Saudi women are hitting the streets, revving their engines and trying to drive home a very serious point. It’s all part of a push for social reform by defying the desert kingdom’s longstanding ban on female drivers.
“We are not trying to reinvent the steering wheel. We just want to be more than third-class citizens in our own country. So-called ‘backseat bitches.’ We want to drive to the mall, drive to the manicurists, maybe even try Formula One racing,” says one person, presumably a woman, from under a black face covering.
In Saudi Arabia, it is considered sinful for women to drive because it could eventually lead to the unthinkable – freethinking women parading around in public exposing their faces and hair. Many conservative men make the mental leap that this would naturally lead to nationwide moral and social corruption. Not true, says the rest of the rational world.
Saudi Arabia is the only country in the known universe where women are forbidden to drive. The ‘Women2Drive’ campaign was launched online through Facebook but has now hit the road and is slowly racking up mileage on the highways and avenues of Jeddah, Riyadh, and Dammam.
Many Saudi males are desperately terrified at the very thought of change. “I’m afraid of women drivers because I saw [the] movie, Thelma and Louise,” says Mohammed, a volunteer with the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice.
Since June 17, dozens of determined women are refusing to park their emotions at home and have gone for a defiant spin, challenging the religious and political establishments, the domineering narrow-minded men who are hell-bent on maintaining tradition.
“Let me be very clear: This is a public safety issue, not a human rights issue,” says Ibrahim al-Awati, Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Misogyny and Transportation. “Right now in our country, women aren’t officially human beings. If we allow them to drive, it would set a dangerous precedent for other non-humans. First women, then what? Monkeys, camels, and immigrants will want to drive. Can you imagine the traffic?!”
Great ending line.