Will lingerie lead to reform in Saudi Arabia?

Perhaps. Saudi Arabia is known for its strict segregation of the sexes and laws that prohibit women from leaving their homes without a male relative, non-related men and women who break these rules risk punishment that include jail terms and public beatings. But this creates an odd paradox when it comes to buying lingerie: because salesmen deal with the public, it is a career generally not open to women in Saudi Arabia; intimate apparel stores employ all-male sales staffs. But this means that women, who can't go out in public unless they are covered head-to-toe then have to discuss intimate details of their bodies with strange men in order to buy lingerie or other undergarments. It’s a situation that both customers and salesmen describe as humiliating.

It's also one that's unnecessary. In 2006 the government passed a law decreeing that intimate apparel shops have all-female sales staffs, but it's a law that has so far gone unenforced because the nation's religious police oppose any situations that could result in non-related men and women interacting. Now Saudi women are organizing a boycott of lingerie shops to force the government to implement the 2006 staffing law.

This story made me think of a conversation I had recently with a friend who has experience with the Saudis. I brought up the Saudi laws that oppress women; he talked about the efforts by some Saudis at reform (including proposals like allowing women to drive cars). His point was that you couldn’t talk about the Saudi government as a monolithic thing. There are around 2,000 Saudi princes who run the gamut from very conservative to those with progressive views who want to reform the notoriously oppressive Saudi laws regarding gender and allow women to fully participate in Saudi society as they do in some of the neighboring Gulf States.

But reform is a slow process in Saudi Arabia. The ruling House of Saud is intimately intertwined with the very conservative Wahhabi branch of Islam (an 18th century alliance with Wahhabi leaders helped the House of Saud to eventually gain control over the pastiche of tribes that once ruled what's now the modern state of Saudi Arabia). And as the custodians of Islam’s two holiest sites - the cities of Mecca and Medina - the Saudis trend towards a traditional interpretation of Islamic law and custom.

Still, there are influential members of the Saudi ruling family who are actively trying to modernize Saudi society. Women's apparel just may help the reform process along.