Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Meanwhile, in Egypt: Not Like Your Daughter Or Mine



According to CNN, virginity tests were performed on arrested Egyptian female demonstrators after the March 9 protests:
At that time, Maj. Amr Imam said 17 women had been arrested but denied allegations of torture or "virginity tests."
But now a senior general who asked not to be identified said the virginity tests were conducted and defended the practice.
"The girls who were detained were not like your daughter or mine," the general said. "These were girls who had camped out in tents with male protesters in Tahrir Square, and we found in the tents Molotov cocktails and (drugs)."
We didn't want them to say we had sexually assaulted or raped them, so we wanted to prove that they weren't virgins in the first place," the general said. "None of them were (virgins).
"
Well, that's OK then. Except that the rape excuse is a feeble one unless we believe that only virgins can be raped and that the raped women could somehow prove, after the rape, that they had been virgins before it.

The real intention behind this practice is clear: To make participating in demonstrators more dangerous and more humiliating for women. Then they will stay at home as they are supposed to do.
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Via Jennifer Armstrong.