Saudi women's rights movement

Saudi women refuse to stay in their kitchens and waste their education and skills on nothing. They are ready to move on, alongside men.

By Fatema Kareem - Tuesday 26 Jul 2011

religious countries, Saudi Women, women's rights

Political Islam, or whatever you want to call it, has failed on both sides: Shiite and Sunni countries. Some people may argue that it’s the fundamentalists from each side who need to be blamed for this dark and scary image of Islam, not the religion itself! Until we find modern intellectual minds that interpret and apply the pure Islam on the Earth, political Islam will continue to fail. We need unbiased individuals and groups to help reform and modernize the religion and also to take the non-Muslim into account because we all live together on one planet.

I want to ask those who want to apply the real Islam in our daily and political life, as they claim: which Islam do you want to apply? Sunni Islam or Shiite Islam or Wahhabi Islam?

On the first day we go to school, in the first religion class, we have been told that it is un-Islamic to separate religion from state and as Muslims we should be ready to give our lives to protect this religion. Otherwise we are considered “kafir”, which means infidels in Arabic, who accept western values.

We need to find a middle ground to stand on for all people, even non-believers, and move on with our lives to the future. What happens in Saudi Arabia or Iran, for example, affects other people on the other side of the world and vice versa. We are no more isolated from others: the world is changing and it is better to embrace this change for good.

There are many who are affected negatively by political Islam and when it comes to women the situation becomes worse. Women’s fight to gain their basic rights in some countries has become a dark long night with a dawn that never comes.

In a country such as Saudi Arabia, the abuse of women’s rights is not simply the unfortunate result of religious authority. It is the consequence of a state policy that gives women fewer rights than men and that means women face discrimination all their lives. That allows men to practice their power on women without being accused by law. On the other hand, nobody will never know. It is always there; something has been cooked and in case of Saudi women the “Arab spring” might raise the heat under their pot a little bit. The women in this area are growing and deciding to take the hard path and are starting to express their opinions freely. Saudi women now don’t want to waste their education and skills or get married to someone to satisfy their materialistic desires. According to “Arab News”, in a study conducted recently (which more than 200 women participated in between the ages of 17 to 35), 87% would choose financial independence over depending on their husbands. Only 13% admitted they would marry a rich husband.

“I cannot see myself staying at home and doing nothing but cooking and cleaning. I want my husband to see more in me than just a ‘baby-making machine,’” said 34-year-old Zahra Abunaser

Oppressed people cannot stay oppressed forever. Even though women in this area are not asking for many rights, such as political rights, banning or limiting other religious issues like polygamy or temporary marriages for men, women’s rights may obtained years from now.

The women’s movement in Saudi Arabia is still taking baby steps; it could take years to walk independently. Academic achievement is not necessarily helping to push the women’s rights movement. The confrontation of women’s groups who are asking for more rights within Islam with the small number of secular and atheist women (due to lack of freedom of religion and beliefs in this country) make it hard for all women to get together and benefit from unification. There are women who still find that being a feminist is not Islamic, there are some who want few rights—such as stopping the ban on women’s driving and removing the guardianship law on women at the age of 18. It is not surprising that we find women who are still against the freedom of choosing clothes and not wearing the veil, and who support polygamous marriage, or even temporary marriages. There are women who would fight hard to keep things as they are. There is a woman called Salwa al-Mutairi, a well-known television hostess and thankfully an unsuccessful candidate for the Kuwaiti Parliament, who claims that women being sex slaves is an Islamic practice to legitimize men’s sexual desires outside of marriage and to avoid adultery!

Another example of a woman that refuses the fight to acquire more rights for women is Rawdah Al-Yousif, a Saudi Arabian who describes herself as activist. This woman attacked Manal Al-Sharif, the woman who started the campaign “Women2Drive” and drove her car in June 2011 to make a statement that the driving ban on women should be stopped in Saudi Arabia. Al-Yousif was also a campaign supervisor and organizer, with a number of other Saudi women, on a campaign supporting the Kingdom’s male guardianship system. The campaign was entitled “My Guardian Knows The Best For Me”.

Another reason pushing the women’s movement back in Saudi Arabia is the conflict between Shia and Sunni Muslims. Every time when women from Shiite minority demand that women of Saudi Arabia deserve more rights, no matter what their background is, they are always facing the accusation of disloyalty to their country and the hidden agenda, mostly the Iranian Shiite agenda, claimed to be destroying other Saudi women’s morals. All these reasons keep women uniting and fighting to gain their rights as human beings.

Twenty years ago we weren’t standing where we are now. It is maybe the “Arab Spring” or the “social media” or whatever helps the young ones to start thinking and to try to put the pieces of the puzzle together. For sure, the picture will be clear for everyone eventually and the Saudi youth will start to understand that we are all Saudi Arabian and this is what most matters to build this country.