cold hearted, and young.

You’re not oppressed, you’re a princess!

In Arab News, Rima al-Mukhtar argues that Saudi women don’t really want to drive to begin with. “To them,” she writes, “driving is a hassle and not appropriate for Saudi Arabia” because Saudi women usually hire drivers to chauffeur them wherever they need to go. “Usually, only the rich and famous have their own chauffeur,” she adds, “but in Saudi Arabia almost everyone has one.” She quotes several Saudi women who are loathe to assume the tiresome responsibility of having to steer their own vehicles. “When I travel to a country where I can drive,” says Zaina al-Salem, a 29 year-old banker, “I’m usually burdened about the part when I get to park my car and walk all the way to the store.” (Walking’s bad enough, but when you throw in the humidity? Forget about it!) Shahad Ibrahim adds, “I feel like a princess where my driver takes me everywhere I want without complaint.”

God says women drivers are evil and deserve to die.

The Saudi-owned Elaph.com website reports on the meditations of Saudi cleric Shaykh Abd-al-Rahman al-Barrak against women who wish to drive cars. “What they are intending to do is forbidden and they thus become the keys to evil in this country,” he writes, calling them “westernized women seeking to westernize this country.” Name calling aside, al-Barrack is drawing on an extremist Wahhabi interpretation of Islam, according to which God forbids any mixed-gender mingling outside the family. Giving women the freedom to move around on their own would be to tempt God’s wrath. In fact, al-Barrak predicts the activists will be struck dead: “They will die, God willing, and will not enjoy this.” [read more]