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With Egyptian women taking to an anti-sexual harassment campaign on Monday, in what is the first such massive movement on the streets and online to promote a change in Egyptian society toward the treatment of women, the role of women’s empowerment in the Middle East and the Islamic world has too often been left on the sidelines in the face of grave injustices that are reported.
It is a dark time for women across the Islamic world, but we are witnessing a revolution of thinking. When Egyptian women took to the streets on International Women’s Day, they were met by angry men who harassed and assaulting them, showing the ugly signs of Egyptian society. Now, however, women’s advocates are not turning a blind eye and running; instead they are facing the societal issues head on in an effort that is gaining steam, supporters and effectiveness.
“This is happening finally, we are having a women’s revolution in Egypt and it will spread to other places where women are struggling,” said Heba, a 33-year-old mother of two who has joined forces online to promote Monday’s campaign.
For those who supported or observed on Monday, thousands of women and women advocates took to Twitter with the hashtag #endSH in order to voice their concerns and tell their stories of sexual harassment. The event was led by HarassMap, who joined forces with activists and bloggers in Egypt and across the region in the organisation of the online campaign that is just part of the growing women’s revolution.
The key word here is “women’s revolution” and not “sexual revolution” as many Western commentators too often argue is what is needed. While ostensibly they may mean the same thing in Western intellectual circles, talking of a sexual revolution inside conservative Islamic societies alienates and ultimately lessens the impact that women’s rights leaders and organisations can achieve.
By talking on empowerment and a “women’s revolution” these women – who hail from all walks of life and economic backgrounds – are able to be inclusive and not exclusive of many of the conservative elements, including among women, that are now beginning to join forces in the battle to give women a just future.
While empowerment does include aspects of sexuality and sex itself, women in Egypt and elsewhere in the region have understood that if the focus is on a woman’s body they face an uphill task that sees the scorn of the religious community, men and the governments. So they have chosen to go another route, a better route.
Empowerment to these women means equality. Equality, they argue, for the workplace, on the streets, at home and among friends and colleagues. This vocabulary change and prioritising goals has helped to draw in thousands of women to the cause, and it is growing.
Menna Ahmed is a 24-year-old recent Cairo University graduate. She has taken on the cause of women’s empowerment in Egypt and says that through her discussions with her other female friends, she is garnering new followers.
“When we talked a few months ago about the role of women in society, we were all frustrated at how a lot of people talk about sexuality and sex as a means to progressing our societies, but the reality is that through other aspects such as jobs we can achieve more,” she said.
Menna is right. By talking of empowerment, and not sexual liberation, there are specific goals that can be achieved through a bottom-up perspective. In Egypt, this means pushing education to create a society that will view women as integral parts of society, not periphery beings that can be tossed aside – as we have witnessed in the months after the protest movement took down former President Hosni Mubarak’s regime.
What Menna and others hope to achieve is simple: break down the construct that women are objects. Over the past few years, we have seen arguments on why sexual harassment is so rampant in Egypt – studies show nearly two-thirds of Egyptian woman report harassment and 97 percent of foreign women – and a lot of it is focused on the women themselves instead of the men doing the harassing.
As the nascent women’s movement in the region, and especially Egypt, begins to truly take form, the change in tone and campaign to one of empowerment will likely be a winning combination. I remember a couple of years ago, a Cairo-based sheikh told me that if Egyptian women were to be granted the freedoms of the west, “they would resort to promiscuity and this would damage the family and society. This cannot happen because men would not be able to control their behavior and harassment and sexual abuse would continue.”
And this is the conundrum that these women in Egypt are planning to tackle. They want to change the perception that women’s activists have on the ground. Menna said that in her conversations with other women’s activists, the sentiment is that changing perspectives within daily life is the key to success. They want to avoid a conversation on the role of sex in the women’s movement in order to achieve more widespread success. And they are right in doing so.
“We are looking for all ways to create a new Egypt and that means getting women into the educational system and forcing jobs to be open and equal in their dealings with women applicants,” she said.
Although it is still too early to say the overall success, the fact that it is growing and making a public image for itself is positive and one we should all be supporting.
The writer is an American journalist based in Cairo and is the Editor-in-chief of bikyamasr.com
