The Scholarship Office Employee

2014

“Go take a pregnancy test and come back, so I can start processing your papers”.

FULL STORY

My Children Are Ashamed of Me

2018

I feel like my children have become uneasy around me because of the time I did in jail.
They don’t treat me like I’m their mother.
“Well, you have been to jail,” my siblings say.
“You act like someone who’s been in jail.”
social stigma, prison

FULL STORY

The Gym Teacher’s Joke

2014

When I was in college, a joke started about someone in our group and spread throughout the entire university:
“Is that your body, Ahmed, or your mother’s?

FULL STORY

Clean Shave

2016

I don’t like it when you tell me "clean shave" after I remove my facial hair.
I know I have facial hair like men do.
I also know that you say this as a joke, thinking it’s funny because I laugh when you say it.

FULL STORY

Underwear

2014

I’ve always wondered,
Why men’s underwear is hung on the front washing line.
Some people say, “White clothes are hung on the front line and colored clothes are hung on the last line.”

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I Want to do you

2017

I was walking down a street with two friends of mine, and a man kept following us, saying,
“I want to fuck you” and do so and so to you. The kind of talk everyone’s familiar with.
One of my friends stopped walking and cussed him out.
gender violence, harassment, social stigma, the street

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Something Wrong With Her

2016

Her family thought she was a slut.
They thought she had sex with him.

Her sister was positive she did something bad with him.
Otherwise she wouldn’t be insisting on marrying him.
She must be trying to cover up what she did.

FULL STORY

I Have a Problem with My Body

2016

I have a problem with my body.
It suddenly got bigger and I felt the need to always hide it.
I had to hide my hair and my breasts.
And menstruation was the biggest secret of all.

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The Police Car

2017

I was walking down the street, when a police car sped by me,
As if it were on a highway,
And our street is narrow, I mean, it doesn’t make any sense.
There were people walking and children playing.
He could have hit me, so I was startled.
social stigma, gender violence

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We Weren't Playing

2016

I’m a guy.
I was ten years old at the time.
We were living in a family house,
Which meant I was oftentimes left alone with other family members.
They’d tell me they were just going to play with my toys,
But we never actually played with them.

FULL STORY