How brave is this woman?

[shimmerysilverglitter]

I have already posted this on the In The News Board but I wanted to discuss it here. I knew Saudi women had a hard time of it but I did not realise that in a so-called developed country that women are not even allowed to drive!

saudi women beats up virtue cop.

As I said on the other thread I cannot imagine how desperate this woman must have felt knowing how severe her punishment would be for doing something she has every right to be doing. I can't begin to imagine this kind of life.

It says at the end of the article that there are changes happening in Saudi with regards to attitudes towards women, does anyone know anymore about this subject? because I am woefully ignorant and I don't think I should be.

And this is what good old Britain does to people who don'T want to have crusades against Islam

Oh I'm not saying in any way shape or form that the US or the UK do or have done good things with their foreign policy. Totally the contrary, and often when we thought we were doing good things it was quite the reverse. And I live in Canada where the churches were guilty of terrible things, verging on the edge of genocide. Nor was I suggesting that the Saudi government funded Al-Queda. But there is a strong fundamentalist aspect to the country (obviously as it supplies the religious police) and it is one that has been very active across the middle east. So pushing Saudi Arabia to radicalise further (a likely effect of sanctions) could be a very bad idea.

Bush was a self righteous idiot, whose religion bolstered his own self of self importance. Sadly religious conviction is still held to be terribly important in selecting Americans for high office (being an atheist means you are probably unelectable, and Obama is currently the subject of a smear campaign for being "Muslim", not that he is or that that should be a smear.

Interestingly the biggest producers of missionaries are now Africa and South America.

Nooka Sakura I see you are much more interested in
rhetoric, point scoring and argument than productive discussion. I had my hopes up there.

That was just meant for Sakura, I don't know how Nooka's name ended to there. Doesn't anyone have any interest in how to make a difference to the lives of women of other cultures without being accused of cultural evangelism? Apart from just criticising this book?

At least they and their fans are doing something (apparently.tly) I suppose they might be exaggerating. But is "doing something" such an anathema? Because they are seen as rightwingers?

They can name women they have freed, rehabilitated, whatever. Their tub thumping is attached to action.

I see from that article that our own suffering in the western world trumps the suffering of women in Africa, south Asia, south east Asia, the developing world. For god's.sake - as if we don't talk about ourselves enough! this topic is jammed full of the problems of women in the developed world - but oh no they're still more important than the problems outside it.

This is exactly what I said earlier up the thread. Any feminist issue that forces us to think about the left of centre view, and whether it is the answer to the problems many women face, is simply ignored, or distorted.

now I understand why nobody in the mn feminist section wants to talk about it. and prefers to talk about advertising or feminist beastfeeding tra la la.

what a bloody epiphany.

I am so sick at this. It's about a week since I heard of half the sky, and I was interested in the difficult questions it raises about dire t action. But it seems many feminists would rather women weren't helped, than were helped by someone they wouldn't vote for.

But one can talk about direct action without reading it. Some people have made up their minds anyway.

But I agree with Sakura. To really help women in the third world, the Half the Sky people should be lobbying western governments. Third world governments do listen to western governments, because of business and trade. If western governments really cared then change would occur. Western governments put sanctions on South Africa and eventually apartheid was dismantled. The movement to "save the planet" lobbies western governments in order to change things. Why don't Half the Sky do the same thing? (or maybe they are doing that, I don't know). But I agree with Sakura, that "humanitarian intervention" is often a smokescreen for imperialism and interfering in other countries' sovereignty. Even the "save the planet" movements may not be what they claim to be. When intervention occurs, it is because the elite want it to occur, and the reason that not enough is done for women is because the elite are not interested.

I think there should be sanctions to prevent injustices against women, and I think changes would then soon occur. There are times when we should intervene on real humanitarian grounds. But we should be sure that we are not being tricked and that our intervention is really not just a cover for imperialism. The best way to effect change for women across the planet is to change the attitudes of the rulers of the planet.

