Tag Archives: women’s rights

International news

Saudis on UN women’s panel? Huh?

Critics of the United Nations — and I am not one of them — gripe often about the absurd decisions the world body makes.

I have to concede that the U.N. has made a bonehead call by placing Saudi Arabia on its Commission on the Status of Women.

Huh? What the … ?

Does anyone need reminding here that women are not allowed to, um, drive motor vehicles in Saudi Arabia? How about pay equity? Women earn a fraction of what Saudi men earn. Saudi women aren’t even allowed to make critical decisions without a man’s approval, for crying out loud!

Sheesh!

The Miami Herald reports that the Saudis formed a “girls council,” but didn’t appoint any females to it.

Good ever-lovin’ grief, man.

The United Nations needs to think about this. I doubt the U.N. would rescind the appointment. Bureaucrats tend to cover their backsides even as they undergo push back from goofy decisions.

The anti-U.N. crowd in this country has been handed plenty of grist with which to beat the world body bloody. I won’t join them in calling for the end of the United Nations.

Decisions such as this one involving the Saudis and the women’s commission, though, does give me pause.

International news

Michelle's just the latest to flout Saudi tradition

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Laura Bush did it. So did Condoleezza Rice and Hillary Rodham Clinton. Same with Angela Merkel.

What did a former U.S. first lady, two former secretaries of state and the chancellor of Germany do? They appeared in public in Saudi Arabia — without covering their hair, as prescribed by Muslim tradition in the Sunni nation.

http://thinkprogress.org/world/2015/01/28/3616556/saudi-arabia-michelle-obama/

The current first lady, Michelle Obama, thus is the just the latest woman to flout the custom demanded of Saudi women.

It’s interesting at a couple of levels that the media would make any kind of mention of Mrs. Obama’s decision to go scarf-less in public.

No. 1, she is hardly the first foreign dignitary to be photographed doing this.

No. 2, and perhaps more importantly, is that she was virtually ignored while she stood in a greeting line alongside her husband — Barack H. Obama, president of the United States of America.

The dignitaries walked along the greeting line, shook hands with Mr. Obama but didn’t shake Mrs. Obama’s hand. What’s up with that?

Actually, I know. Saudis disrespect women whenever and wherever possible. That, too, is part of their custom. Women aren’t able to drive motor vehicles legally, for example. It should come as no surprise, then, that the potentates or whoever those gentlemen were greeting the president would ignore his wife.

To whatever extent she intended, Michelle Obama did a nice job of standing tall and proud for women in the country that played host to her briefly — and, in fact, for oppressed women all around the world. So did those who preceded her.

Well done, ladies.