The Women in Egypt and Their Rights - Essay Example

With more and more topics coming to light under the vast umbrella of gender issues, they have gained more and more important with time. Similarly, the role, treatment, and rights of women have also come under scrutiny and are being widely criticized.

It is true that the treatment of women in Egypt cannot be isolated from cultural, religious, and social factors, however, that cannot be singularly attributed to one single factor. Islam is the most widespread and commonly practiced religion in the area, and this is where people are pointing blaming fingers at it. A common misconception in the Western world is that Islam allows for the mistreatment of women. In the Middle East, the culture is predominantly male-dominated and patriarchal, which gives men room and authority to subordinate their women. Overall, this forms a more impacting factor than a religion where the treatment of women in Egypt is concerned.

This paper explores how women are treated in Egypt and analyze the correctly attributable causes that have caused this kind of treatment to prevail in the area.
Islam allows women to educate themselves, it allows them ownership of property, the right to education, employment, and political participation as well as the right to marry by choice. Female circumcision is one practice that is wrongly blamed on Islam. Even though it is rampant in the Middle East among practicing Muslims, it has no religious precedence. (Safty El, Madiha).

Violence against women in such an atmosphere is very common. Among the identified types of violence that women are subjected to include, physical, sexual, psychological and economic violence. Due to the response a woman gets in such a society to the violence she faces, often violence goes unreported. Denial and social taboos also become a hindrance to a woman being able to seek help for any violence committed against her.
However, the situation is not completely bleak and there are, for example, shelter, medical and legal assistance, witness protection and housing etcetera. (Susan D. Somach and Gihan AbouZeid, 2009).

When women were granted the right to khula in Egypt in 2000, the media gave it extremely negative coverage. However, other more recent laws that are in the same vein have received a more positive response. For example, in 2009 the media gave extremely supportive coverage to a law penalizing sexual assault. This shows that to some extent, Egypt’s treatment of its women has changed.

The main stakeholders and catalysts in Egypt concerned with the treatment of women and their rights are government and women’s NGOs. They combine regularly with international entities with the same interest like the United Nations to provide financial support for the projects they have started to help Egyptian women. (Dawoud, Aliaa, 2011).

The development of the intellectual struggle for women’s rights in Egypt can paradoxically be attributed to male modernist reformers. Women’s contributions to the issue have encouraged debate on social issues related to the man issue of gender discrimination. Even then, the relationship between these two entities has been far from peaceful. The instigating factor has been the patriarchal streak in the nationalist men.

Increased confrontation with the Islamists forced President Mubarak to impose more conservative laws targeted at women. However, the need for aid and funds from the US has forced Egyptian authorities to abide by women’s rights as deemed fit by their benefactors. (Nadje S. Al-Ali, 2002). Read More