Gender Trouble: On Egypt’s revolution and the future of international feminism

Two years after the 2011 revolution in Egypt brought down former president Hosni Mubarak, another wave of protests erupted against his successor, the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohammed Morsi. This time, the demonstrations were actively supported by the military. As debates raged about whether the protests should be called a coup or a fresh wave of revolution, there was an uptick in mob attacks against women, which had been plaguing Tahrir Square for months. Between June 30 and July 3, 2013, Operation Anti-Sexual Harassment and Assault (OpAntiSH), an Egyptian group dedicated to combating sexual violence, documented 186 such cases. A petition by women’s organizations attributed the spike to the “trend of targeting female activists, to punish them for participating in the public sphere and to exclude them from political life.” With the #MeToo movement sweeping the world, OpAntiSH organizer Yasmin El-Rifae spoke with writer and...