Posted on 10/19/2009 8:24:34 PM PDT by Saije
The crowded, bustling streets of Cairo can be an intimidating environment for women who venture out alone or even in groups.
It is well known that sexual harassment is a pervasive problem in Egypt, from touching to lewd and abusive cat calls.
But it seems there is another phenomenon that goes largely unreported, phone stalking. With the advance of modern technology a large number of women complain they receive the unwelcome and relentless attention of men they have never met.
One of our colleagues in the BBC office has had a number of phone stalkers, who call repeatedly through the day and sometimes in the middle of the night. She has given them no encouragement - but rarely do they need it.
"What's your name?" enquired one whose mobile number has become depressingly recognisable.
"What's your NAME?" he demanded insistently. "Hello.... Hello."
***
Most of the harassment - calls and texts - are from young men who ring numbers at random, and often the conversations are fairly commonplace. But occasionally they can lead to something more sinister.
...in a survey last year of 2,000 women by the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights, 83% said they had encountered some form of sexual harassment - 23% said they were receiving obscene phone calls. But even so, statistics on how widespread this is are hard to come by.***
Nonetheless there are those who believe phone stalking is symptomatic of a bigger issue.
"The only outlet for legitimate sex in Arab society is marriage, which is very difficult to afford these days," said Said Sadek, sociologist from the American University of Cairo.
"Repressed sex in Egyptian society manifests itself in many forms: crank calls, Arabic porn channels, harassing women in the street, secret marriages - it is a real problem.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
Just block the numbers. End of story.
“Secret marriage”... so that is why my colleague does not wear his wedding ring when we go out to drink.
I guess he must be “secretly married” and must not want any of the young lovelies in the bar to guess his secret
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