How Uber Is Changing Life For Women In Saudi Arabia

An anonymous reader writes: Being unable to legally drive is hard for many women in Saudi Arabia, especially working women. With notoriously poor mass transit options, and the stigma attached to women riding the bus alone, Uber has changed the life of many Saudi women by giving them greater mobility and independence. While there are no official statistics on how many women use the service, anecdotal evidence suggest that 70% to 90% of Saudi riders are women. "A lot of them, I would say, are young women," says Saudi Arabia general manager Majed Abukhater. "We have some data to show that these women are starting to rely on Uber a lot more for their daily commutes; the proportion of trips that we see in Saudi during the weekday is actually very high relative to other locations. That's just kind of one indicator to tell us that women are really starting to rely on Uber for their daily commutes to work, or to school, or to university."

Comments

Uber is not the answer

[Anonymous Coward]

Eradicating blatant sexism is.

Re:Uber is not the answer

[sims 2]

Yeah but I am sure the next step will be to ban uber in Saudi Arabia.

Re:Uber is not the answer

[mykepredko]

Maybe it's the beginning of the answer.

If Uber allows women to move more freely and work at jobs and go to school, something they weren't allowed before then I would think this is a first step.

Re:Uber is not the answer

[Anonymous Coward]

If Uber allows women to move more freely and work at jobs and go to school, something they weren't allowed before then I would think this is a first step.

A technology which facilitates women in Saudi Arabia to be in the presence of men who are not relatives.

What could possibly go wrong?

Sorry, but for the same reasons they aren't allowed to drive (Sharia law), or travel without the permission of their husband/father ... it will only lead to cracking down on women using the service.

Saudi Arabia has no interest in allowing women more freedom of movement, and it will be the women who are punished as much as the men.

In Saudi Arabia, women are effectively property, and not meant to be out in public without an escort.

This isn't an answer, or an increase in freedom ... it's a way in which when they crack down women will be the ones who bear the brunt of Sharia law and a society who treats them like property.

A man and a woman who are not married alone in a car is recipe for someone being charged for adultery or other ridiculous things.

And Uber will claim they're championing freedom, but they might get someone into a world of trouble. Defy the law and convention in Saudi Arabia at your own peril.

Re:Uber is not the answer

[Anonymous Coward]

Eradicating blatant sexism is.

Why was this modded down ? It's the truth. Saudi Arabia is still in the 15th century when it comes to woman's rights.
Want to improve woman's condition in that shitty hellhole of a country ? How about let woman legally drive instead of this "religious" nonsense. Man knows better, females know jack shit said good ol' mohamed.

Re:Uber is not the answer

[Zeio]

Agree here. Why is the headline stated like this ~ Uber makes things great for Saudi women. It should be ~ Women suffering under Islamic misogyny codified into a Islamofascist totalitarian state find respite and have a slight increase in quality of life with Uber.

Nobody calls a spade a spade anymore.

Re:Uber is not the answer

[Jason Levine]

Unfortunately, this first step will likely be followed by the (easier to implement) second step of "Uber is violating Islam by letting women go outside without a male escort! Shut it down!!!!" instead of the (better, but harder to implement) second step of "Hey, maybe we should treat women like they are actual people instead of things that we own."

Re:Uber is not the answer

[Anonymous Coward]

They will simply require that women riding in Uber be escorted by a male family member.

Re:Uber is not the answer

[smooth wombat]

Nobody calls a spade a spade anymore.

Uber is a taxi service but is trying to claim it's not a taxi service even though people use them as a taxi to go from one place to another which is not along the route of the driver. The reason they claim they're not a taxi service, even though they are, is because they would have to abide by the rules all the other taxi services have to abide by, including additional insurance for their drivers and associated fees.

Calling a spade a spade.

Re:Uber is not the answer

[Anonymous Coward]

And amazingly, the rest of the world managed to solve this problem too, WITHOUT such insane gender-based discrimination. Give me a break.

Re:Uber is not the answer

[Anonymous Coward]

many actually treat them with great respect.

... like their cars? Getting washed every Sunday morning, serviced properly, never driven too hard even though it would be fun?

s/uber/taxi.

[nimbius]

If they enjoy Uber then perhaps theyd really enjoy a taxi service. Taxis, offer all the benefits of Uber with the convenience of government controls like licensing, inspection, background checks, and safety standards for vehicles as well as passengers. Then again, theres nothing like taking an uber from the Khalid international airport and being forcibly driven to the middle of Highway 40, your new final destination.

Re:s/uber/taxi.

[gstoddart]

Where I live, they mandated that taxis have an on-board camera with a circular buffer of 24 hours. It had been done in response to allegations a cab driver had assaulted a women ... they later found other evidence for it from another source.

