DRIVING HURTS OVARIES

While browsing the internet the other day, I was stunned by a jarring headline from msn.com shouting, " Saudi Cleric Says Driving Hurts Women's Ovaries."  The story reports that, in Saudi Arabia, only men are given driver's licenses. I seems, Saudi women planned  a protest by rallying together and driving--in direct opposition to society and religious norms. To put a halt to this outrageous show of rebellion,  Sheikh Saleh bin Saad al-Lohaidan warns women against driving claiming, "If a woman drives a car, not out of pure necessity, that could have negative physiological impacts as functional and medical studies show that it automatically affects the ovaries and pushes the pelvis upwards." 

 

Further investigation from Reuters reveals that the head of Saudi Arabia's morality police says there is nothing in Islamic law that bans women from driving, but in the past, they have been fined or put on trial for "political protest." 

 

I  remember first learning about the morality police while watching the TV show, House Hunters International.  On the show, they interviewed an American woman who's husband had taken a job in a country where women were considered subservient. Even as an American, she could not  get a driver's license, rent a house or even call a plumber without her husband's consent.  The woman shared her  run-in with the morality police while in a shopping in a mall.  She was shocked when a store clerk came up to her and shoved into her hand a morality police warning card. It asked her to be respectful in public and to be considerate of the culture. She was taken aback, because she thought she had done all she could do to be in conformity. Her skirt length was well below her knees and her shirt was modest and unrevealing.  After some inquiry,  she discovered that her infraction came from the her shirt's sleeve length.. Although the shirt had sleeves, the morality police determined the sleeves were too short and her arms were too exposed for a public place.

 In our country, stories  warning of the dangers of driving and ovaries, or morality police handing out cards for sleeve lengths, may seem absurd. But it doesn't take much reflection, for us to remember  absurdities that our country held, not to long ago--absurdities like slavery, and voting rights, dueling to the death and  married women not being allowed to teach in public schools.

 

The other week I took a trip to the Truman Library in  Independence, Kansas. At the end of one their movie presentations, they broached the  heated debate surrounding women serving in the military.They  pointed out  that the same arguments used against why women should not serve in the military today,  were the exact same arguments used to justify why blacks should not serve in the military years ago.

When I think of all the, seemingly,  absurd customs we, as a country, used to fight about and hold dear as a country, and read of the beliefs held by other cultural that almost seem laughable, instead of disregarding them, I stop. I try to take a moment and pause to look at my own values.  I try to  reflect on the passionate beliefs I hold today, and using history as a reference,  try to discern what side of history my beliefs might end up on.