The Israeli daily Jerusalem Post runs an opinion piece from a Saudi who responds to the anti-Saudi (and generally anti-Arab) rhetoric of the paper’s columnist Caroline Glick. The writer, a woman who prefers to remain anonymous, points out where Glick is, at best, misinformed about the country and ends with an invitation for her to visit Saudi Arabia.
Letter from Saudi Arabia
By H.A.Hello Caroline Glick, I am a 20 year old female living in Saudi Arabia. My family and I used to live the United States for 13 years, until we decided to move back to be closer to our relatives. The other day, I was searching for articles on Google and I came across your op-ed on Laura Bush’s recent visit to Saudi Arabia.
I am sorry to say but I was very disappointed with your article. You said things that are not true about my country. For instance, you mentioned that women in Saudi have no choice on who they marry, and that men can marry up to four women and divorce them just in a matter of words.
We do have a choice on who to marry. You do realize we live in the 21st century?! Both my sisters and brother knew their spouses before they were married, and I come from a relatively religiously committed family. My mother and father met through family outings in Saudi Arabia in the 50′s. While it is true that men can marry up to four women, there are still consequences that comes with it.
First, this is a part of our religion which gives no one the right to mock us about it. Second, no sheikh (the equivalent to a priest) will allow a man to marry a second or third wife without conducting an interview with him to see what his reasons are. For instance, my uncle recently married a second wife. This second wife was a woman who’s husband died and was in financial debt. My uncle did what he thought was right, after asking for his wife’s blessing. If he had not received this blessing he would not have done it. Nor would he have done it if he had not realized how bad the situation this woman was in.
…
RSS feed for comments on this post.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
January:31:2008 - 15:05
You do realize we live in the 21st century?!…First, this is a part of our religion which gives no one the right to mock us about it.
This writer appears to be missing something very big here: that mockery is a very important tool in evaluating religion. We can imagine a student brought up in an isolated community who had been purposely mis-taught that “Islam” means that everyone should stand on their head and cluck like a chicken every day. If no mockery is permitted of this and absolute respect demanded instead, how could the student cope if suddenly immersed in a larger Muslim community? Perhaps more importantly, how could the student’s new community cope with their clucking ignoramus?
For the opposite of mockery is holiness. Just as without evil in the world people cannot recognize good, so it is that without mockery people cannot recognize holiness. The very absence of mockery, then, suffices to remove the aura of holiness from a person, community, or even a nation.
January:31:2008 - 15:43
The authoress seems to lack any sense of irony in her defensiveness.
Physically yes. Intellectually and socially? Lady, get a grip. A society that refuses to let women drive, travel without permission, devalues their legal standing, denies them right to participate in the government isn’t in the 21st century. In fact, we would have to peer into the distant past to come with similar restrictions on women in other countries.
See Solomon2′s comments above.
I frequently see men assisting women in times of dire need without feeling the need to take them on as an extra wife. I am dealing with a death in a family and a female relative left without any assistance. I would never suggest polygamy as a means of supporting her. We are giving money, support, help in re-establishing her life. Telling her to go and be a man’s second wife for the sake of support?!? I don’t think so! Holding up this uncle’s conduct as an example of assistance to an unfortunate woman is an insult to those who help selflessly without attaching conditions to it.
Um….has anyone informed the religious police about this? So in the future a woman going out without an abaya is not beaten over it? It’s not much of a choice if you are going wind up beaten, imprisoned, or fined over it.
I think I will stop here. That letter is too easy to make fun of.
January:31:2008 - 16:04
Agreed. She is so defensive that you have to wonder if she believes what she’ defending.
That Caroline Glick might have it wrong also is not really a defense.
January:31:2008 - 19:25
I noticed this one too;
You do realize we live in the 21st century?!
From what I’ve been learning recently, it seems to me that women were a lot better off in the beginning of Islam than they are now in KSA.
(please correct me if I’m wrong, I realise my knowledge is limited)
Olivetheoil: does one really get beaten up if one doesn’t wear an abaya?
