Rapper Mayam Mahmoud uses hip-hop to address issues such as sexual harassment and to stand up for women’s rights in Egypt.
Women played a significant role in the demonstrations that eventually toppled the regime of Hosni Mubarak in 2011. In the aftermath, however, the problem of sexual harassment has become what activists now describe as “an epidemic”.
The 18-year-old rose to prominence through her appearances on the popular TV show Arabs Got Talent. Aged 12, she was introduced to poetry by her mother. She began writing her own work, which soon turned into rap — still a male dominated music genre across the world.
“It’s got a lot of people talking about whether it’s possible for a veiled girl, or even a girl, to do this,” she says. “The girls in this field are thought to have bad morals. So it’s hard to find someone to work with her, to create a beat, to master the track.”
In order to develop her own voice, Mayam tries not to listen to western Hip hop and her songs tackle harassment and victim-blaming head-on – condemning Egyptian society for accepting harassment as part of everyday life, and for laying the blame for it on women rather than men.
“I won’t be the shamed one,” she says in one of her raps. “You flirt, you harass and you see nothing wrong with it. But even if it’s just words, these are not flirts, these are stones.”
The Innocence of Muslims is truly the free speech story that keeps on giving. The crude, cheaply made anti-Islam film sparked international outrage when it first appeared on YouTube in September 2012, with even President Obama forced to weigh into the debate after the US Embassy in Cairo issued a tweet “condemning” the video. While ostensibly supporting free speech, the White House did suggest that Google should examine whether the video contravened its own terms of service.
Google eventually blocked the video of its own accord in Libya and Egypt. Meanwhile, in its move to censor the film, Pakistan simply blocked the whole of YouTube.
Now, a US court has ruled that Google should remove the video from YouTube. Not because of blasphemy, but because of copyright. The case against Google and the makers of the film was brought by actress Cindy Lee Garcia, who appears in the film for all of five seconds. Garcia claims that her single line, suggesting that Muhammad was a “child molester” was dubbed, and that she was duped into appearing in the anti-Muslim film, having been told it was a trailer for an adventure movie.
Crucially, she also says that she has a claim to the copyright of the film. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed that she may have a claim, and on 19 February ordered Google to remove the film from its YouTube service.
The court further ordered that the ruling be kept secret until 26 February, when the 37-page opinion on the case was issued “to prevent a rush to copy and proliferate the film before Google can comply with the order.”
Google has said it will appeal the order, saying that not only could the copyright claim of a bit-part actor create havoc for filmmakers of the future, but that service providers could now also be swamped with takedown requests from people who regret appearing in works in the public domain.
Interestingly, it also suggests that the simple removal of the video could constitute a tampering with the historical record. That chimes with an argument Index has made before – we seem far more comfortable with the removal of web content than we do with, say, the pulping of books, even though the intent is the same.
As things stand, Google has complied with the order, and the Innocence of Muslims can no longer be found on YouTube.
In yet another twist, Pakistani web freedom campaigner and Index on Censorship award nominee Shahzad Ahmed has used the removal of the video to pressure his government to lift the YouTube ban.
“We think that now the government of Pakistan has been left with no excuse to continue blocking access to YouTube,” he is reported as saying. “But the ban on YouTube has got more to do with the government’s desires and efforts to impose censorship, content filtering and moral policing and we are fighting against them in court through a constitutional petition.”
Are you, or have you ever been, a member of a 18th century European group hell bent on taking over the world by rejecting religion and fomenting revolution. If so, could you get me Katy Perry’s autograph? It’s for my niece.
Pop star Perry is, apparently, in the Illuminati. At least according to some of the 30,000 plus people who have signed a petition calling for her new video, Dark Horse, to be removed from YouTube.
The video, featuring Perry as a Cleopatra type queen in ancient Memphis (Egypt, not Tenessee, though apparently it’s a play on the southern hometown of her collaborator on the track, rapper Juicy J).
Anyway, ancient Egyptian imagery such as pyramids loom large in conspiracy theories about the Illuminati. But they are not the reason people are calling for Perry’s video to be banned. No, the reason is that apparently, during the video, a pendant with the word “Allah” on it is burned, or turned to dust. It’s not entirely clear. Perry hits the chap wearing the pendant with some sort of lighting bolt and then he just kind of melts.
A Shazad Iqbal from Bradford has said that this is bad and he wants it taken off the web. Iqbal’s petition reads:
This is the reason for lodging the petition so that people from different walks of life, different religions and from different parts of the world, agree that the video promotes blasphemy, using the name of God in an irrelevant and distasteful manner would be considered inappropriate by any religion
We hope that the video itself depicting such images is removed. Such acts are not condoned nor tolerated, we hope YouTube will remove the video.”
