The article begins by explaining Rotana's policies, with an emphasis on their liberal application of the country's mandatory dress code and women in various positions of power. The work environment is such a radical departure from the normal manner of doing business that men who apply to work at the company must be tested to see if they can handle such a dramatic shift:

The sight unnerves enough men who come looking for a job that human-resources manager Sultana al-Rowaili has developed a trick to see if a male applicant can handle working in a mixed-gender office. She arranges for a female colleague to interrupt the initial interview, and watches to see if the man loses concentration or stares too much. Sometimes even that isn't necessary. Many men are undone by the very idea of being interviewed by a woman. "They are in a state of shock to see a woman in a position of authority and to have to ask her for a job," al-Rowaili says.

The women of Rotana appear to be happy and fulfilled with their work, and Andrew Lee Butters uses their cheerful beginning as a way to discuss the changing role of women in Saudi Arabia. While women are becoming increasingly educated and have indicated a willingness to participate fully in society, they are still faced with large obstacles:

Critics outside the government say the state is still failing to take a systematic approach to dismantling gender barriers. While the government is trying to encourage women to enter the workforce, for example, there are still no clear guidelines as to what is legal and what is illegal in an office setting, according to Abdulaziz al-Gasim, a former judge who now runs his own law firm in Riyadh. "We would like to hire women," he says. "Women in the law faculties send us their CVs. But where would we put them?" Without a separate entrance for women, or gender-specific meeting rooms, firms fear they could be prosecuted. There are also still no laws to protect women from harassment at work. "There is no meaning behind female education if they can't enter the workforce," says al-Gasim.

In addition to matters of law, matters of perception also influence how much women can push for change. Sadly, it appears that many women are just fine with the status quo:

There's evidence, too, that many women don't want radical change. A government poll in 2006 - one of the few attempts to gauge women's opinions - found that 86% thought women shouldn't work in a mixed environment, and 89% agreed women shouldn't drive. Iman al-Alqeel, the editor of Hayat, a conservative magazine for girls, says most of her readers find the thought of working or studying around boys and men intimidating. "They want to be able to relax and not worry about what other people think about them," she says, though that's partly because Saudi men don't know how to behave around women. "Before you bring in something new you have to fix the old habits," she says. "If you want women to drive, send the men to driving school."

Still, the article ends on a hopeful -yet defiant - note:

"We are not a bunch of Barbie dolls," says al-Rowaili, the Rotana television executive. "All of us have faced so many challenges to get here. We are pioneers. And we are going to win."

Saudi Arabia's Small Steps for Women [Time]

Arab News reports:

As part of the campaign - entitled "My Guardian Knows The Best For Me" - the women have written a letter to Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah in which they confirmed their full support for an Islamic approach in administering the Kingdom.

The campaign has been launched to counter calls to abandon the Kingdom's guardianship or wali system. In a statement published on the Internet, Rawdah Al-Yousif, the campaign's supervisor and organizer, wrote about "her dismay at the efforts of some who have liberal demands that do not comply with Islamic law (Shariah) or with the Kingdom's traditions and customs."

Al-Yousif also pointed out in her statement that the campaign's mission is to promote the voices of Saudi women who reject the "ignorant and vexatious demands" of liberals to do away with the guardianship system.

Much of the reactions in newspapers and on blogs is in favor of doing away with the system, but the writers all take a nuanced view of feminist issues at play. After all, the complicating factor in this controversy is that other women are advocating to uphold a patriarchal policy.

Nesarine Malik debunks some myths over at Comment is Free:

I do not believe it is anything as clichéd as Stockholm syndrome or even a sincere commitment to what they believe are religious values. Even under subjugation, women have power, mostly over other women, and that power is drawn from their hard-earned position in the established hierarchy.

Those that have excelled at compliance have achieved some status and can then look down on the less honourable and rebellious. An assault on this system destroys an entire arsenal of survival skills and lifetime of work. Like the chronically redundant, they would have to retrain and re-enter the job market at junior level with all the other upstarts. In fact, by allying themselves to the male guardians, women are then delegated power that they can in turn wield themselves. They have a vested interest in the status quo and in maintaining their positions as the matrons of propriety.

