Culture plays a very big role in how we understand public and private space. Where I come from, for the most part, private space is a myth. In Egypt, we find pride in our social nature. We love the fact that our homes are always open, our tables are always welcoming and our spirits are mostly high. In our culture, we celebrate coming together for feasts, for birthdays, for funerals. And for revolutions. However, this hospitality rarely extends to the public space – to the street. Culturally, and sadly, a man’s place is in the public space while the private space is the woman’s, to exist in but not to rule or control.
Then there is the political side. Recently, we’ve lost the ability to be so social. Even if we don’t count all the friends lost and relationships that broke over the political rupture we’ve gone through, it has become risky to exist in big groups in public. Demonstrating is illegal and in a legal system where everything is poorly defined anything can be deemed a demonstration. And ever since the crash of the Egyptian pound, private gatherings are simply unaffordable. This break in how we’re meant to live our life, how we understand our existence in the space we inhabit has broken us – well, dented us. My generation has already been battered and had their blood and bones splattered on the very streets we now have little access to. Demonstrating much other than our miserable individuality is highly frowned upon. We are a living manifestation of divide and ruthlessly conquer.
Public space is also, of course, gendered. For men, the public space is the street; for women – the public place is her life. Our (in)ability to walk down or stand on the street is a consequence of women being perceived as the object of observation. We are constantly under scrutiny for the specific purpose of judgment – by everyone - including, most heartbreakingly, other women. When does she leave her house? What time does she go home? How often is she out? Who does she go out with? Where are they likely to go? What is she wearing? Answers to these questions are to be known, by neighbours and the infamous bawab (doorman). Then, if you pass that impenetrable filter of respectability and honour, and are about to get married, how you inhabit your personal space is now next on the list. Can she cook? Can she clean? Does she take care of herself, or does she let herself go once nobody is looking? Is she a pretty-matching-PJs kind of girl or wretched hair-don’t care kind of girl? We live for the gaze, and practice existing for it, even in private.
A while ago, a girl was standing on the street, in suburban Cairo (not that this should be relevant), when a man approached her and invited her for a cup of coffee. He claimed to only want to relieve her of the harassment she’d get by simply standing there, and that he was “not bothering her”. Her response was that he was in fact bothering her. She then posted the 30 second video on Facebook and it blew up… in HER face.
Initially, most people were hung up on the man’s mispronunciation of the name of the café where he suggested they go, and completely disregarded the intention of the video. He’d just invaded her personal space and had used her own inhibitions against her. Yet, he became a public figure as a victim of unjustified shaming. She, on the other hand, was declared as deserving of his minor trespass - and the shaming that followed, given the way she was “probably” dressed. She wasn’t actually visible in the video, yet, reposting Facebook photos of her in short dresses claiming “She was asking for it” was seen as perfectly acceptable, deserved even. The argument about her clothing is that she “dresses like a European, so she should accept this supposedly European behaviour” of being asked for coffee by random men on the street; “it’s not like he verbally abused her - or worse”.
The consequences of these 30 seconds were fame for the man and complete desecration and isolation of the girl who lost her job, her reputation and even some friends.
There are no social rights for a woman in Cairo. There are only responsibilities. She is responsible for her own reputation, as well as the reputation of the men in her life. The way she behaves is instantly a reflection on the men that she is associated with - father, brother, husband and, very quickly, son. Hence, the rush everyone is in to shut down her ability to self-express. A girl, we’re told in school, is a direct expression of the morals of her entire family. She is also an expression of where the entire society falls on the moral spectrum.
In the debate against the girl, people attacked her for shaming him. Her morality was reduced to not caring about another human, despite her own position of vulnerability against him. There were also debates on whether she had a good reason to be standing on the street to begin with. She put herself in harms way; as if harm is inevitable – and sadly, in Cairo it is. That same argument was used against protestors killed and injured in police attacks – why were they there? It seems to be the way we perceive the world in Cairo: harm is inevitable and it is our responsibility to get out of its way – fighting it, eradicating it, is not an option.
