Note: contains spoilers

What is 60 minutes ?  

Halfway through watching “60 minutes,” I’m amazed at how many unspoken dilemmas are discussed and talked about. The tv show openly puts the stumbling blocks in Egyptian society in its scenario. Sexual harassment, the shame of taking, domestic abuse, emotional abuse, mental illness, etc., are boldly instigated in the episodes.  

Yasmeen (Yasmeen Raees) plays the wife role of a prominent psychologist Doctor Adham (Mahmoud Nasr). Doctor Adham seems to be a loving father and a husband. With a big ego and a clean reputation who lives based on a book of morals.

Yasmeen thinks she’s in love with Adham, but deep down, she knows that red signs will never turn green. He emotionally manipulates her into thinking he’s one of a kind and that his unwanted hands on her manifest his deep love for her beauty. As the plot escalates, the well-known doctor turns out to be a pedophile and a sexual harasser.

Famous psychologist accused of being a sexual harasser

Victim number one interfered in a show that Doctor Adham was invited to. Mumbling words about how he harassed her in his office, in the university where he teaches.

With everyone talking about the incident, Yasmeen, his wife, had to know if her lovely husband was actually a monster. Yasmeen kept asking questions but instead, she received words covered with manipulation and counterfeit love. No more than two days, and Dr. Adham had already used his authority to cover it up — and his words to gain back his wife.

Living with Adham, Yasmeen was always a suspect, the one to be questioned and followed everywhere. Being emotionally abused and manipulated was something Yasmeen coped with or ignored. Her fear of confusion ceased the box she lived in with her abuser, so she suffocated in her misery. Leaving her in debris and morose, she kept her mouth shut. But her mind awakens, asking questions with no clear answers.

We should stop blaming victims of being “delusional”

The second victim is a previous patient who used to get her therapy in DrAdham’ss clinic. In one of the earlier episodes, we learn that Sara (Fatma El Nabawy) is a mother who committed suicide by throwing herself from the roof of her house. Her story reached Yasmeen by the non-stop sharing on social media platforms. Yasmeen’s gut tells her that something is not right about it. Especially after finding out that Sara sent her a friend request on the same day she threw herself on. After being hospitalized, Sara gets another chance at life.

Yasmeen then decides to follow her. The more she digs in, the more she sees closed doors. It’s not a coincidence that Sara is a past patient of Dr. Adham. Sara decides to file a report against Adham, accusing him of assaulting her inside the clinic. With the help of a lawyer, they decide to open an investigation regarding this matter.

Dr. Adham, of course, has a backup plan that contains manipulating his wife and the audience.

He lays his head on his wife’s shoulders, telling her how he’s tyrannized and accused of stuff that never happened. And because Sara is“schizophrenic” based on what Dr. Adham said to manipulate the whole case, she’s delusional. He then proceeds to explain how she creates scenarios in her head to fulfill her fantasies.

One more time, Dr. Adham builds bricks upon the cases. “It’s a losing case,” Dr. Adham says. And one more time, Yasmeen is back to block zero. It’s never an excuse. Mental illness is not something you use against survivors of sexual assault and can cause serious conflicts and more trauma to the victim.

The shame of talking and the pain of “keeping it inside

Escalating more into the tv show, it turns out that Dr. Adham is indeed a sexual harasser and is emotionally abusive. Using his authority, he knows how to cover up well with the magic of his words and his understanding of the human mind.

Another case represented in the show is Dr. Adham using his clinic as a hiding place and his words as a way of manipulation to harass an insecure teenager. It’s important to talk about such problems with teenagers and how we should spread the culture of“talking” and exclude the culture of “sham” and the taboos surrounding it. Leaving the victim in fear of her parents and society.

Many teenagers never talk about being touched by a stranger because they’re afraid of the finger-pointing and the shame coming with talking. Teenagers encourage others to speak up by doing the same. Saving others from being utilized and traumatized. We need more tv shows like 60 minutes in Egypt to open our eyes to such topics without saying it’s the victim’s fault.

Read also:
The Type Of Sexual Assault We Don’t Talk About: Coercion
Gaslighting 101: How It Affects Rape Victims
The Curious Case Of Jameela Jamil