You could read up the thread. Plenty of opinions there without Substance. Wish i'd never mentioned it now. As if the authors' cvs render ALL direct intervene.tion beyond d the pale.

I felt the same way about direct action but felt that the approach which swept all its own doubts aside to get stuck in there was an interesting one.

we are all let off the hook if you are right claig. does this mean no longer donating to schools for girls and female collectives and female medical centres and maternal mortality campaigns, charities for missing and traffickers women in south Asia?

what about south Asia? sanctions and boycotts there?

personally I would go for sanctions everywhere for real injustices against women. Once that message was sent out, the leaders in these countries would be falling over each other to demonstrate how just towards women they were. The charity donations do good, but they are like a drop in the ocean to what the politicians could do if they felt like it. As Sakura said, there is a danger that our energies are being diverted (possibly intentionally) from effecting real, lasting change, by concentrating on the micro level rather than the macro level of the politicians. Maybe we should put the politicians on the hook.

that would mean sanctions against India, where sexual equality is enshrined in law but poor women - not just poor women - often lead the most horrible and degraded lives because they are women, where foeticide and girl killing still happen, where women carry out the filthiest of jobs.. all illegal. sanctions?

and sanctions against Thailand, cambodia, Bangladesh, Pakistan, eastern Europe... where laws may be in place but vile practices contine?

What about where you are taking sanctions against a culture, not a country? As with, say, India?

well yes, why not? It wouldn't take long before countries started changing things in order to avoid sanctions. It's similar to the way that entry into the WTO is waved as a carrot to countries provided they carry out changes. We could say that you can't join the club unless you follow the rules. However, again we should be wary of a Blairite humanitarian intervention which is really just a smokescreen.

It sound just as morally colonial as direct action.:)

I think that if the injustices are so large that they do not fit with what we consider civilised, then we are entitled to say that you cannot join our club unless you play by our rules. Cultures do change, that's how women gained the vote here. We can help to speed up change in other countries too. Otherwise, in a way, we are in danger of condoning things such as the caste system and crimes against women and crimes against humanity.

yes you are right, it is a bit of a moral colonialism, but it would prevent so much suffering and injustice that it would be immoral not to do something. The danger is that the politicians cloak their intentions under a moral guise. We always need to remain sceptical in case they are fooling us and being immoral instead of moral.

So basically you would approve of sanctions against Hinduism?

She deserves a medal. Or better, a sort of ceremonial gold stick for bashing every moralising judgemental sexist bully who feels the need to poke their unwelcome nose into her day.

that's going a bit far. I don't really know what Hinduism is. Is the caste system part of Hinduism? If so then I would still say that pressure should be applied on that aspect. Let's assume that the Mayans were still around. I would still impose sanctions on them, no matter how they tried to justify their bloodthirsty human sacrifices as a religion.

We should do sanctions that target the rich and powerful, not sanctions that harm the innocent people, like the sanctions that stopped some medicines going to Iraq. The rich and powerful only care about their own interests, not their people's. If we were able to impose sanctions that harmed their interests, I think they would sit up and listen.

Yes I agree we shouuld also sort out our own backyard. I don't think it is us, the people, who are the hypocrites, it's our politicians. We need to make sure we get good politicians and a good fair proportional system that encourages more decent women and men to stand. Personally I'm in favour of frequent referenda that could then be implemented, something like the Swiss system. Not this representational system, where the MP ignores the public's wishes for four years.

It makes me unhappy that the conclusion is to do nothing except at home. It's depressing beyond belief. But shouldn't surprise me on mn, given the history of the topic.

Do nothing for those poor bloody women so that we aren't accused of hypocrisy. In the end it's always about the white western woman. Is there no other way.

My solution would be to track down local campaign groups and support them financially, ignore doubts about imperialism and target a country's educated class with campaigning by women or men of that culture who've come to reject its worst practices. Still a bit sticky but more effective than campaigning for sanctions and better than doing nothing.