Please Poke Now!

I have a confession to make: I am not a virgin anymore. I think it is better to say this right out loud so that if one day the Egyptian military should get their hands on me, they won't have to take the trouble to poke their fingers into dark spaces to find out anything that some might think is none of their business. No, I confess it right here and now to spare them the trouble. So please take it down in your files, dear army: no virginity left - so nothing to test.

You know of course that to the army of Egypt knowing the virginity of a revolutionary is of vital importance. Because - no doubt about it - you're either a virgin or a direct threat to the national security. In fact, if you get caught sharing a tent at Tahrir square virginity is basically erased automatically. It must have something to do with the poles they use to prop these tents up or something. I am no expert in this, but the army knows. And they know too - for this is what their accusation ran into - that if you're not a virgin you're automatically a whore, a prostitute. What else could you possibly be?

To me this is of course troubling. Not being a virgin and not being a whore leaves me somehow in limbo, a place no one really likes to be in. And what I find even more irritating as to my status is - that I am a boy, And boys never get checked on their virginity by the army. That really sucks.

Because why are we treated differently to girls? Why do they get the caring special attention by army officers in their most private crevices while we are simply ignored? Don't we have a dignity that can be molested? Is there no sexual privacy ours that can be attacked? Don't we too hold openings that can be used for the first time and after that are undisputedly reduced to proof of looseness, western decadence and the sure travel ticket to hell?

Truly, the way the army handles the matter clearly shows that gender inequality is on their minds. I hate that! I want to be equal to women. I don't want to be discriminated just because of my sex! So please, Supreme Council of Armed Forces, see to it that your military officers respect this. Instruct them accordingly and - now that one of your Generals admitted to this - make sure next time we guys get the same treatment you gave to the girls: the goggling soldiers standing by, the windows letting in the stares of strangers, the open door to the corridor holding spectators while a male what-ever-he-is pokes two fingers into us. We would just love that, and the times when you ignore us coldly shutting us out from this ritual must end once and for all.

I mean: Are you trying to tell us that our virginity is of no interest to the security of the country? Are you trying to insinuate that if WE lost 'it' that's ok, it's only the girl's loss that shakes the ground of Egypt? If so, you are saying nothing less than that women are more important to the country than men!

Dare you say something like that. WE are the heroes of the world! WE are the ones that make Egypt's ground shake! So for God's sake, will you please poke your fingers in us next time so that we know - you are taking us seriously!

Oh - and while we are at it: You dear fellow revolutionaries, good hearted brave warriors for a new Egypt - how could you let this happen? How come you just ignored all those testimonies from the girls that had been telling us about this gross violation of gender equality since March 9 already? Why did you not protest to having been ignored so violently by the arresting army officers? And why are some of you still even now in doubt whether this is true and the army actually did this to the girls?!

Yeah, I know. You simply can't take it that your virginity is of no importance to the country, that it is ignored, thought nothing of. I know, that hurts. But then - don't just stand there damn it and be in denial! Get your bottoms (sure you're virgin? - let's check) up and voice your protest!

From now on - if the army thinks it is in the national interest to assess the virginity status of arrested protesters - WE want to be the ones tested! Poke US, dear army officers! Because then at least you might find out something that so far you haven't noticed: Checking on virginity can really get you into shit!

Yours sincerely
Unmolested, unchecked - truly heart broken

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