A Feminist Mantra
Women, as the Persons that They Are
One day, in a fictional narrative after a (much needed) sexual revolution takes place in Egypt, a woman finally becomes the first female President of Egypt; women are viewed as the persons that they are.
"Why Egypt?" you ask.
Because Cairo, the capital of Egypt, was recently named "world’s most dangerous megacity for women," according to a report by the Thomson Reuters Foundation; and because the author of this counterfactual story is a very frustrated Egyptian woman.
*Fast forward to her alternative reality.*
Here, in the future, women are viewed solely as the persons that they are.
In the future, women in Egypt feel safe walking down a street any time of the day. Women's bodies are respected, not because they are someone's daughter, wife, sister, or mother, but because women are viewed as the person that they are.
In the future, women in Egypt are called in public by their first names, instead of their father's or brother's. (Can you believe that's actually a thing?) But thankfully women here are now viewed as the persons that they are.
In the future, I see some women wearing hijab and others not. Everyone knows it is each woman's personal choice, because women are free to dress however the fuck they want without judgement, and because women are viewed as the persons that they are.
Those who choose to wear a hijab are allowed to do all sorts of jobs and sports, because everyone knows that a piece of cloth does not affect your ability to think or act, and women are viewed as the person that they are.
Those who choose not to are not expected to dress a certain way, wear makeup, or meet unrealistic beauty standards, because women generally are not reduced to their looks anymore; women are viewed as the persons that they are.
Women who have kids are not called “Omm...” (Mother of...), they are called by their own first names, because they are not viewed only as mothers of a person—no, women are viewed as the persons that they are.
And finally, romantic movies, novels, and novellas don’t end with a kiss, they end with sex, because women finally claim their sexual desires and aren’t shamed for them, because women are viewed as the persons that they are. (OK, that last one was mainly for laughs.)
But maybe if we repeat it enough times, maybe one day in Egypt and everywhere else in the world, all women will be viewed
simply
as the persons
that they are.
About the Creator
Yasmeen Ramadan
I just wanna talk about the fights I won
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