A few of the signatories appear to link Perry’s alleged Illuminati membership with the apparent Allah-name burning. This might just about make sense if one was to examine the original purpose of the real Bavarian Illuminati, which was quite anti-religious. Equally, it might make sense if the Illuminati really existed and Katy Perry was a leading member of it. But well, if “ifs” and “ands” were pots and pans…
But while most signatories do not seem to buy into the Illuminati theory, there is still a sense that Allah’s name was deliberately inserted into the video and then desecrated. Rather than the rather more obvious explanation that an LA costume designer went out looking for vaguely “Egyptian” looking jewellery and picked this pendant up without giving the first thought to what the letters might actually spell.
The petition is a good example of the “conspiracy versus cock up” clash. When something happens you don’t like, it’s easier to think it was a deliberate attempt to upset you: the grim alternative is that the person who has offended, say, a belief held deeply, neither knows nor cares about you or your belief. In the grand scheme of things, you are utterly irrelevant. Better to imagine that Katy Perry, the Illuminati, the woman behind the counter in Costa who always seems annoyed with you, Nick Clegg, Elmo, and Herman Van Rompuy are all plotting against you. It puts you back in the centre of the universe, which is where all of us really want to be.
Index on Censorship here. We’ve noticed some you have had trouble telling the difference between terrorists and journalist lately (yes, you too Barack: put the BlackBerry down). So we thought as people with some experience of the journalism thing, we could offer you a few handy tips to refer to the next time you find yourself asking: journalist or terrorist?
Have a look at your suspect. Is he carrying a) a notebook with weird squiggly lines on it, or b) an RPG-7. If the latter, odds on he’s a terrorist. The former? Most likely a journalist. Those squiggly lines are called “shorthand” – it’s what reporters do when they’re writing things down for, er, reporting. It might look a bit like Arabic, but it’s not, and even if it was, that wouldn’t be a good enough reason to lock the guy up.
A journalist
Still not clear? Let’s move on to the questioning part.
Questioning can be difficult. Your modern terrorist will be highly committed, and trained to withstand even your steeliest glare (and whatever other tactics you might use, eh? LOL! Winky Smiley!). So it may be difficult to establish for certain whether he or she is in fact a terrorist by simply asking them. They might even say they are a journalist, when actually they are terrorists! Sneaky! But there are some ways of getting past this deviousness.
Does your suspect have strong feelings about unpaid internships and their effect on the industry? Or “paywalls” and profit models? Your journalist will pounce on these question in a way that may be quite scary to watch, and keep you there talking about it long after you’ve told her she’s free to go. Your terrorist is not as bothered by these issues, generally, though may accept that it is very difficult for kids to get on the terror ladder these days and nepotism is not an ideal way to run a global bombing campaign.
A terrorist
Ask your suspect if he spends too much time on Twitter: If he gets defensive and says something along the lines of “Yes, but the fact is it’s justified. Stories break on Twitter. It’s not just all hashtag games and…” (again, this could go on for several hours, and will most likely end up being all about hashtag games), then he’s a journalist. [Note: If your suspects seem to spend a lot of time getting into Twitter spats with the Israel Defence Force, they may be a bit terroristy].
Does your suspect look stressed? Like, really, really stressed? Probably a journalist.
Finally, just try saying the phrase “below the line”. If you get a slightly confused look, you’ve probably got a terrorist. If there is actual wailing and gnashing of teeth, journalist.
Now let’s go over why you might be making this mix up. This is where a lot of people get confused, so we’ll be as clear as possible, but do keep up.
Terrorists generally hold quite extreme views which, it’s fair to say, most of us probably do not agree with. However, this does not mean that anyone you disagree with is a terrorist. Or, importantly, that someone who’s spoke to someone who you disagree with is a terrorist.
Sometimes, journalists will cover the activities of terrorist organisations, like al-Qaeda. This, however, does not automatically make them their “media man”. Get this — you can even interview members of a terrorist organisation without actually being a terrorist yourself.
Similarly, if someone has something that you want back, that doesn’t mean you get to use terrorism laws to get it, even if you think that thing is very, very important. And yes, even if they intend to use that thing to write stories about you.
Keep these basic ideas in mind and we can almost guarantee you’ll never make the embarrassing mistake of calling journalists terrorists again. Any doubts? Call us. We’re here to help.
