could actually affect change, not just to express the hatred in your heart for the thing that you want changed. Now I think an overlooked implication of this hadith is the prohibition against futile action and futile speech. If your action or your speech are not predictably likely to bring about change, then you shouldn't do it or say it. This is important to remember, I think, particularly in the age of social media because it seems to me that people very often verbally lash out at someone whom they believe is doing something wrong, but what they say and the way they say it couldn't conceivably be expected to actually change that person's behavior. It's really only said as a kind of Muslim version of virtue signaling, taqwa signaling, with zero expectation that it will actually rehabilitate anyone's behavior.

It's only expressed to demonstrate the speaker's offended piety. Now as a qawam, a father or husband has the authority to change a munker by his hand or by his speech with regards to those under his care. So it's even more important for him to ensure that whatever action he takes or whatever words he speaks will actually be helpful in changing it and not just be punitive or blaming. The desired outcome is improvement, not self aggrandizement or domination, and this will require and towards your wife or your children if you truly want to correct something that they may be doing wrong.