Episode 26: The Femilemmas of Allyship – Voices from Beirut

The Gender at Work Podcast

In this episode, three graduate students from the American University of Beirut, Maria Hamarneh, Elvira Abi Zeid and Leil Younes, question male allyship for women’s rights and feminist values in a social media context heavily influenced by toxic misogynists targeting young men and boys. They reflect on the ways that, as in many parts of the world, women’s rights are under attack and work on gender equality is being undermined or rolled back, including by ultra-right wing, fundamentalist groups. Nisreen Alami, a Palestinian feminist activist who lives in Jordan and who is also a Gender at Work Associate, joined the conversation. Nisreen opens another dimension of the Femilemma by questioning the value of transnational feminist allyship when critical contextual and historical realities are left out. As she says, “misogyny has become very good at using transnational tools and feminism has not been very successful at being a truly transnational movement.” These are important Femilemmas with no easy answers. Come on in and listen and let’s hear your views!