A
Different Kind Of Revolution
Aliaa Magda | Maryam Namazie | FEMEN | NudePhotoRevolutionary
18+ Only
Last
year a youth movement that helped overthrow Egypt's president Hosni Mubarak now
faces another battle - distancing itself from a woman who posted nude pictures
of herself on a blog.
Last
year, 20-year-old Egyptian blogger Aliaa Magda Elmahdy caused a
social media frenzy when she posted nude pictures of herself on her blog "Memoirs
of a Revolutionary". According to Aliaa, she believes she is a Free Egyptian
woman & calls her action a scream “against a society of violence,
racism, sexism, sexual harassment and hypocrisy.”
“I
have the right to live freely in any place… I feel happy and self satisfied
when I feel that I’m really free,” she said.
The
disturbing pictures led to a flurry of criticism on the social networking site
Twitter. Many people in the Muslim world saw her as a threat to the women in
their own communities, including concerns voiced by liberal activists that the
nude photos would be used against them by their conservative opponents.
"Try
the nude models who worked in art faculties in the 1970s, hide art books and
destroy nude artefacts," she wrote on her blog.
"Then
strip and look at yourselves in the mirror and burn your bodies which you hate
so you can rid yourselves of your complexes before directing your racist
insults at me," she wrote.
This
year, to show support for Aliaa Magda Elmahdy, an Iranian human rights activist Maryam
Namazie launched The Nude Photo Revolutionary Calendar. Launched on
March 8, International Women’s Day, the calendar runs from April 2012 to April
2013.
Ms. Namazie says: “What with Islamism and the religious right being
obsessed with women’s bodies and demanding that we be veiled, bound, and
gagged, nudity breaks taboos and is an important form of resistance.”
The
calendar, designed by SlutWalk Toronto Co-founder, Sonya JF Barnett, it
features a variety of women of different backgrounds who wished to pose nude to
take a stand for freedom. (Including FEMEN activist Alena Magelat.)
FEMEN Activists
Read: Exclusive interview with FEMEN’s founder, Anna Hutsol
Says
Ms. Barnett, “I felt that women needed to stand in solidarity with Aliaa. It
takes a lot of guts to do what she did, and the backlash is always expected and
can quite hurtful. She needed to know that there are others like her, willing
to push the envelope to express outrage.”
YouTube Video in support of Aliaa: Nude Photo Revolutionary Calender
Aliaa
Magda Elmahdy who started a new form of revolution have made a great impact on
the Muslim world. Many people in the Muslim world are now understanding &
supporting this revolution in their very own way. There is no doubt that this will
get attention. Naked people always seem to, no matter how many billions of
artistic, scientific and erotic nude pictures are available at the stroke of a
Google. I guess we'll just have to wait & see what would be the future of
such revolution.
Source:
Free Thought
No comments: