A Seat at The Table, but Reservations Only!
- By: Amira Gamil , Editor-in-Chief
“Want a cigarette?”
“Habibiiii, aywaa”
I watched in utter confusion as two of my guy friends, who had just met for the first time seconds ago, warmed up to each other like they were inseparable since birth. I shook my head and let out a laugh, a mix of both surprise and envy. They told me that one cigarette is enough to spark a friendship. And if that turns into sitting on the nearest ahwa (cafè) watching the Egyptian derby?
They’d practically become best friends by this point.
Whether in an ahwa smoking shisha or in a Ramadan athletic tournament after Iftar, a huge aspect of men’s socialisation process is tied to bonding through their manhood. But if that’s the case, then what happens to us women? Where do we stand when the places that surround us are so heavily gendered, systemically?
Simone de Beauvoir, social theorist and writer, explains in The Second Sex how the spaces we occupy are all socially constructed, shaped by the people that occupy them. But in a country where women, not long ago, still had to peek through the mashrabiya (wooden lattice window) just to get a hint of the street, can we really say these spaces were made with us in mind? When the street, in its essence, belongs to men, these spaces automatically operate in relation to them, not women. The intersection between cultural geography and feminist discourse is nothing new, yet it made me wonder: When that shisha and cigarette and derby-match bonding extend to the workplace, how am I expected to keep up, particularly with my curfews and constraints on where to go and where not to. What becomes of women, then, with the subtle exclusions, the dirty comments said in whispers, and the football matches I know I will not get invited to?
Beauvoir explains how women are seen as the Other, a secondary being only in relation to man, and in those “old boys’ clubs”, which usually take place out of work hours. I am more reminded of my Otherness. I’m not just worried about how this form of exclusion can deprive me from expanding my social networks, but what it could mean for my professional development. What conversations will I be left out from? What opportunities will be shared, in between cigarette breaks and shisha rounds? Yet, I was lucky enough to spend my four years of university in a space that, by chance, is mostly woman-dominated: The Caravan’s newsroom.
I knew that no matter what happens in my male-dominated business minor classes, in my part-time job’s meetings or in governmental paperwork visits, I’d still have a place that understands why I need to leave before 11pm, why I can’t take an Uber alone or why I take the longer (but safer) route home. It’s a space where women were the absolute, where jokes about the lack of the men in our team were a common occurrence, and our leadership never questioned. It’s also a place where I’ve grown under the leadership of four powerful generations of women Editors-in-Chief. But with my graduation approaching, the time ticking is a reminder that my bubble is about to pop. That Caravan is the exception and not the norm. And frankly? I don’t feel ready for it.
As of now, the majority of top editors across 12 markets in 2025 are men, according to a research on Women and Leadership in the news media by Reuters Institute. I can’t help but wonder, are those leaders aware of such exclusions? Or is our presence a mere afterthought? I watched media firms on International Women’s Day preaching about how inclusion is key, how women are the pillars of the industry, and how they never discriminate by design. But I also know that missing that late-night newsroom gathering might still mean not getting that senior editors’ business card, that rejecting that cigarette break chat might translate into being called rude, and that my hesitance to cover a story downtown might cost me my job. And so I sit and keep watching those men climb up the ladder with their suits and ties, knowing they will never truly understand the social disparity that exists within and beyond the newsroom. I know it’s easy to say women are finally getting a seat at the table, but how does that help when the table itself is skewed?