They pushed through the law requiring this, against the objections of the cab drivers who though they were being spied on.

When a cab driver was subsequently robbed, and the suspect caught on camera, the cab drivers were all in praise of it.

It turns out, the mandated cameras made it safer for everybody.

Imposing regulations on cab drivers can work, and despite claims to the contrary, isn't always about protecting the interests of cab drivers.

The licensing, inspection, background checks and safety inspections aren't the only benefits to be had.

Stop listening to Uber who keeps saying the lie that regulations the cab drivers have to follow are something the Uber drivers shouldn't be subjected to ... claims that cities are defending the interests of cab companies in enforcing their laws are complete bullshit.

Uber never has been, and never will be the underdogs ... and this never has been, and never will be, about protecting entrenched players.

It's about cities being able to regulate industry players to a minimum standard.

So, if in my city Uber drivers are willing to get commercial licenses, hold the proper insurance and drivers license, and have the same video devices installed for the safety of everybody (you know, like an actual legal cab company) ... I'm sure people would say they're welcome. But Uber claiming they shouldn't have to is bullshit.

As long as Uber insists that they aren't subject to laws, they continue to be lying bastards in my book. They're just a company whose business model is in trying to insist laws regarding taxi companies don't apply to them.

Re:s/uber/taxi.

[Burz]

Uber was supposed to be a way to do IGT (intelligent grouping transportation) where the trips of different customers are automatically combined to save money/resources.

Instead, it turned into another war over cheap labor and skirting regulation with no actual ride sharing. Uber are liars and cheats who conduct 99% of their business on public streets.

Uber can't change the chaperoe/mahram law.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

The shari-ah holds that women are not allowed to travel alone without a proper male relative acting as chaperone. It is known as maharam or honor law. Women caught in Saudi Arabia without a proper male relative in the company of an unrelated male can be prosecuted. Since all uber drivers are male, (women can't drive in Saudi Arabia) and likely to be unrelated, unless these women have a constant supply of "proper" male relatives, they would not have freedom of movement, uber or no uber. I am no islamic scholar, so not very sure of this: The relatives who can act as chaperones are husbands, brothers, fathers, sons. Not very sure who among the in-laws are allowed to be chaperones as per mahram.

Re:Uber is "ride sharing" ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not to be defending Saudi Arabia, Islam or anything in between, but let's be clear here...Saudi Arabia is a totalitarian feudalistic system. They use Wahabism, which is one of the strictest sects of puritan Islam, which gave us among other things: Al-Qaeda, Taliban, ISIS, etc. When you have a totalitarian system, you always need some sort of bullshit ideology to legitimize your total control. This has/is being used in many countries: Soviet Union, N-Koera, Nazi Germany, etc.

The founder of the Saudi dynasty made a deal (about 100 years ago) with the Wahabi clerics to help him take over the place, and in exchange, they would split up the spoils. This is part of history (no conspiracy theory here). Today, the Saudi family is taking all the oil money it can and the clerics get to to enforce their bullshit puritanic beliefs. Saudi Arabia is just a product of an alliance where two parties get what they want and the people in the middle are paying for it. The beheading, flogging, hand cutting, etc...are a great tool for any totalitarian regime to keep people in-line (Hitler/Stalin got rid of a lot of people they didn't like because they were 'anti-regime', 'enemy of the state')...oh, but this came from the Koran, yeah sure...the Old Testament is full of craziness too but nobody's using for stoning people even through it's in there.

How come we've never "liberated" SA?

[tekrat]

19 of the hijackers on 9/11 were Saudi. Osama Bin Laden was Saudi. We claimed to have "liberated" Iraq because Saddam's people were oppressed (after the WMD argument fell apart); so, why have we never "exported freedom" to Saudi Arabia?

Exactly what stranglehold do they they have on us (other than having gobs of oil)? And not like that's never stopped us before... I assume they must have Child-Porn pictures with Bush and Cheney. I can't quite understand the thinking of Dubya, assuming he was thinking at all....

Re:Uber is "ride sharing" ?

[myowntrueself]

The penalty for not following local laws in most countries would be a petty fine. In Saudi Arabia . . . it would be a couple hundred lashes with the whip.

If the offense was considered to be an insult to Islam . . . say bye-bye to your head.

Oh, and being left-handed is considered to be an insult to Islam. You don't need to try very hard to insult Islam.

That is why Über folks decided to abide by Saudi Arabian laws.

My experience in life has been that people who are easily offended are usually insecure and have low self esteem.

So this would probably apply to MOST of the worlds Muslims...

Fuckin sad bunch.