- Campaigners in Egypt say the problem of sexual harassment is reaching epidemic proportions, with a rise in such incidents over the past three months. For many Egyptian women, sexual harassment - which sometimes turns into violent mob-style attacks - is a daily fact of life, reports the BBC's Bethany Bell in Cairo.
Even in cultures where women are often fully covered up you get scumbags telling women that it's their fault.
- On the Qasr al-Nil bridge in central Cairo, a hotspot for harassment, I met a group of teenage boys hanging out near street stalls blaring loud music.
When I asked them about a recent case of mass harassment in which women at a park were groped by a gang of boys, they told me the girls brought it on themselves.
"If the girls were dressed respectably, no-one would touch them," one of them said. "It's the way girls dress that makes guys come on to them. The girls came wanting it - even women in niqab."
Which is of course a lie
- "It does not make a difference at all. Most of Egyptian ladies are veiled [with a headscarf] and most of them have experienced sexual harassment.
"Statistics say that most of the women or girls who have been sexually harassed have been veiled or completely covered up with the niqab."
Harassers are getting younger, campaigners say
In 2008, a study by the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights found that more than 80% of Egyptian women have experienced sexual harassment, and that the majority of the victims were those who wore Islamic headscarves.
I wonder how those who tell women in North America that they could prevent their sexual harassment and rapes by not dressing 'provocatively' would react to this. This is reaching reductio ad absurdum levels, IMO.
If an attractive woman happened to be walking down the street nude and someone raped her, that person would be a horrible monster. There is no justification for such things. Never, ever, ever. I don't care how they are dressed or what they said etc. If you force yourself upon a woman (or man), you are evil. It's that simple.
I shiver at the thought that this is a reality. That people are capable of such a thing. I would fear for the safety of pretty much every girl out there and especially my sister and female friends. If girls provoke sexual harassment just by going outside, something has gone terribly wrong. The government, but also parents and educators, have the responsibility to act and try to stop this behaviour or at least try their hardest. The harassers should also take a critical look at their own behaviour (I know, wishful thinking). What I do not understand though, is how these people are capable of doing this. Would they do the same with their own sister, niece or female friends?
I wonder if this "just" a cultural problem, or a parental problem. At least this shows that even wearing a niqab doesn't work against the horny men walking around in the Islamic world. Actually, I wonder of this problem is also rampant in the rest of the Islamic world or just an Egyptian problem!
It's what happens when boys are told that women are less than men and only good for sex and making babies. There is definitly a political/religious agenda behind this. If speaking out against this behaviour can get you killed, the country will slowly slide into a new dictatorship. And the sad fact is that it looked so promising right after the revolution.