Ten years after the overthrow of authoritarian president Hosni Mubarak, Egypt faces economic downturn and continuing support for General Abd al-Fattah al-Sisi’s authoritarian regime. In this essay, Jessica Winegar explores how “the alluring aesthetics of authoritarian populism” contributed to a departure from the revolution’s demands. Drawing upon her research in Egypt, she examines why Egyptians, exhausted by the upheaval of the uprisings, called for stability (istiqrar). Winegar argues that Sisi’s authoritarian rule based on “masculine, military, and middle-class aesthetics” cultivated his image as a strongman and savior, enticing everyday citizens yearning for dignity, respect, and stability.
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Six months ago, I logged into a Zoom room at the Skokie, Ill., courthouse. After 15 minutes of rote proceedings, the judge pronounced my spouse and I divorced. It was a strange but relieving end to a 21-year marriage that I had thought would last forever. I was just one of thousands of women who experienced the end of a relationship during the pandemic. I closed the computer and went back to check in on my son’s remote learning, joining multitudes of women doing the same with their children.
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I am dreading the day that my young son comes home from school hurt from his first experience of anti-Muslim bigotry. We risk alienating an entire generation of our kids if schools do not work to make sure they are safe and welcomed.
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I spent a large part of my 30s suffering — largely in silence — because I couldn’t seem to get pregnant. And whenever I did, I had a miscarriage. Those were also my years on the tenure track, when I was working madly to publish, perfect my teaching, and do academic service in order to achieve a decent salary, job stability, and a successful career.
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Certainly there are differences among societies and regions of the world when it comes to domestic violence. But if we exoticize it we miss what is going on.
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Behaviors that are considered red flags in the U.S. and Western Europe are considered normal, even desirable, in other parts of the world.
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Egypt’s most important human rights nongovernmental organization recently received notification from the Egyptian authorities that it would be shut down.
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Negative stories about the Middle East dominated Western news headlines in 2015. It’s easy for Americans, especially those who listen to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and his supporters, to get the impression that the region is just one miserable homogeneous place of violence, terror, religious fanaticism and authoritarianism.
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In last week’s Republican presidential debate in Colorado, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie garnered huge applause after a moderator’s question about whether fantasy football should be regulated like gambling. With his famed Jersey bluntness, Christie exclaimed, “Wait a second. We have 19 trillion dollars in debt. We have ISIS and Al-Qaeda attacking us. And we’re talking about fantasy football?! Can we stop?!”
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