Backdrop to Lara Logan's Sexual Assault on Cairo Streets

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Lara Logan

Lara Logan has been sexually assaulted and there is no reason ever to excuse abominable behavior by Muslim men in public contexts.

I am/was a State Dept FSO trained as an Arabist and lived in four Arab countries. I’ve visited Egypt several dozen times both as a USG diplomat and afterwards as a Political Risk Analyst for Amoco, the largest foreign corporation in Egypt. What happened to Lara is absolutely inexcusable, but the photo shows her heading into the crowd without a shawl or scarf, the bare minimum a woman must wear in order not to be considered a prostitute when she walks in the streets of Cairo. TV snaps of Christiane Amanpour show her wearing a shawl/scarf when she was in a public street situation. Americans are notoriously [indeed all Brit Empire Anglos seem to be] very disrespectful or ignorant of foreign customs, just as a matter of course. Strange as it may seem to us Americans, Lara may have been perceived by the animals who attacked her as disrespecting Egyptian customs, flaunting a feminist agenda, or even taunting them by wearing inappropriate [to their eyes] apparel in a public situation. That’s the way the minds of these medieval males work.

No excuses, but Lara did not do the very minimum required to show that “when in Cairo, do as the Cairenes do.