January:31:2008 - 19:39
Aafke:
I have never been to KSA (I decline to cover my head or my face) so my knowledge is secondhand. That said, I commented on the issue of the abaya based on what I read in the news. I particularly recall that issue catching my eyes when during the school fire of 2002, there were reports of the school-girls being beaten back into the burning building because they were not appropriately “covered.”
http://hrw.org/english/docs/2002/03/15/saudia3801.htm
January:31:2008 - 21:06
I think one of the major problems in the KSA is that there’s not one set of laws or rules that people can follow, other than to absolutely do nothing that might cause offense to anyone, anywhere, anytime.
That’s not a way to live a happy life. Instead, it’s a life of misery and minimalism. It’s hard to think outside the box when the box is made of layers of lead, surrounded by Kryptonite.
February:01:2008 - 17:46
olivetheoil: I have read about the schoolgirls: incredible, and also that those muttawa weren’t stoned to death for their crime. Doesn’t the preservation of live go before everything else according to the Quran? Or have I been reading the wrong sites again?
John: I’ve heard so much about how saudis smile once they’ve crossed the border, and how the smiles end when they come back, it does sound like a horrible version of ”1984”.
February:01:2008 - 18:07
For anyone who has lived outside the KSA, for any length of time, the KSA can only be seen as a repressive society. ‘Fun’ is not the first word you think of putting in a sentence with the words ‘Saudi Arabia’ already in it.
There are many good–and actually fun–things about the KSA. It’s just that there are many who really think ‘fun’ and ‘sin’ and ‘crime’ are merely synonyms. It’s sad, it’s pitiful, but it’s true.
February:02:2008 - 00:08
”I’ve heard so much about how saudis smile once they’ve crossed the border, and how the smiles end when they come back, it does sound like a horrible version of â€1984—. Its true. We recently returned from our annual winter trip out of KSA. At the airport, waiting for our flight back to Jeddah, the lounge was full of people chatting, smiling, wearing Western clothes, quite a usual sight in an airport. The atmosphere was quite festive. However, on the flight back, these same group of people slowly changed back into their thobes and abayas. I can’t explain it, but it happens every time we come back to KSA. Their demeanours change with the change of outfit. The facial expressions become more sobre, the volume lowers, people stop looking at each other and you can feel the fun being sucked out of you just be being with them. Of course, as a Westerner living in KSA, I can just tell you what I observe, but based on what I’ve seen, the smiles, or at least the public ones, end at the border!
February:02:2008 - 17:37
That article is plain and simple hogwash
if she is so confident, then hold a poll among saudi women 2 c how many will forfeit the rite do drive…saudi is just a failed state—its only becuz of oil and da west’s insatiable appetite for that oil that they havent disintegrated yet. Hello saudi, wake up its da 21st century, not da stone ages!!
February:03:2008 - 14:05
The facial expressions become more sobre, the volume lowers, people stop looking at each other and you can feel the fun being sucked out of you just be being with them… the smiles, or at least the public ones, end at the border!
Like the experience of leaving the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany, only in reverse. Could the be an exaggeration? Who doesn’t get depressed while returning from a great vacation abroad, no matter what their nationality?
February:03:2008 - 15:20
I also found the retort very defensive. She also defended the lack of religious freedom by implying that Saudi Arabia is a holy land for Islam, and that allowing freedom of religion would be tantamount to building mosques in the Vatican City.
That’s hogwash. The holy cities already ban non-Muslims. To say the entire country is the holy land is part of the Saudi propaganda that constantly links its culture to Islam.
February:03:2008 - 16:59
I read what she had to say and the comments others made. I agree with olivetheoil in her points and John’s that she was overly defensive and Saudi people take proud in what they do, say, wear believe etc. It could be that she is truly a happy Saudi woman in which case I am happy for her.
HOwever, I suspect that she is a wealthy one born into privilege although I could be mistaken. And I can add a little tidbit about this type is that in actuality they don’t even really care who worships in their land or how (although this is hidden from the masses for fear of retribution). They are all about helping uphold an image that they really deep down do not buy into. That in addition to maintaining their posh lifestyle is high on the priority list. I know I shouldn’t generalize, but this is what I have encountered personally.