She ultimately concludes:

Nobody is stopping women from deferring to their guardians' authority in their private lives, but insisting that this authority applies across the board shows a shocking disregard for other women not privileged enough to have guardians who "know what's best for them".

Blogging for the Huffington Post, Sabria Jawhar takes pains to explain how Islamic law is being conflated with local customs by the guardianship supporters:

Tribal customs should not usurp Sharia. Yet, to listen to the pro-guardianship camp, Saudi customs and traditions should indeed be a central part of the system. In effect, they are placing customs and traditions above Islam.

By waging a campaign fully supporting existing guardianship rules dooms thousands of Saudi women to being housebound servants to male family members.

A campaign to encourage guardianship, but also to demand that codified laws protect the abused, makes more sense. Such a system respects an independent woman's right to move about, attend university and marry whomever she pleases. It allows the family to determine a comfort level, but also imposes consequences on guardians who manipulate the laws to their own advantage.

Eman Hashim over at Muslimah Media Watch also uses caution in her arguments. Her analysis revolves around the tricky ideas of personal choice and agency and she writes:

Women empowerment will not be achieved neither by Saudi princesses quoting some verses from Qur'an on their online campaigns, nor by human rights activists who sometimes also slip into the same mistake of prejudice when they meet any woman whose life style is different from theirs.

Empowerment is the freedom to choose. Bring up your daughter to believe in herself and her potentials, educate her, and then let her lead her own life and make her own choices. If you bring up your daughter as a fragile creature that's liable to fracture and who is unable to protect herself, she'll grow up into a woman who's just that: a fragile creature unable to protect herself.

Give her the liberty to choose her life, and stop judging her if that choice doesn't resemble yours.

Women backing guardianship law create a stir [Arab News]
Saudi women fight for autonomy [The Guardian]
Saudi Tribal Customs, Not Islam, Responsible for Male Guardianship Abuses [Huffington Post]
Someone to Watch Over Me: On the Saudi Guardianship Campaign [Muslimah Media Watch]

A British court has granted the woman anonymity, but she reportedly comes from a wealthy family in Saudi Arabia, and is married to a member of the royal family. (Her husband and her relatives have cut off contact with her.) Her fears of stoning are not unfounded — 40 women have been executed in Saudi Arabia since 1990, and one currently awaits stoning for adultery. (She had a child six years after her husband died.) Another princess, Mishaal bint Fahd, was executed by "gunshot to the head" after admitting adultery in 1977. After a British documentary was made about her execution, the Saudi government expelled the British ambassador, pulled members of their royal family out of Britain, and canceled lucrative export contracts.

It is likely fear of such retaliation that makes the British government keep asylum deals like the princess's a secret. Robert Verkaik of the Independent writes that to make public such deals "would in effect be to highlight the persecution of women in Saudi Arabia, which would be viewed as open criticism of the House of Saud and lead to embarrassing publicity for both governments." (Interestingly, the Obama Administration, as reported last week, is softening the United States' stance on granting asylum for victims of domestic abuse.) But in keeping secret Saudi Arabia's human rights abuses, Britain is essentially protecting the Saudi government from any international pressure to change.

Note: The Muslim pilgrims pictured are stoning a pillar as part of a religious ceremony; they are not participating in an execution.

Princess Facing Saudi Death Penalty Given Secret UK Asylum [Independent]
Saudi Princess Given Asylum In UK Over Fears She Faces Execution For Having Illegitimate Child With British Lover [Daily Mail]
Saudi Arabian Princess Seeks Asylum In Britain Over Illegitimate Child [Telegraph]

As mentioned earlier, Saudi Arabia's strict segregation laws ban women from working in stores, which means that women have to buy underwear from male clerks. Three months ago, a group of Saudi women launched a campaign to boycott lingerie stores until the country allows them to employ women. Reem Asaad, the women who organized the boycott, says training women was the idea of Suhair al-Qurashi, who is also working on the campaign. The Associated Press reports:

"She wanted the training to be a part of the solution because the industry was complaining that there's a lack of qualified [women] in the market who can run and manage lingerie stores," said Asaad. "So we covered fitting and technical issues, we covered selling and handling customer complaints."

