This video is called Detained, Tortured and Without Trial, a Saudi Political Prisoner Returns Home.
From daily The Morning Star in Britain today:
Women allowed to ride bikes
SAUDI ARABIA: Women will now be allowed to ride motorbikes and bicycles, but only in restricted recreational areas.
The powerful religious police say that women can ride bikes in parks and recreational areas but they have to be accompanied by a male relative and dress in the full Islamic head-to-toe abaya.
The official says women may not use the bikes for transport but “only for entertainment” and that they should shun places where young men gather, “to avoid harassment.”
This is a ridiculously small concession to the Saudi women’s movemernt, which demands that women should have the right not just to ride bikes, but drive cars as well. And not just for “recreation”, but for all types of transport for which men use these as well.
However, even this ridiculously small concession is a sign that the tyrannical repression in the Saudi absolute monarchy is not really working well for the rulers any more. This should give pro-democracy movements in Saudi Arabia more confidence for mass pressure for bigger improvements.
Saudi Sheikh Saleh bin Saad al-Luhaydan says that women should not be permitted to drive cars because driving hurts a woman’s pelvis and ovaries, thus causing children with birth defects: here.
Related articles
- Saudi religious police lift ban on women on bikes (dailystar.com.lb)
- Saudi ladies can bike ‘for recreation’ (timesofisrael.com)
- On your bike! Saudi women allowed to ride bicycles, buggies in public (issahwuni.wordpress.com)
- Saudi Women Can Now Ride A Bike In Public – With Certain Restrictions (thinkprogress.org)
- Heard the one about the Saudi cleric who said driving damages ovaries? | Naomi McAuliffe (theguardian.com)
- Saudi Arabia & labor conditions: Already about 200 Ethiopians being treated for mental problems (ethiopiaobservatory.com)
- Saudi cleric warns driving could damage women’s ovaries (wtkr.com)
- If Women Drive They’ll Damage Their Ovaries, Says Stupid Saudi Cleric (jalopnik.com)
- What a [Saudi Arabia] Girl and Her Bike Can Say About Women’s Rights (womennewsnetwork.net)
Dear Kitty. Some blog 
C’est énervant cette nouvelle loi qui infériorise encore la femme saoudienne. Mais ce qui m’énerve encore plus, c’est ces imbéciles et hypocrites responsables saoudiens quand il se réfèrent à la religion musulmane pour élaborer des lois qui abaissent de la valeur de la femme que l’Islam a privilégiée et lui a permis d’exercer toutes les fonctions et d’accomplir les travaux licites convenant à sa nature.
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Yes, a Libyan once said to me: “In the days of the Prophet Muhammad, women rode on horses, donkeys, camels, etc. Why then a ban on women driving cars now?”
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L’Islam a donné à la femme tous les droits que la femme actuelle lutte pour les avoir tout en respectant sa personne dans la dignité et la fierté d’un être humain responsable et conscient de son existence. Ce sont ces fanatiques religieux qui ont rendu la femme à l’état de l’esclavage au nom de l’Islam. Il n’y a de différence entre la femme et l’homme que par le degré de la piété. Les mauvaises traditions et coutumes ont fait de la femme une esclave mais ce n’est guère la religion.
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No es sobre Arabia Saudita sino sobre Irán. Ser mujer en Irán según Marjane Satrapi.
Las mujeres no pueden correr porque el movimiento de su trasero puede ser provocador para los hombres
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Hi, thanks for the video link; but it does not work, as it says if you start it: Multi Screen Media has blocked it from display.
Bad as restrictions for women in Iran are, Saudi Arabia is definitely much worse.
In Iran, women could already cycle everywhere before now. And they have always been allowed to drive cars, etc. Clothes rules are worse in Saudi Arabia, etc.
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Both the video and the article in my blog post are definitely about Saudi Arabia, not about Iran.
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No quiero comparar las políticas de Irán y Arabia Saudita y entiendo sus diferencias. Me refiero a la dificultad de ser mujer frente a los integrismos.
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Yes, that is a indeed a problem. With ultra-orthodox Islam, with ultra-orthodox Judaism in Israel:
with Christian fundamentalism, with hardline Shintoism in Japan, etc.
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Completamente de acuerdo 🙂 No tengo una postura islamofóbica, ni pro-israelí.
El patriarcado es democrático: está en todos lados.
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Yes, indeed, patriarchy is all over the world; though I would not call that “democratic” 🙂
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My parents lived in Saudi Arabia in the late 60’s; my mother HATED not being able to drive so they would go way out of the village on picnics so Mom could just drive across the desert for awhile. I’ve worn her robe and burka a few times in my life…it is the most bizarre feeling to be so…shadowy. If women willingly and freely chooses such a lifestyle, to each his own. But that it is forced upon anyone to be so restricted…? Unimaginable. Freedom to ride a bike – in a limited area, no less – is indeed a rather puny and pathetic concession…
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Hi, MisBehaved Woman, thanks for this comment! I agree.
By the way, maybe billions of people use the word “burqa” (which really traditionally is a type of clothes for upper class women in Pakistan) for various other restrictive types of clothing in other countries. See
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So sorry for my mistake – my Mom called it a veil, period.
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Hi, you don’t have to apologize 🙂
I used to call non-burqa clothes “burqa” until I read the newspaper article about it.
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It’s funny that since they lived there for 2 yrs, you’d think my parents would have used some proper name when talking about but the whole ‘get-up’ Mom just called her “robe & veil” but sometimes with a curse word added to it – understandably! 🙂
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Maybe foreign people there in Saudi Arabia lived rather separately, meaning they picked up few Arabic words. I understand the “curse word” 🙂
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They lived in the small village of Tabuk (it was small then, not sure now); there was one American “camp” where most of the women spent their days. My parents did not understand why people would travel to another country and then sit in a room watching American TV and eating hamburgers all day so they never went to the camp. Dad is fluent in Arabic but Mom never learned as well…even still, she had many friends among the Saudi women and spent her days with them learning to cook the best food, ever. I still make Dolma the way she was taught by the women there. Back then no women were allowed at market, even with their husbands…I wonder how much that has changed and if things are better or worse now?
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Hi, thanks for this interesting comment! Your dad was quite right in this.
Sometimes, if people go to other countries, they pick up some words in the local language, but not other words which may be important words. I was in Finland for a short time, but still one of the few Finnish words which I know is “korkeushyppy” (high jump in track and field).
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