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News > World News > Egyptian art student Aliaa Magda Elmahdy, 20, poses nude for woman's freedom

Egyptian art student Aliaa Magda Elmahdy, 20, poses nude for woman's freedom

Updated: 16 Nov 2011

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Read more on Aliaa Magda Elmahdy woman's freedom

Facebook photo of Aliaa Magda Elmahdy.

An Egyptian blogger is defying the Islamic prudes in her country by taking it all off — and posting the pictures on the web.

Aliaa Magda Elmahdy said it's her body to bare.

"I have the right to live freely in any place," Elmahdy wrote on her blog. "I feel happy and self satisfied when I feel that I'm really free," she said.

Under the heading "fan a'ry," which means nude art, Elmahdy posted several pictures of herself in the buff, including one with strategically placed yellow rectangles.

"The yellow rectangles on my eyes, mouth and sex organ resemble the censoring of our knowledge, expression and sexuality," wrote Elmahdy, who turns 20 on Wednesday.

On her Facebook page, Elmahdy wrote that she was "echoing screams against a society of violence, racism, sexism, sexual harassment and hypocrisy."

A media arts student at the American University in Cairo, Elmahdy took the pictures at her parent's place. Her blog also has a photo of a seated naked man holding a guitar.

While placing provocative pictures on the Web rarely raise eyebrows in the West, in an increasingly conservative Egypt what Elmahdy did is an unprecedented act of defiance.

Egyptian women have long enjoyed relatively more personal freedom than their female counterparts in other parts of the Arab world, but a worrying result of the ouster of longtime dictator Hosni Mubarak has been the rise of the Islamic Brotherhood and other religious parties.

Western clothing, once common for middle class women, has given way increasingly to head scarves and more modest attire.

And art students like Elmhady can no longer draw nude models because they've been banned.

SOURCE: nydailynews.com

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Vikki Commented on 19 Nov 2011

Despite every Egyptian male and every other Arab male looking at her nudes and lusting after her, she will probably be arrested and flogged for her actions and activist activities. They will make sure her natural beauty will be ruined. The shame will be on all Egyptian men and the Arabic society as a whole should she be punished in any way. The Arab and Egyptian women need to deny their men sex and other services until changes are made to bring them out of suffrage and have they have equal parity with men in political and social issues.