After hearing about the boycott online, an Australian women offered to teach the course and a group of Victoria's Secret employees sent a box of bras to be used during training. "It was a beautiful experience," said Faten Abdo, who works as a coordinator in the offices of a lingerie company. "The most shocking thing for me was the bra sizes. We didn't know how to get proper measurements before."

Yesterday, after completing the 10-day course in Jiddah, the women held a small graduation ceremony. British consul-general Kate Rudd attended to show support for the campaign. "It was a small step, but perhaps from this little drop there will be bigger ripples," said Rudd.

Saudi Women Learning To Sell Bras [The Associated Press]

Earlier: Boy-Cott: Male Lingerie Salesmen Not Helping Modesty Say Saudi Women

"If a person gives SR 1,200 [$320] to his wife and she spends 900 riyals [$240] to purchase an abaya [the black cover that women in Saudi Arabia must wear] from a brand shop and if her husband slaps her on the face as a reaction to her action, she deserves that punishment," Al-Razine said, setting off a wave of protests from women in the audience. [CNN]

[The person seen in the image at left is not the girl in question] The girl's mother petitioned for the annulment in December, but was refused on a technicality. The eight-year-old's father arranged the marriage between his daughter and a "close friend" in order to settle debts with the man. According to Al Arabiya News Channel the marriage contract was created as part of a loan repayment agreement. In exchange for the girl, the groom agreed to deduct the equivalent of $8,000 from the debt owed him by the girl's father.

The judge ruled that the child bride will be allowed to petition for divorce once she has reached puberty. Her husband was also forced to sign an agreement that he will not have sex with her until then. There are reports that the judge initially tried to negotiate with the groom, asking him to divorce the girl in exchange for monetary payment. The girl's uncle was unhappy with this idea. "We cannot accept that. It's like rewarding him. The court has to make an example of him so that others won't try to do the same thing," he said. An unnamed relative told the press that the girl's mother plans to continue to seek an annulment for her daughter.

Many members of the Saudi government maintain that it acceptable for girls as young as 10 to wed. "It is incorrect to say that it's not permitted to marry off girls who are 15 and younger," said Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Sheikh, the kingdom's grand mufti, during an lecture on underage girls being forced into marriage. "A girl aged 10 or 12 can be married. Those who think she's too young are wrong and they are being unfair to her." Al-Sheikh also reassured the public that "sharia law has not brought injustice to women."

On Monday, UNICEF expressed its "deep concern" over the court ruling.

"Irrespective of circumstances or the legal framework, the marriage of a child is a violation of that child's rights," said Ann Veneman, executive director of UNICEF.

"The right to free and full consent to marriage is recognized in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Consent cannot be free and full when either party to a marriage is too young to make an informed decision."

Many believe that the mere fact we are talking about this, and that the young girl's mother would have the courage to petition the courts, signals a change in attitude. Christoph Wilcke of Human Rights Watch tells CNN that he hears of cases like this every few months, and not because the practice is new: "Saudi public is now able to express this kind of anger — especially so when girls are traded off to older men," he said. Further support comes from the Saudi Society for the Defense of Women's Rights. Recently the group released a video titled "I am a Child, Not a Woman." They are also campaigning to raise the legal age of marriage to 17 for girls and 18 for boys.

And there may be hope yet for the 8-year-old bride: Earlier today, the justice minister announced plans to regulate the marriages of young girls. Justice Minister Mohamed al-Issa told newspapers that they aim to "to put an end to arbitrariness by parents and guardians in marrying off minor girls."