Once her own images came to light, a miserable twist occurred; people blamed her for her own misery. While his reputation deserved saving, hers was everyone’s property to do with whatever they wanted. The way she dresses was seen as unacceptable – skinny jeans are an abomination, and hence, anyone is entitled to attack her. She was portrayed in long posts as this demon that is out to destroy the lives of innocent men just going about their days by being a walking sin. In fact, someone claimed she was lucky someone was nice enough to offer to get her out of harm’s way – or rather stop her from being harm to other people, by simply existing in that space.
This brings us to the religion argument. Islam calls for modesty. A woman (and in fact a man) should always be modest in the way they present themselves to the world. Dress decently and – more relevantly humbly. A woman should not be a point of attraction. One argument against our fellow Egyptian woman was that she dresses attractively; hence she is inviting and should bear the consequences of her decision to draw eyes to her. These arguments dismiss the elements of that very religion that also demand, all of us, men and women, to cover our eyes from what we feel is too revealing. Again, the responsibility – of both man and woman – falls solely on the woman. Shortly after the incident, and another one involving the murder of a husband defending his wife against a harasser, Al-Azhar declared that harassment is haram (forbidden) in Islam, regardless of what the woman is wearing.
The main aspect of this situation with which I’m struggling the most is the amount of women that not only rushed to the rescue of the man’s reputation, but inhumanely and with painful certainty shattered the girl’s. From where I am sitting, seeing a video like this, all I can feel is admiration for her bravery at holding up a camera to a man approaching her on the street and not letting herself be paralysed by fear at what he could be capable of. She is not oblivious to the existence of plenty of people like him who would rush to his side and attack her; yet she proceeded to post the video online anyway. I would be terrified and I was and am for her. I still catch myself, after years of living abroad, scanning the area around me and making sure there is always safe distance between me and the next man on the street; that is after finally learning to walk with my back straight and pretend to be comfortable! Look straight as opposed to the ground and not speed up frantically when someone walks close to/behind me for some time.
I have been wracking my brain, trying to understand or relate to how someone who walks the same streets I do, who witnesses the same things I have witnessed can completely break a fellow fighter-for-mere-existence like that. But then I remembered. When the declaration by Al-Azhar came out and after some discussions with friends about its possible value, it hit me. We have internalised this responsibility; it has gone so deep in some of us that they have managed to wear their adjustment to these conditions as a badge of honour. For those who are familiar with The Handmaid’s Tale, they’re the wives of Gilead, who are proud of their share in the oppression and use their place to abuse other women who practiced their freedoms.
An image from Azeri photographer Alexandra Kramer-Khomassouridze’s exhibition ‘Faces of Freedom’. She interviewed and photographed 50 women living in Baku, Azerbaijan about their opinions of freedom and the hijab.
I flash back to a time where I would cover up to leave the house, like it wasn’t about the street, like it was my decision, like my body cover is the way I should be, it is my invisibility cloak that will get me from point A to B without drama. I remember dismissing the incidents where it didn’t work. I remember seeing girls who dressed up and looked nice and simultaneously thinking they were making things harder for themselves while picturing what I would be wearing if it were up to me. And this is what I think it might all come down to – us thinking it is not up to us. It is up to society, to culture, to religion what we wear and how we exist – and society, culture and religion all tell us to exist in the way that makes life easier for men. Be ugly on the street and sexy at home. Be everything and nothing all at the same time. Saving our best for our husbands and choosing to follow the religious instructions because they are meant for us, to protect us and to make us worthy. Sound familiar?
Something has always felt off about this logic but I could never quite put my finger on it. Until I attended a certain religious lecture where the teacher was talking about modesty and used her own daughter’s outfit as an example of what not to do. She then proceeded to warn us against all the ways men are horrible and how our protection falls on our own shoulders. She went on and on reciting instances where men have harassed women who fit the code of how to behave and left it for us to imagine what they would do if we did not even abide by that code. Religion was only there to protect us against those horrible creatures that are men.
