For a Woman in Egypt, Fear of Losing Equal Rights

Following is a personal observation by Mayy el-Sheikh, 24, who was recently hired as a reporter and researcher in The Times’s Cairo Bureau working alongside the bureau chief, David Kirkpatrick, to cover the first parliamentary elections since President Hosni Mubarak was forced from power. The second of three rounds of voting for the lower house of parliament was completed Thursday. It is expected that Islamists will dominate the new legislature. I wear a veil and jeans. I have a fiancé and a job. In a country where the majority of women need permission from a male guardian to go the movies, I have had a rare experience of complete independence. I live on my own, pay my own rent, choose my own clothes and travel to other countries without asking permission from my father or my fiancé. I pursue whatever dreams I have without worrying about traditions or social restrictions. This may seem “normal” and “ordinary” for many women around the world. But it is much more freedom than the overwhelming majority of Egyptian women can claim. With the first free parliamentary elections, I was reminded that a significant number of men and women in my homeland believe the amount of freedom I have might be too much or even wrong and impious. I have attended rallies for the Islamist parties dominating the elections and I have talked to many of their voters. And they all tell me that my fears as a working independent woman who likes her life exactly as it is are secondary to more important pressing issues for the future of this country. I’m secondary to the reconstruction of Egypt and my fears are trivial compared to crucial matters such as security, the economy and the power struggle between the ruling military council and the Tahrir Squares around the country. But I’m still, maybe selfishly, concerned with my own life. I’m concerned with what would happen if, as in Saudi Arabia, a law were passed to ban women from traveling without a male guardian, or, as in Egypt a few years ago, without a male guardian’s permission, and how this would affect my career as a human rights activist and a journalist. I’m concerned with what would happen if an Islamic ascendance were to stir an ideological shift that led ordinary people in the street to believe that my jeans were impious and that I was unworthy of respect because I wore them. I’m concerned with what would happen if I decided to divorce my husband and whether I would even be legally permitted to initiate a divorce. I’m concerned with what would happen if I decided not to have children and a law were passed to ban birth control. I’m concerned with the kind of society I will raise my children in. I’m concerned with whether or not I could ever run for parliament, or governor or president. I have a concern for a daughter I may have. I want her to feel worthy of respect regardless of what she chooses for herself. When she goes to school, I don’t want her to have to take the classes I had to take on how to cook and clean just because she is a girl. I don’t want her to grow up as I did in a struggle between what she is made to believe she “should” be as an Egyptian woman and an aspiration to one day be free to be whoever she decides to be. The radical conservative Salafis say they know society isn’t ready for some parts of their interpretation of Sharia, such as Islamic banking, cutting the hands of thieves and stoning women for adultery. The society needs preparation first, so don’t panic just yet. The more mainstream Muslim Brotherhood acts more like a disapproving father who rewards your brother for doing the right thing rather than punishing you for doing the opposite. Their tool is a cultural and ideological movement toward a pious society that encourages their vision of virtue, abiding by their relatively more moderate interpretation of Sharia. I heard a Salafi sheik tell a crowd that those afraid of Sharia must be alcoholics, fornicators and thieves because that is who should be scared of its punishments. I’m not a thief, nor am I a fornicator or an alcohol drinker, but I’m still concerned. I’m concerned about living in a society ruled by a government that gives itself the right to restrict my freedom in the name of my own religion. And I’m simply not secondary.   By Mayy el-Sheikh