Saudi Women Have Message for U.S. Envoy By STEVEN R. WEISMAN Published: September 28, 2005 JIDDA, Saudi Arabia, Sept. 27 - The audience - 500 women covered in black at a Saudi university - seemed an ideal place for Karen P. Hughes, a senior Bush administration official charged with spreading the American message in the Muslim world, to make her pitch. Karen P. Hughes, the under secretary of state for public diplomacy, was hired to publicize American ideals in the Muslim world. But the response on Tuesday was not what she and her aides expected. When Ms. Hughes expressed the hope here that Saudi women would be able to drive and "fully participate in society" much as they do in her country, many challenged her. "The general image of the Arab woman is that she isn't happy," one audience member said. "Well, we're all pretty happy." The room, full of students, faculty members and some professionals, resounded with applause. The administration's efforts to publicize American ideals in the Muslim world have often run into such resistance. For that reason, Ms. Hughes, who is considered one of the administration's most scripted and careful members, was hired specifically for the task. Many in this region say they resent the American assumption that, given the chance, everyone would live like Americans. The group of women, picked by the university, represented the privileged elite of this Red Sea coastal city, known as one of the more liberal areas in the country. And while they were certainly friendly toward Ms. Hughes, half a dozen who spoke up took issue with what she said. Ms. Hughes, the under secretary of state for public diplomacy, is on her first trip to the Middle East. She seemed clearly taken aback as the women told her that just because they were not allowed to vote or drive that did not mean they were treated unfairly or imprisoned in their own homes. "We're not in any way barred from talking to the other sex," said Dr. Nada Jambi, a public health professor. "It's not an absolute wall." The session at Dar Al-Hekma College provided an unusual departure from the carefully staged events in a tour that began Sunday in Egypt. As it was ending Ms. Hughes, a longtime communications aide to President Bush, assured the women that she was impressed with what they had said and that she would take their message home. "I would be glad to go back to the United States and talk about the Arab women I've met," she said. Ms. Hughes is the third appointee to head a program with a troubled past. The first, Charlotte Beers, a Madison Avenue executive, produced a promotional video about Muslims in America that was rejected by some Arab nations and scoffed at by a number of State Department colleagues. Her successor, Margaret D. Tutwiler, a former State Department spokeswoman, lasted barely five months. A report issued in 2003 by a bipartisan panel chosen by the Bush administration portrayed a dire picture of American public diplomacy in the Arab and Muslim world. Ms. Hughes, on this first foray, has churned through meetings in which she has tirelessly introduced herself as "a mom," explained that Americans are people of faith and called for more cultural and educational exchanges. Her efforts to explain policies in Iraq and the Middle East have been polite and cautious. As a visiting dignitary, she had audiences in the summer palaces of Jidda with King Abdullah, Crown Prince Sultan and the foreign minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal. But mostly it was a day that underscored the uneasy Saudi-American relationship, fed by unsavory images the countries have of each another. In December, there was an armed attack on the American Consulate in Jidda, leaving five people dead, and that meant that the Americans traveling with Ms. Hughes were cautioned against traveling alone in the city. At the meeting with the Saudi women, television crews were barred and reporters were segregated according to sex. American officials said it was highly unusual for men to be allowed in the hall at all. A meeting with leading editors, all men, featured more familiar complaints about what several said were American biases against the Palestinians, the incarceration of Muslims at Guantánamo Bay and the supposed American stereotype of Saudis as religious fanatics and extremists after Sept. 11. Ms. Hughes responded by reminding listeners that President Bush had supported the establishment of a Palestinian state and asserting that Guantánamo prisoners had been visited by the International Red Cross and retained the right to worship with their own Korans. Americans, she said at one point, were beginning to understand Islam better but had been disappointed that some Muslim leaders had been "reticent" at first in criticizing the Sept. 11 attacks. "Now, several years later, we're beginning to hear other voices," she said. But it was the meeting with the women that was the most unpredictable, as Ms. Hughes found herself on the defensive simply by saying that she hoped women would be able to vote in future elections. In June, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice talked of democracy and freedom in the Middle East but declined to address the question of driving. By contrast, Ms. Hughes spoke personally, saying that driving a car was "an important part of my freedom." A woman in the audience then charged that under President Bush the United States had become "a right-wing country" and that criticism by the press was "not allowed." "I have to say I sometimes wish that were the case, but it's not," Ms. Hughes said with a laugh. Several women said later that Americans failed to understand that their traditional society was embraced by men and women alike. "There is more male chauvinism in my profession in Europe and America than in my country," said Dr. Siddiqa Kamal, an obstetrician and gynecologist who runs her own hospital. "I don't want to drive a car," she said. "I worked hard for my medical degree. Why do I need a driver's license?" "Women have more than equal rights," added her daughter, Dr. Fouzia Pasha, also an obstetrician and gynecologist, asserting that men have obligations accompanying their rights, and that women can go to court to hold them accountable. Ms. Hughes appeared to have left a favorable impression. "She's open to people's opinions," said Nour al-Sabbagh, a 21-year-old student in special education. "She's trying to understand." Like some of her friends, Ms. Sabbagh said Westerners failed to appreciate the advantages of wearing the traditional black head-to-foot covering known as an abaya. "I love my abaya," she explained. "It's convenient and it can be very fashionable." Source __________________ http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/28/i...e3bbcccd8fa7b4&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
well it was more like, who forgot and didnt vote? we kinda ruined that whole live and let live policy with these few wars we have on our hands
Rhetorical questions, adeelsiddiqui. It's funny how no American would want another person or country to tell us what to say or do, and now... To form this country, we overthrew a king and talked a lot of good talk. Making Saudisraelia the 51st state would give us a little more credibility than we have right now...
