Pulling the rug: girls’ sports and the erosion of Saudi religious authority

[rug]

Friday, 11 April 2014
Last Update: Friday, 11 April 2014 KSA 09:35 - GMT 06:35
Abdullah Hamidaddin
Abdullah Hamidaddin is a writer and commentator on religion, Middle Eastern societies and politics with a focus on Saudi Arabia and Yemen. He is currently a PhD candidate in King’s College London. He can be followed on Twitter: @amiq1

If you follow news on Saudi Arabia, then you would probably have read reports about the Saudi government’s decision to lift the ban on sport education for school girls. This was described as a step forward in the kingdom’s efforts to give women more rights amidst strong resistance from the country’s religious zealots. You may have also read about the ensuing debate between the Saudis who supported this decision and those who shunned it.

But, the first reaction to those debates was that of bewilderment. To listen to clerics warning of the dire consequences should girls play sport. To live in the 21st century, and still need to discuss if or not girls should practice sports in schools is mystifying. To be using Twitter and YouTube to argue against such basic issues is disorienting! Are we really having this discussion? Sadly we are. But then, when I gave it more thought, I realized how important this was in changing the structure of authority in the country.

Changing the structure

The easiest way to explain what happened is to say that there are zealots whose interpretation of Islamic scripture is misogynic and thus believe that the only option women have is to lie down and die. Thus the government decided to intervene and give women some hope of a natural life. This explanation is made easier by the fact that zealots from all religions have this negative attitude towards women and it is only governments who can keep them at bay.

Appealing as the religious explanation maybe, I do not think that we should stop at it. The religious factor can explain the behavior of a very small number of people, but it cannot explain the behavior of a religious institution. More fundamentally it cannot explain the support from a wide section of the public. And I say this for one main reason; if the motive was religious then we would see an ongoing campaign against music and banks, both of which are considered much graver sins that girls performing sport. The religious institution is unanimous in its position against a financial system that allows interests on loans and that those who practice it will burn in hell. It is also unanimous that music is a grave sin, and those who enjoy it will also burn in hell. Yet we don’t see such mobilization against either. There is the occasional sermon or book but nothing more serious. The government was not fighting religious zealotry and the religious institutions were not conferenced with religious laws.

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/views/news/middle-east/2014/04/11/Pulling-the-rug-girls-sports-and-the-erosion-of-Saudi-religious-authority.html

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