Saudi Judge Refuses To Annul 8-Year-old's Marriage [CNN]
8-Year-Old Girl's Marriage Ruled Legal [UPI]
No Divorce For 8 Yr. Old Saudi Girl, Says Judge [Al Arabiya News Channel]
Saudi Arabia To Regulate Girls' Marriages [Reuters]
Liberals And Child Brides [NRO]
UNICEF 'Deeply Concerned' Bbout Marriage Of 8-year-Old [CNN]

Since strict segregation laws prohibit Saudi women from working in most public spaces- where they can deal with male strangers - women now, counterintuitively, have to buy intimates from male clerks. Says Breitbart, "The result is mortifying for everyone involved-shoppers, salesmen, even the male relatives who accompany the women." As a result, women say they feel furtuve and ashamed when lingerie shopping, and take measures like traveling to other, less restrictive countries where they can deal with female clerks. Part of the issue is that, in a country where women are required to veil themselves completely, racier lingerie is a popular mode of self-expression. Then too, fitting rooms are banned in Saudi Arabia - the undressing would be too close to men - so any purchase of said intimate apparel requires prolonged and in-depth discussion of fit with a salesperson.

As a result, there's a campaign afoot to boycott lingerie stores in an effort to force the government to employ female staffers, and to encourage patronage of the nation's few (windowless) female-run boutiques - a campaign male lingerie salesman apparently back unilaterally. So far, 1,700 people have signed a Facebook petition in support of the movement, and the official boycott was launched Tuesday. The organizers are pushing for the implementation of a never-imposed 2006 law that states that only female staff can be employed in women's apparel stores.

While we wholeheartedly endorse the campaign - lingerie shopping can be quite embarrassing enough with female clerks, thank you very much - it seems a shame that the only alternative is an equally restrictive policy that actually bans men legally from such work. In any event, such measures hardly seem necessary, given the evident embarrassment of the men who work in these stores. And if the boycott fails, we can't help thinking that there's a major internet market out there for someone who has a working knowledge of Arabic, lingerie, and the politics of brown-paper wrapping.

Saudi Women To Spurn Lingerie Shops Over Salesmen [Breitbart]

• A new survey suggests that fathers are better at giving driving lessons than mothers, who tend to panic, while dads just swear. • Brazilian researchers have found that among teenage girls, there are alarmingly high rates of STDs that often go undetected. • The BBC has an amazing video of a monkey teaching its young to floss with human hair. • More monkey news: zoologists have found that monkey tantrums should never go ignored. • From the Institute of No Shit Studies: men in their 60s drive the most powerful cars. • A Miami evangelist claiming to be the anti-Christ has gone into hiding following a court ruling to pay his ex-wife $2.2 million. Wonder if Satan will help him out of this one. • Some asshole put his wife up for sale, describing her as "Nagging Wife. No Tax, Not MOT. Very high maintenance - some rust." He says he was shocked that he received several offers. • The Hijabi Monologues, a little known play about Muslim women who wear the headscarf, is currently showing in LA. • A little over a year ago, Wajeha al-Huwaider made a pledged to get the Saudi ban on women driving lifted by Women's Day 2009. Sadly, the ban is still in place. • The man who threw his shoe at our esteemed former President has been sentenced to three years in prison by an Iraqi court. • This is not exactly news to any American college student, but the American Dietetic Association has found that 58% of "kid cereals" are actually being consumed by adults. • Sad: a survey of Boston teens found that nearly half of them believe Rihanna was responsible for Chris Brown's assault on her. •  Could Coulter's reign of terror be coming to a close? Ann Coulter's new book Guilty isn't selling nearly as well as her others did. • 

Last year a member of the Saudi religious police entered Khamisa Mohammed Sawadi's home and found two younger men with her, Fahd and Hadian. Fahd, 24, said he was not breaking the law because Sawadi breast-fed him as a baby and is considered to be a son to her in Islam. His friend Hadian was accompanying him to deliver bread to Sawadi. Both men were arrested. Fahd was sentenced to four month in prison and 40 lashes and Hadian was sentenced to six months in prison and 60 lashes. The judge who made the ruling claims that it's been proven that Fahd is not Sawadi's son through breast-feeding. Sawadi insists he is and says she will appeal the case. "[This case] made everybody angry because this is like a grandmother," said Saudi women's rights activist Wajeha Al-Huwaider. "Forty lashes — how can she handle that pain? You cannot justify it." [CNN]

"The woman tried to escape when she saw a police car and in the process hit another car, which was slightly damaged," said a police spokesman. The woman, whose name and nationality were not released, was turned over to the Saudi Prosecution and Investigation Commission for investigation. [CNN]

On Saturday in Saudi Arabia, Nora bint Abdullah al-Fayez, a US-educated former teacher, was made deputy education minister in charge of a new department for female students, reports the Guardian. The appointment was part of a cabinet reshuffle by King Abdullah that did away with several ultra-conservative minsters and clerics and paved the way for more moderate reforms.

