This article appeared in the February 2016 issue of the print edition of THE TORCH as a part of the center spread feature titled “Gender Inequality Remains a Global Human Rights Concern.”

The treatment of women as property may seem to be something of the very distant past; however, this is the furthest thing from the truth in some countries. In Egypt, objectification is being hidden by a wolf in sheep’s clothing that identifies it as a protective law.

Egypt’s “tourism marriage” law allows for short term marriages between young girls and much older than their “summer bride,” as long as the man pays the girl’s family a large sum of money. Egypt claims making the practice legal is an act of good will that purportedly helps poverty-stricken families who were illegally resorting to selling their daughters into such marriages.

The brides are being married to wealthy Arab tourists from Gulf countries, claims a report on human trafficking released by the U.S. State Department. The marriages are not legally binding and end when the men return to their home countries.

The price for the so-called “summer bride” is negotiable and can range anywhere from $500 to $5,000, according to Britain’s The Daily Mail. the wealthy tourists pay an amount to poor families through intermediaries, ranging from anywhere between $495 and $4,950.The young victims, some under the age of 18, are then forced to serve as sex slaves as well as servants to their “husbands.”

According to Al Arabiya News, “in many cases, the family agrees to marry their daughter without her consent, but often the girls are willing participants as they see it as the only way to help provide for their families.”

One such case involved Hind, now aged 27, who said that her former marriage left her feeling disgusted at the fact that her “husband” (age 59) was older than her father. Hind told National Public radio (NPR), “I was an innocent girl who believed in love and marriage.“ Now, I hate the word ‘marriage.’“

This opportunity at survival turns into the death of happiness for the girls taking part in the “summer marriages.” The girls involved succumb to mass humiliation and regret. Many of the abandoned “summer brides” often become ostracized by society and find it difficult to re-marry in the traditional way, particularly if the “summer marriage” resulted in a child, according to Al Arabiya News.

“Many of the young women end up in a cycle of temporary marriages with Gulf tourists, and others are targeted by Egyptian men who marry them in order to force them into prostitution.”

According to NPR, marriages between foreign men and women who were 25 years or more younger was once illegal in Egypt. “But in 1993, the government began requiring foreign men to pay for the right to marry much younger Egyptian women,” reports NPR.

Amr Abdel Rahman, a researcher at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights., scoffs at Egypt’s claim that the law is “protective.” “It’s an industry,” says Rahman, “Especially in the north where it becomes some sort of tourism marriage.” Rahman claims that the “tourism marriages” roughly translates to sex trafficking.

Egypt is a country where more than a quarter of the population lives below the poverty line. Rahman says that since the Egyptian government now regulates the practice, it will only benefit the government through tax revenue and those who broker the “tourism marriages.”

“It’s basically making everyone profit without providing any protection to the girls,” Rahman told NPR. “These girls need medical protection. These girls need a social safety network. These are not there. They were not there before…and they will continue being absent.“

Money is tangible but the emotional shipwreck growing inside Egyptian women is not. This is where it becomes easy to ignore the cries of men and women all over the country for equality. Even more so in America, where it is much easier to turn geographic distance into the make-believe. As long as these catastrophic occurrences aren’t happening right in front of us, it is incredibly easy to turn a blind eye.

Right now, women in Egypt will continue to lay themselves on the line for their poverty stricken families. It is apparent that when the Egyptian Minister of Justice, Ahmed al-Zand, allowed the practice of foreign men purchasing a woman’s hand in marriage, he was not thinking in terms of safety or morality.