This week, the women of Poland took to the streets in black Black Monday protests against the criminalization of abortions, with up to five years of imprisonment for women who terminate their pregnancies. Until when do we have to fight for our rights over our bodies? It’s the same thing throughout history – trying to control our bodies, each time in a different way. It’s the Burkini ban in another form. In Egypt, there’s an attempt to force female university students undergo virginity tests. In Israel, the contraceptive Depo Provera has been administered to women from the Ethiopian community as a way of population control. It’s the same power game of controlling our bodies. There’s nothing new about these attempts. Trying to decide how we behave with our bodies, dressing us, undressing us, controlling our bodies, controlling our reproductive rights. When will you realize that you cannot control our bodies? Just stop! Stop policing our bodies!
At the time of the Burkini ban, I wrote a peom, which is still relevant, because it’s the same struggle.
you will not
drag my body through your –
muddy dirty
battlefield.
you will not –
dress me
undress me
police me.
my body is not
the battlefield
for your morals –
religious or secular.
my morals
reside in my heart
my morals are –
not hidden in the folds of my clothes
(and just to make it clear,
my honor lives with my values,
and not as you think – in my vagina.)
stop dressing us,
undressing us,
stop policing our bodies
in the name of your –
false morals and values.
(c) khulud khamis | Haifa | 26 August 2016
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Writing in the Margins 