So Saudi Arabian Women will be able to vote soon....

[trt]

So when will they be able to have a medical operation without a male family member giving their permission, and also why cant they drive a car?

Its pathetic!!!!

[trt]

Sorry should have given you the link.

http://www.dailymail....women-vote--2015.html

[youngmafbog]

By western standards maybe, but they are not Western.
Change is haapening in the middle east but it will be slow as the older generations and fundamentalists will resist change.

[jake-the-peg]

Before you get on your high horse remember women in the UK only finally got the vote on the same basis as men in 1928.

To me it's a bit like winning a race and then turning back and yelling "Come on aren't you there yet?"

[emmie]

That doesn't mean to say one can't have sympathy.

[ummmm]

1928....That's a long time ago..!

[jake-the-peg]

Indeed em

But isn't it a hugely encouraging step?

True the Daily Mail makes a big play about it not being for another 4 years but that's 4 years quicker than banking reforms in this country!

[jake-the-peg]

1928 is within living memory of people today

It's only 11 years before World War 2

People were driving Ford Model A cars, Stalin was in Charge in Russia and JFK was 11.

It was the year the Oscars started

It really isn't that ancient a history when we're talking political reform

[emmie]

Its a pittance in time, and if you look what women went through to get the vote, and equal rights, like the suffragettes, force fed, imprisoned, and much much worse.

[ichkeria]

...and Swiss women only got the vote in Federal elections in 1971!

[Ankou]

they have to wait 4 years because that is the next time such elections will take place.

[AB Editor]

"So when will they be able to have a medical operation without a male family member giving their permission, and also why cant they drive a car?"

I reckon being able to vote for someone who would let them has to be a good start.

[jno]

women got the vote in New Zealand in 1893. They must have been astonished that their sisters in backward, patriarchal Britain took 35 years to catch up. Pathetic!!!!

[ganesh]

Yes but in 1893 we didn't have the amazing communication and instant knowledge of what goes on around the world as we do now.Things should move quicker now and you can't say feminism is just a western concept and that it will take centuries for others to catch up.Seems to me religion holds a lot of social change back.

[sandyRoe]

Vote? They'll be wanting to drive cars next.

[emmie]

SR, that may be tongue in cheek, sadly it resonates with many women around the world, having no status whatsoever in law, and in many cases in every other aspect of their lives.

[jno]

communication may not have been instant in 1893, ganesh, but it would have taken about 6 weeks for a letter to get from NZ to UK saying that women had got the vote.

[ganesh]

Yes I know but the general poulation would not receive a letter,jno,and we all watch television now and see what goes on in other countries.You can't deny recent events in Egypt for instance were successful because of social network.We know more about political reform in other countries and social change is and should be quicker in this century.

[New Judge]

Yes indeed, women in the UK have had completely equal voting rights for “only” 83 years. However, times change and no doubt the Saudi regime may get round to giving equal rights to their womenfolk in the fullness of time.

Most of the rest of the non-Islam developed world seems to have managed to move on a little in that time so perhaps the answer to your question, trt, is possibly that 97% of the population of Saudi Arabia is Muslim.