its late... gotta forgive my jumpiness. It just pisses me off when people say that Islam is evil because it forces women to be second class citizens and that extremists force women to wear viels and stuff like that...
The article would be more interesting if they had not just picked the "privileged elite" to attend the session. It would be interesting to see what the common and underpriviliged women would have to say. It is one thing to hear the privileged elite say they are happy, it is another to see what the poor and impoverished would have to say.
I'm pretty sure the "privileged elite" of the "more liberal areas" of most countries are "all pretty happy." That's like going to Bel Air and asking how they felt during the Rodney King riot. Maybe they should take an anonymous poll of women living under Sharia about whether they all want to give up rights so as not to have extra "responsibilities" forced on them. Maybe next time they can ask a council of Imam's how they feel about Allah. EDIT: Of course bobrek covers all this while I am typing.
The American government is completely ethnocentric and cannot fathom why some one would not want to live the way we do. That is why so many hate us. Because we appear to have no respect for anybody elses culture and believe that if they don't live like us then they are wrong.
Just out of curiosity, what does you mom or sister or girlfriend or female teachers or aunts or female friends think about a country where they don't allow women to drive or vote? Do they think that country should change and give women they same rights as men or do they think that because it's another country, there is no problem with it?
How big of a problem does it have to be to justify using arms to forcibly change their way of life? Similarly, does the ends justify sending our military onto a foreign land? 1.4 billion Chinese are under a totalitarian regime. Most of Africa lives in oppression and squalor, yet the ME always recieves our special attention when we've armed or aided half the major governments there for the past 30 or more years. Realistically, politics and morality have always been muddled over stronger interests. Past presidents like Bush Sr. and Clinton understood that silent agreement, whereas Dubya's straight shooter style is really getting on the nerves of our allies and their people....
It really doesn't matter. There is NO right culture. All cultures are equal. At one point in our history women weren't allowed to vote and for a long time, most people including women were fine with it. Our culture has changed. It's not that our views and attitudes today are right and they they were wrong back then. They're just different now. Certain actions like slavery or genocide are different because acts are carried out against unwilling participants. The way Arab women are treated is part of their culture. If, as suggested by the article, they don't view themselves as being oppressed then we shouldn't "free" them. Nor should we assume that because we do things differently that we do things better and everybody else should do things our way. The American way is NOT the right way because there is no universal right way. This is what the government doesn't understand and why other countries resent the "Americanization" of the rest of the world.
Weren't there women against suffrage here less than a century ago? I don't think they understand how Jurassic the conditions in which they live in are. That being I feel like the Women's Lib movement here is a big reason the country has so many problems. There is a line between Iraq and The US that is right.
I will go more into depth when I get to work and I do not want to sound like a dinosaur but look at what happens when there is not a person at home with the kids. Whether it is mom or dad is immaterial but it changes the very fabric of society. Here is the price for the plight of NOW and other organizations like them: 1. inflation up 2. crime rates up 3. test scores down 4. divorce rates up 5. unemployment rate up I will break these down later and I am swayable on these but it will take a Herculean effort to sway me.
I don't want to try to sway you. I just want to see your justification for blaming rising inflation, rising crime, dropping test scores, rising divorce, and rising unemployment on equal rights for women.
At first I thought it was a joke, but then the more I think about I believe there is some truth, however non-pc it may be.