Women's Lib Reaches Saudi Arabia?

I suppose it's good news: women will be allowed to vote in local council elections by 2015. Maybe. It's been promised before. And it's hardly worth applying match to bra for, quite frankly.

I see Saudi women as one of those unfortunate social groups whose rights have to be set aside to keep the rest of us in the style to which we have become accustomed. You know, like the Palestinians, or those little Bangladeshi children who make such a good job of stitching together my undercrackers. Such nimble fingers.

After all, if we told our Saudi friends that women were people too, they might not sell us all that lovely oil. So it's much better to keep quiet. So what if they aren't allowed to leave the house without a male relative, drive cars, travel, work or marry without male permission, or object to marital rape? Collateral damage.

No, it's much better to bomb neighbouring countries in the name of human rights.  Before Paul Uppal MP was a twinkle in the Tory Party's eye, I asked my Labour MP why he voted for the Iraq war because it would 'bring democracy and human rights', while declining to invade Saudi Arabia on the same grounds. To my eternal regret, he refused to explain beyond saying that the situation was 'totally different'. Really?