A friend of mine sent me a link to a Facebook group called, and I roughly translate, Saudis for Women Driving in Saudi Arabia. This made me wonder how focused we are on the nitty-gritty we are losing sight of the big picture. How about a group for Saudis for Saudi Women Adult Status?
Do not get me wrong, many are the times when I have to wait in a store or at a place and see my fellow men instinctively get into their cars and drive away, not thinking twice about having to call a driver, coordinate a pickup schedule and be stranded somewhere waiting for their ride and I wish I had that privilege. However, how useful is the right to drive if we women still cannot exercise that privilege unless we are permitted to by a loving father, a protective brother, a doting husband, or a concerned son?
Almost everyday there is a newspeice or such in the local papers that shows how women struggle to finish paperwork yet cannot because they do not have a "guardian's" approval. You look up the procedures for acquiring a passport, and there you find separate procedures for Saudi Women and Children. When did being a woman equate being a minor? Every little thing in my life as a Saudi woman requires that sign-off from my "guardian": getting into college, taking a semester off, leaving the campus before 12 p.m. even if I do not have classes, applying to work, getting married, accepting a better work offer or going to a better school outside the country, everything that Saudi men, and citizen of other Gulf States, are privileged to do.
By contrast, if a Saudi woman is to commit a crime, even unknowingly as her world is confined by what her "guardian" permits her to do, she, not her "guardian", is going to receive punishment. Now, how is that fair? If I am not fit to make my own decisions, and if someone else has been given the power to make those decisions for me, how is it that I am going to benefit from punishment? I have no brains, nor do I have legal power to make my own decisions and thus learn from my mistake, remember? I am but a feeble-minded Saudi woman.
A group of Saudi women launched a public plea called "My Wali, i.e. guardian, Knows What's Best for Me". Another group of Saudi women started a counter-plea called "My Wali Doesn't Know Anything About Me". Those are very interesting social movements we are witnessing. Maybe, someday if I ever get married, my daughter will live in a Saudi Arabia that does not group her with children.
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I agree that while women driving is not the key issue, and we are addressing a symptom rather than the root cause, this battle represents far more than the issue itself "women driving".
ReplyDeleteIt is a very simple example of how one of the basic rights and necessities is taken away from women in Saudi.
The root cause of the problem is how women are perceived in the culture, and how this perception influenced policies to be passed against the religion, and common sense.
It is clearly the time to reexamine how we view others in our society and acknowledge equal rights, for women, men, children, and even foreigners who helped build the country, regardless of the oppressive and racist policies.