Salma al-Shimi

Tourbeau

Active member
So this happened...

https://nypost.com/2020/12/02/model-photographer-arrested-after-pyramid-shoot-in-egypt/

News outlets have also identifed her as a "dancer," but without watching everything on her YouTube channel, it looks like "person who lip syncs and poses to music in the hope of monetizing her social media presence" might be more accurate. Not that she couldn't be a great dancer (what little moving she does seems fine, and she's got lots of personality), but...



Anybody have a better example of her actually dancing?
 

Zorba

"The Veiled Male"
"Whatever".

Seeing the words "Facebook, Instagram, and Tik-Tok" tells me everything I need to know. The article uses the term "revealing" to describe her attire. Hardly. {INSERT RANT ABOUT MONOTHEISTIC RELIGIONS HERE}
 

Tourbeau

Active member
Personally, I don't understand how some people can turn making attention-desperate fools of themselves online into millions of dollars, but apparently, it is a thing that occasionally happens to a tiny fraction of the ones who attempt it. She managed to get trending on Google News yesterday, so...win?

I suppose one could give her the benefit of the doubt and say she's not an off-brand Kardashian wannabe, but rather, someone who lives in a place where mainstream opportunities for women to become financially secure and have social clout/public validation are more limited than in other places, or perhaps that many entertainment-industry jobs in the ME didn't recover from the Arab Spring and they are suffering even more, now that COVID has stomped all over international tourism, so trying to become an influencer has a certain logic to it. Or you could consider her a boundary-pushing freedom fighter who is standing up to retrograde, Muslim-fundamentalist opinions about women being neither seen nor heard, and female sexuality being something women have the responsibility to control (if men lust after you, you did something grievously wrong) but not full ownership of (once you get married, as all decent women do, your sexuality becomes the effective property of your husband).

There's also a thesis in here about the evolution of public opinion and generational shift regarding self promotion in the ME. When TV reality shows and the ability to cast yourself as a star online started 15-20 years ago, the prevailing opinion in the ME was "Why would you want to do this? You'll disgrace your family!", but as time has gone on, more and more young people have pushed back with "Why shouldn't we do this? Everybody else in the world does it!" There's still a big conservative contingent fighting the trend, but for better or worse, you know the old saying: That genie ain't going back in the bottle anytime soon.

But, yeah, her motivation probably starts and stops at "become rich and famous."
 
Top