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" I was 15 when my family moved to Jidda from Britain in 1982. Living in Saudi Arabia was such a shock to my system that I like to say I was traumatized into feminism. "
Mona Eltahawy
Living
System
Family
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" Anti-U.S. sentiment has been born out of many grievances - support and weapons for such dictators as Mubarak, unquestionable support for Israel in its occupation of Palestine, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and drone attacks in Pakistan and Yemen that kill more civilians than intended targets. "
Mona Eltahawy
Israel
Dictators
Born
" I detest the niqab and the burka for their erasure of women and for dangerously equating piety with that disappearance - the less of you I can see, the closer you must be to God. "
Mona Eltahawy
God
Less
You
" Too many have rushed in to explain the Arab world to itself. "
Mona Eltahawy
Itself
Explain
Arab
" To say that there is patriarchy in Arab culture is not denying women agency. "
Mona Eltahawy
Patriarchy
Say
Women
" The fight against racism must be seen as a revolutionary one. "
Mona Eltahawy
Racism
Seen
Fight
" I can write about my culture and religion because I am a product of both. Even when I'm accused of giving ammunition to the Islamophobic right, in the struggle between 'community' and 'women,' I always choose the women. "
Mona Eltahawy
Women
Community
Culture
" I believe at the heart of any revolution for social justice and human dignity are consent and agency, the unequivocal belief that I own my body - not the state, not the church/mosque/temple, not the street and not the family. "
Mona Eltahawy
Justice
Body
Family
" As a U.S. citizen, I cherish the First Amendment. "
Mona Eltahawy
First Amendment
First
Citizen
" I wore the hijab - a form of dress that comprises a head scarf and usually also clothing that covers the whole body except for the face and hands - for nine years. Put more honestly, I wore the hijab for nine years and spent eight of them trying to take it off. "
Mona Eltahawy
Dress
Trying
Head
" A source of embarrassment for Libyans, Gadhafi has never been a joke: disappearances, a police state, zero freedom of expression, and poverty for at least a third of the population of country tremendously wealthy thanks to oil. "
Mona Eltahawy
Police
Freedom
Country
" When Tunisians overthrew Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in 29 days and Egyptians Hosni Mubarak in 18 days, it was an appropriate rebuke to dictators and Bin Laden. "
Mona Eltahawy
Egyptians
Dictators
Days
" As an Egyptian, I was glad to see the film 'Black Panther' embrace my country with its inclusion of the Ancient Egyptian goddess Bast as the deity of Wakandans. But considering the anti-black racism against the Nubian indigenous community and visitors in my country, I knew Egypt would not return the love. "
Mona Eltahawy
Community
Love
Black
" Anti-black racism is not just an Egyptian problem. It exists in many parts of the Arab world. "
Mona Eltahawy
Just
Problem
World
" When Mubarak does die, he will be remembered as the most bland of those military men turned dictators: compare him with Gamal Abdel-Nasser and Anwar Sadat. The legacies most associated with him are a network of bridges and highways and 'stability.' "
Mona Eltahawy
Will
Bridges
Military
" In the U.K., my mother had been the breadwinner. I'd seen my parents side by side. In Saudi Arabia, my mother was basically rendered disabled. She was unable to drive, dependent on my dad for everything. The religious zealotry was so suffocating. "
Mona Eltahawy
Mother
She
Drive
" Authenticity has never been Barbie's strong suit. "
Mona Eltahawy
Strong
Authenticity
Barbie
" I started off at a local newspaper called 'The Middle East Times,' which is no longer in existence. I remember one of the earliest stories that I wrote for them was a study about domestic violence in Egypt from a government-run research institute think tank. "
Mona Eltahawy
Violence
Research
Think
" I defend a woman's right to cover her hair if she chooses, but the face is central to human interaction, and so the ideologues who promote its covering are simply misogynists. "
Mona Eltahawy
Woman
Hair
Right
" Authoritarianism, religious fundamentalism and militarism are inherently patriarchal and hierarchical. "
Mona Eltahawy
Militarism
Religious
Patriarchal
" Saudi Arabia isn't just a conservative country with different values we shouldn't judge. It is a modern Gilead. "
Mona Eltahawy
Country
Judge
Values
" For years, successive Arab dictators have tried to keep discontent at bay by distracting people with the Israeli-Arab conflict. "
Mona Eltahawy
Conflict
People
Dictators
" I like to call the Republicans the Christian Brotherhood of the U.S. so that my fellow Americans recognise the line that connects their mix of religion and politics with their Muslim equivalent in Egypt. "
Mona Eltahawy
Religion
Brotherhood
Egypt
" Across the globe, fundamentalists of all religions are on one side, and their attitudes towards women and towards female sexuality are almost identical. "
Mona Eltahawy
Globe
Women
Side
" There was always something sickening about tourists taking pictures of themselves posing in front of that big gaping hole called Ground Zero. "
Mona Eltahawy
Pictures
Big
Always
" I was born in Egypt, and my family moved to London when I was seven. I grew up mostly in Clapham, where I also went to school after a brief stint in Whitechapel. "
Mona Eltahawy
Born
School
Family
" Too many on the Left are earnest about nothing at all, sadly. They've been rendered spineless by snarkiness - not least on Twitter. "
Mona Eltahawy
Too
Been
Left
" Muslim views are not a monolithic blob. "
Mona Eltahawy
Views
Muslim
" My family moved to Saudi Arabia from Glasgow when I was 15. Being a 15-year-old girl anywhere is difficult - all those hormones and everything - but being a 15-year-old girl in Saudi Arabia... it was like someone had turned the light off in my head. I could not get a grasp on why women were treated like this. "
Mona Eltahawy
Family
Women
Why
" This ISIS group, they attack Muslims more than they attack anyone else. "
Mona Eltahawy
Group
More
Else
" Nothing protects women from the patriarchy of military regimes. "
Mona Eltahawy
Military
Nothing
Patriarchy