Social Media Subterfuge As Art
Egyptian Magda el-Mahdy Aliaa’s Controversial Blog
By: Nelida Nassar - Nov 26, 2011
Magda el-Mahdy Aliaa’s blog was created in late October 2011in a protest against religious extremism by publishing a series of naked pictures of herself. It is buzzing on the internet despite the few nude photographs and a short text, nothing really incentive or revolutionary! If Magda was not Egyptian and an Arab her blog would most likely have gone unnoticed.
Yet Aliaa’s blog – “The Diary of a Rebel” – ignites the Web. The first naked woman photo on the blog is her photograph. The second is that of a friend she refuses to identify. Interspersed are these words: “Condemn the models who posed nude at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Cairo in the early 1970s, censor art books, destroy archaeological statues... then take off your clothes, look in the mirror, burn these bodies that you hate so much and get rid of your sexual complexes prior to insulting me ​​and preventing me from expressing myself freely.” Words such as these in a country like Egypt, have the effect of a bombshell.
At the approach of the first parliamentary post-Mubarak elections, the tension between Liberal and Islamist Egyptians are heightening. Thus, radical parties, such as al-Nour (a Salafi party), multiply their interventions to prove their presence and impose their rule. They already have covered the mermaids that adorn the fountain of Jupiter at the center of Alexandria with a burqa. They also replaced their female candidates’ pictures on election posters with images of flowers, or their husband’s portrait. To them, any expression of nudity in all its forms, including art is unacceptable and intolerable.
Aliaa’s, a twenty years old political science student at the American University of Cairo wants precisely to expose this regressive mentality with her blog-shock. On Facebook, she screams against a society of violence, racism, sexism, sexual harassment and hypocrisy.” On twitter, she portrays herself as an atheist, liberal, vegetarian, and individualistic. Her revolution encompasses all levels. “I have the right to live freely whenever I want,” she writes. “I feel happy and fulfilled when I feel totally free.”
“My view is that the veil is not a personal choice in Egypt, but the result of religious and social pressure.” It seems that Aliaa is also the young woman behind the Facebook page calling upon men to wear the veil in solidarity with women. “The women with head veil that I know wears it because of their families or because they don’t want to be beaten in the streets. I don’t see why they always dictate to women, and not to men, what they should wear.”
But ten months after having overcome the political obstacles posed by Hosni Mobarak’s regime, is Egyptian society prepared to break away from the remaining of its taboos? This case creates dissidents amongst bloggers. “I think that she is really brave write @abraralshammari. Nudity is natural, forget the old notions that it is shameful, she posts”. “It is a lack of modesty and understanding of what freedom means” responds Elna7as_Pasha. “If she went out nude in the street, I would consider it an infringement on my own freedom.” “I would not do it and I think there are other ways to express one’s freedom argue@SandraYacoub. “However, it is her body that she is exhibiting. Who are we to judge?”
Numerous political groups starting with the Islamists who seek to discredit the Liberals that support el-Madhy are being presented as immoral and prostitutes opinates Shahinaz Abdel Salam. Salam is an author and a blogger from Alexandria. The French newspaper Le Figaro portrays her as a very committed women’s rights activist and militant for freedom. She claims: “I totally respect her position and I do not see it as a provocation, however we must recognize that it is very offensive to a vast majority of Egyptians.”
CyberDissidents.org contacted Karim Amer, Aliaa’s boyfriend who stated that the 20 years old young feminist “has already received threats.” “We still do not know the implications of this case and I will do my best to attempt to solve these difficulties peacefully. I will remain alongside Aliaa’s no matter what happens. I am very proud of her and of her courage. I wish I could be as brave” he adds. In 2007, Karim who is also a blogger was sentenced to four years of prison for having “violated Islam.”
Alas, with the Arab Spring revolution unfolding, a genuine yearning for change and democracy has awoken across the Middle East and Africa. Fueled by the social media and the youth naivete and passion for a tabula rasa, ideas are not being processed long enough to create a coherent strategy of transformation. Art is being trampled on and compressed to one-sound bite and provocative imagery. It seems that we may have to be more patient and will have to sacrifice another generation before acquiring the claimed human and women's rights we so desire and for a new narrative to take hold.