I realised in this moment, that our practice as women, whether religious or social is entirely driven by fear – we exist on survival mode. Our beliefs are derived from an assumption of the inevitability of harm and the best we can do is follow whatever rules there are to keep it at a minimum. It was a counterproductive lecture, because her instructions were contradictory: cover up so men don’t justify their harassment, but know they will harass you anyways. Veiling up is not a religious practice to have a relationship with God, it’s a defensive act, one that comes from expecting the worst of others. This middle-aged woman does not know how to survive otherwise and there she was dooming us all to that same inhibiting mindset. And, sadly, I cannot blame her because this is the experience she has of life.
I believe that the girls who attack a victim of harassment are stuck. They have squeezed themselves into the role ascribed to them by a lifetime of instructions and threats and are hit every day by the uselessness of it and the possibility of an alternative. A slightly bitter theory would stipulate that they do not want that girl to “have her cake and eat it too” whatever the hell that means. They refuse to believe that a person should be able to do what she wants and get away with it, that’s just not how our society works. They attack her for trying. They have finally mastered walking the thin line society has set for them and see any alternative as discrediting their efforts, and challenging their place as the only group worthy of respect.
This perspective, sometimes translates into moral superiority. Once one follows the rules of how to be the best example of an Egyptian woman, they welcome the holier-than-thou entitlement. If someone is following rules that strain them, that make them uncomfortable they will constantly need to give themselves some motivation to keep going. They need this view from their high horses; they need to constantly reclaim this spot, through reminding everyone else that they are down below in the mud. A person who is satisfied with where they are, who is being themselves does not care where other people are in the field, in fact they hardly notice. They are content in themselves.
And I say this from experience. I am someone who has struggled with the rules; I tried to internalise them, to fit in, to make it work. I wondered why I followed these rules and found it so hard while other people found it easy, and another group found it easy to not be concerned with the rules at all. I have envied both groups equally and for the longest time dreaded attempting to abandon the struggle because I didn’t know who I’d be if not a rule follower. Self-reflection is difficult, it requires venturing into the unknown, and starting on a path we’re not always sure about where it leads. But the one thing it leads to is a lack of attention to and concern with how other people handle their personal lives. But when our moral code forces us to live a life of proving to others that we are rule followers, a good following allows us to also meddle and judge other people’s choices. It would lead a woman to feel entitled enough to yell at me to “cover my hair” in the middle of the street. And sadly enough, the same applies for “liberated” women who attack those who find themselves in the social or religious code. Because believe it or not, veiled women get harassed and discriminated against too, accused of backwardness and assumed to lack agency and choice. The latest case in point, this Bar Rafaeli ad; not to mention their exclusion from spaces within their own communities.
The debate on women’s rights in the world is on-going. It’s true that it is one of very slow evolution, but – well, it exists. We have women and more recently men (thank God – finally!!) all over the world, advocating and raising awareness about the recent discovery that women are fully human and they need to be treated as such…you know, be allowed to work and have equal pay and not have their bodies invaded.
In Egypt, we’re still discussing the right of a woman to safely walk down the street – to simply stand on the street. We are setting conditions for that; her safety supposedly depends on where she’s standing, how she’s standing, what she’s wearing and – pretty much her very existence. It is not true that how you dress protects you. You get harassed anyways; and it is baffling for those of us on this side of the fight to realise that there are women who do not see this problem. Who blame other women for their own assaults! And the sides are not guided by the way we dress, or how we choose to inhabit space. They are guided by our belief that women should be able to practice their personal freedom over their bodies and their life choices, and defend their rights regardless of those choices. But unfortunately, until a significant portion of us engage in self-reflection and practice mercy on ourselves and others, we’re not likely to go anywhere.