During our brief mental health break, several incidents surrounding women’s abuse have surfaced. One incident involved a man who was caught on video masturbating in front of a woman in the women’s cart.

While this particular incident was caught on camera, it’s safe to say it’s more common than we’d like to think.

As a result, the Egyptian government is now considering installing cameras in all trains to monitor sexual harassment and crimes.

More about the sexual harassment incident in the Cairo Metro:

Just like the Mohamed Gawdat case, the authorities didn’t take much time to handle the situation. 

According to Egypt independent, only a day after the incident, the Public prosecutors ordered four-day detention of a man accused of sexually harassing a woman in the Cairo metro, pending investigations.

The harasser was charged with sexual harassment and committing indecent acts in public.

Security services examined the 37-second video posted online, which shows the harasser in a metro vehicle.

The prosecution listened to the accused’s statements, where he confessed that he was in the video but denied that he was harassing the victim. He insisted that he was “tidying his clothes.”

The video, which we refuse to post here, clearly shows the man’s penis out, and he was masturbating while creepy staring at the woman filming him. 

It’s important to remember that this happened for a while before the victim decided to film him. 

It’s a story we all relate to

Sadly, the sheer terror and disgust that the victim must have been going through is not something we can’t imagine. 

Most of us have been through something similar. I know it just happened to me a few days before that on my way to an interview by an Uber driver.

We mostly felt comfortable adding surveillance cameras to trains, but it’s important to remember that we should not celebrate this.

We should not be feeling safe just before we know our harassers are aware that they’re being watched.

We should not be feeling safe when we’re watched more by governments, while other countries have it as a mission to be monitored less.

The government should not spend money on babysitting harassers when other hardworking folks desperately need government support.

I’m happy and feel safer that the government has decided to add surveillance cameras in trains, but it’s a real shame that we’re brought to this.