Bush's friends the Saudis are so enlightened...

[mr blur]

:sarcasm:

Making a public splash in Saudi
By Rachel Reid
BBC News, Saudi Arabia

A new university for women is opening in Riyadh - yet Saudi Arabia remains a country where women cannot vote, drive, dress as they like or go where they please.

The women of Saudi Arabia are not just folded away behind swathes of hot black cloth - they live segregated lives
When I moved to the Middle East six months ago, I knew I would have to bid farewell to my arms and legs.

But I was happy to be working in the region, so I did not resent having to put my skirts and dresses into storage.

But as I prepared for my first trip to Saudi Arabia, I was bristling at the thought of having to wear an abaya - the all-enveloping black cloak that turns the women of the Gulf into mournful ghosts.

Perhaps that is why I called the hotel before I arrived, to ask a question I already knew the answer to - will I be able to use the swimming pool?

The response was a small silence, and then an embarrassed laugh. "Er, No madam. The pool is, of course, for men only. I am so sorry."

The women of Saudi Arabia are not just folded away behind swathes of hot black cloth, they live segregated lives, ushered out of the all-male public spaces into so called "family" areas, escorted everywhere by husbands or male relatives, and expected to ask for male permission to travel.
<snip>

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/6625393.stm

Maybe they need to be invaded and given Freedom and Democracy?

[MADem]

1. Gee, like he "helped" the women of Iraq?

This repression of women, she told me, is not about Islam. It is about culture. Just look at how interpretations of Islam shift with geography.

The closer countries are to other civilisations - the more progressive they are.

Take Tunisia, in North Africa, where women have had full rights for 50 years. The tides of change have now reached the Gulf.....

[CJCRANE]

2. The neocons were right

that (some parts of) the Middle East need(s) opening up to democratic ideas...

BUT in hitching their wagon to a sociopath worshipped by millions of science and civil rights denying fundamentalists they have caused almost the opposite effect -

Once-secular Iraq is now a de facto islamic state and American espousal of "democracy" is now seen as a smokescreen for breaking international law and indiscrimate use of deadly force.

[izzie]

3. I lived in SA and it is odd for an Am.

I got along fine with the people by wearing my black robe and putting a scarf around my neck. They knew I was an Am. and used to follow me around markets and shops as they wanted to talk to me. I was middle age so I think they felt it was fine. The country people were the best and very friendly. Frankly the robe was a good plan. It was very cool as it was large and you could wear what you liked under it. Lighter color would have been even better. That you had to always be with the man on your passport was a pain and you could not even go to a dentist with our him there. That I hated. After seeing how they all drove I was glad I did not have to drive. I have seen the country women drive way out in the country which is where I lived. I would say one has to have an open mind to live there, which I have. I think that they saw that I just took them as they were and made no judgments which most Westerns found hard not to do. We went to the peoples homes. Country people, which was odd and other Westerns asked if we could get them into their homes also but we did not do that. My husband would go to the parties for all men. I really enjoyed my time in their country.

[JCMach1]

4. It's easy to criticize this, but public segregation isn't all bad

The author wants to create the sense that there are no facilities for men. Typically they are the same or better... I really doubt this person has examined anything beyond the surface...

And yes, there are many feminists under those abayas, especially among the educated upper-class.

Here in the UAE, I am quite happy to send my daughters to a segregated school. Boys do not monopolize the attention! We actually switched schools here in the UAE from a co-ed school because my oldest daughter was getting horrific teasing from the western British boys. The British system is sort of notorious for this. It was a huge problem. For her, it was an ideal solution.

Things are far from perfect in the good old KSA, but this woman takes on the subject in the same kind of way that Karen Hughes did:

...
Senior aid to President George W Bush, and the under secretary of state for public diplomacy, Karen P Hughes is on a mission to spread the powers of democracy -- and the lifestyle of women from the United States.

Hughes told women in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, that Arab women are oppressed and Hughes expressed her personal "hope" that Saudi women would be able to become full participants in Saudi society.

Women have equal rights, Hughes said, and they vote and drive cars in the United States, she added...

"We are all pretty happy," said one woman.

"Americans fail to understand our society" said another citing how men and women of Saudi Arabia do live peaceful and in cooperative coexistence. Another woman said she resented that "one-way ideas" from the United States are being spread across the Arab world as the only way to live.

"Not everyone wants to live like you," said one female student who is 23.

Saudi Arabia was the second stop of Hughes' Middle East tour meant to promote concepts of living from the United States. One day earlier, Hughes was questioned in Egypt about President Bush's frequent references to God in his speeches, and Hughes said that God exists in the Constitution as "one nation under God."

Women in attendance, all of which were either enrolled in college or had earned their degrees, told Hughes that they look past their country's ban on women voting or driving. "It is not true we are barred from talking to the other sex," said one health practitioner.

At one point, Hughes paused, collected her thoughts, smiled, and said she'd return to the United States and talk about the women she's met in Saudi Arabia.

One woman said that the United States has become a "right wing country" under President George W Bush and that the press was not allowed to criticize his policies. Hughes laughed and said she wished that were the case, although the women didn't react to her retort. Hughes herself is a former broadcast journalist... http://www.thinkandask.com/2005/0930women.html




Let me be bold enough to add that Saudi women are quite strong enough to take care of themselves on their own terms without the help of narrow-minded western finger-pointing.

[no_hypocrisy]

5. It isn't Islam wholesale. It's the interpretation of the Koran by certain denominations.

In this case, it's the Wahabi interpretation of severely limiting women's roles in the family, in society, and their personal lives.

By contrast, Sufism encourages equality between the genders. And this position infuriates other Muslims as Sufis as seen as blasphemers.