At MEMRI there are some excerpts from Saudi women columnists, denouncing the misogyny of the preachers, and the endless limitations imposed on women in Saudi society. All good stuff, of course, but, things being as they are, they have to argue from within Islam:
Columnist Dr. Hasna Al-Quna'ir wrote in the Saudi daily Al-Riyadh: "Women are victims of [the preachers'] discourse... [which is intended to] condemn them and to prove them inferior [to men] in their piety and in their mental [abilities], [based on] a shameless distortion of the Prophet's hadith..."Our TV channels are full of old and new preachers who convey their views directly to the public... Answering [viewers' questions], they burst with accusations against members of the [female] sex. They excite the viewers' emotions, entreating them to defend the virtues that the women corrupt...
"An example is the answer given by one of the preachers [to a viewer who asked] about consulting with his wife and seeking her advice. [The preacher told him]: Do not consult with her, for she is emotional and her opinions are not valid... As evidence, he cited the Prophet's hadith [which says]: 'a tribe that nominates a woman [as leader] will not succeed'... Many preachers refuse to acknowledge that this hadith... was uttered in [specific] historical circumstances and in a particular context. The Prophet never meant it as a ruling that applies to all women, in every place and at all times...
At which point you can't help thinking that if this is all about what the Prophet really meant, if the last word is always going to be what it says in the Koran or in a hadith, then these poor women are fighting a losing battle. Once you accept that the word of God was handed down 1400 years ago - to, as it happens, a man, in a male-dominated world - and the rest of human history is all about submission to that word, well, feminism quite frankly doesn't have much going for it.
Still, they have no choice but to keep at it. Here's Fatima Al-Faqih in the Saudi daily Al-Watan:
"Are Saudi women actually deprived [of their rights]? [They] are forbidden to drive, forbidden to travel without permission, forbidden to stay alone at a hotel without permission, forbidden to name their own children without [a man's] consent... forbidden to take out a passport without permission... forbidden to leave their homes without permission... forbidden to take a job without permission... forbidden to change the color of their abayas, forbidden to go to school or to the university without permission... forbidden to purchase shares or to open to a [bank] account in their children's name without permission."[A woman] is not allowed to expose her face in some cities of the kingdom... [She] is not allowed to marry without permission... not allowed to stay married if [one of] her male relatives decides that her husband's [tribal] lineage is inferior to hers... not allowed to sue for divorce without apologizing and paying a fine, not allowed to keep her children after the divorce, unless she gets permission... not allowed to hold a senior position in the private or public sectors, not allowed to vote or run for office... not allowed to travel alone with a chauffeur... not allowed to annoy her husband, and finally, a woman's voice is considered [a form of] defilement, and she is forbidden to speak in public, so that her affairs will remain shrouded in secrecy.
"A researcher [studying the limitations on women] would [probably] stop here, since the list is endless, and since he would conclude that whoever doubts the [injustice] inflicted on women either lacks awareness or derives some benefit from the discrimination. The damage [caused by this discrimination] is obvious, and the solution has been delayed, causing the problem to grow [even] more severe. There is need for immediate intervention in order to stop the deterioration."
Good luck with that.
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