While Al-Fayez's appointment as vice minister for women's education marks the highest rank a woman has achieved in Saudi Arabia, there are questions about how much power she will actually have, since other Saudi women have been appointed to lower councils, but then never heard from. Al-Fayez says she's confident that her appointment is not just symbolic, telling CNN, "I think by being the second person after the minister, I think I have enough power to work in the improvement of girls' education."

But, women's rights advocate Wajeha al-Huwaider tells CNN that while the appointment of Al-Fayez is a step in the right direction, she is still subject to oppressive Saudi laws.

"Even this minister now ... she is not really in control of her life," al-Huwaider noted. "It is not up to her, it's up to her male guardian."

She said the "guardianship system" is the first thing that should be removed by the new Saudi government.

"This is the main thing that is controlling our life," al-Huwaider said. "We want to be able to drive our cars, you know, to feel like we are just like the rest of the world."

This weekend, several hundred Muslim women attended a conference in Kuala Lumpur to discuss such conditions and to come up with ways to demand equal rights for women, reports the New York Times. Advocates came from 47 countries for the project, called Musawah, which is the Arabic word for equality.

The women argue that the repression of women does not come from the Koran, but from the human interpretation of it, which has evolved over the centuries into Islamic law. "Secular feminism has fulfilled its historical role, but it has nothing more to give us," said Ziba Mir-Hosseini, an Iranian anthropologist. "The challenge we face now is theological." She referred to controversial Muslim intellectuals who say that the laws derived from the Koran should be interpreted in a historical context and can change over time.

Mir-Hosseini said that President Bush's policies wound up hurting the campaign for women's rights in Islamic countries:

Ms. Mir-Hosseini argues that Muslim societies are trapped in a battle between two visions of Islam: one legalistic and absolutist that emphasizes the past; the other pluralistic and more inclined toward democracy. She said that in Iran reformers were gaining ground, but that President Bush's antagonism toward the country ended up strengthening hard-liners there.

"It's really a struggle between two world views," she said, adding that time was on the side of the women.

Though some scholars argue that the women's efforts to reinterpret years of Islamic scholarship are unrealistic since to do so would require entirely replacing the system of Islamic law, the activists point out that change is already taking place at the grass roots level in many Islamic countries. Isobel Coleman, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, says women's movements are making progress, as girls' education levels increase and the Western world is a click away on satellite television. "It's a slow shift," she said. "It's just beginning to come together as a movement."

[Image via Musawah.org]

Saudi Arabia Appoints First Female Minister [Guardian]
Saudi Activist: Female Minister 'First Step' But More Needed [CNN]
In Quest For Equal Rights, Muslim Women's Meeting Turns To Islam's Tenets [New York Times]

After the girl's father married her off for a £5,000 dowry, the girl's mother, who is separated from her husband, filed for divorce on behalf of her daughter. "The judge has dismissed the plea because she does not have the right to file such a case, and ordered that the plea should be filed by the girl herself when she reaches puberty," said lawyer Abdullah Jtili. Relatives say the father and husband have a verbal agreement that the marriage will not be consummated until the girl turns 18, and she still lives with her mother. [The Daily Mail]

American Bedu points out that while Saudi women can't drive or visit a graveyard, they can own property and businesses. Here's our list of the rights and restrictions for women here in the US of A.

American women can:

— drive
— vote
— run for President
— be really rich (but it helps if you're a Walton)
— join the Navy
— compete in the Olympics (but not in boxing)
— top the New York Times Best Seller List
— become men

American women cannot:

— walk alone at night without fear of being assaulted
— buy birth control pills without a prescription (except Plan B)
— marry another woman (except in Massachusetts and Connecticut)
— be a Navy SEAL
— play professional baseball
— get fat without apologizing for it
— look plain without getting shit for it
— look hot or get drunk without "asking for it"

Now add your own!

What Saudi women can and cannot do [American Bedu]