No Girls Allowed
by Aisha Gawad
As the Olympic athletes pack up their gear and get ready to head home, they can leave with the pride of having represented their countries on one of the most-watched world stages. As an audience, we watch people from all walks of life compete for a chance to show off what their nations are made of. But if we're taking these athletes as true representatives of their home countries, then we may be left with a few questions after seeing some of the delegations, namely Saudi Arabia's and Brunei's. Behind the Saudi and Bruneian flags, we see an all-male group of athletes. This is the representation they want to share with the world? One where women do not exist as athletes or even as public entities?
Women have been slowly but steadily gaining a bigger role in the Olympics since the 1900 Paris Games, competing in larger numbers and in a wider variety of sports. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) declares that "the practice of sport is a human right," and also that "every individual must have the possibility of practicing sport, without discrimination of any kind and in the Olympic spirit," according to Principle 4 of the Olympic Charter. So it seems like this charter is not being fully enforced if countries like Saudi Arabic and Brunei are still allowed to participate in the Games even when they expressly deny women the opportunity to compete.
As we can see from other countries' delegations, it's not that women are incapable of competing on the same level as their male compatriots. They have been given just as much star power by the media as the male athletes, and more importantly, they have competed with just as much athletic integrity. But it is not that women wouldn't be able to succeed as athletes that has them banned from the Saudi and Bruneian teams-it is that, women, delicate creatures that we are, are apparently more susceptible to the morally corrupting influences of the West than men are.
In an opinion piece published in the Washington Post, Mona Eltahawy writes about the joy she felt at seeing the co-ed team of her native Egypt march in the opening ceremony, and the subsequent disappointment in watching some of the other Muslim teams with no or few women. Eltahawy quotes a Saudi religious scholar who sums up the logic behind the ban. "This is exactly what the disbelievers in the West want," the scholar, Muhammed al-Habdan, wrote. "Their plan is to lure Muslim women out of their homes and subsequently out of their headscarf too." I would think that al-Habdan would have a little bit more faith in the power of his own religion on its followers. If the women in his country are veiled because they believe it is necessary in proving their devotion to God, then I would think it would take more than a game of tennis with their unveiled, Western competitors to persuade them otherwise. And if these Western competitors really have that much of a corrupting influence, then shouldn't he be worried about the male athletes as well? How does he know that they aren't succumbing to all sorts of immoral temptations in Beijing? I suppose he feels at ease because men are not nearly as weak-willed as women, right?
According to Eltahawy, Al-Habdan also worries that women, after seeing each other in the locker room or warming up in leotards, might develop attractions for each other. It makes perfect sense, if you think about it. That explains the inordinate number of lesbians on the American and European teams-note the sarcasm.
The Saudis and Bruneians are focusing so much on the immorality of Western teams, but what do they have to say about the other Muslim countries that permit both men and women to compete? What about Eltahawy's Egypt? In a country that is overwhelmingly Muslim, women are allowed to play sports on all levels, from a community game of basketball to an Olympic fencing match. And yet, miraculously, the majority of women in Egypt are still veiled. This fact seems to contradict al-Habdan's sound logic. In addition, the predominantly Islamic nation of Indonesia has in the past even had more female athletes than men in its Olympic delegation, and yet it too still remains a nation strongly rooted in Islam.
In presenting their nations to the world, Islamic nations like Saudi Arabia and Brunei should be eager to show that their women-many of them proud, Muslim women-are capable of being talented, patriotic and religious all at once. They should want to show that their countries are strong, both in their religious devotion and also in their athletic ability. By being one of the few countries with all-male delegations, it makes them seem less confident in their own people, almost as if they aren't willing to trust their athletes as much as all the other competing nations. And of course, the absence of women in the Olympics can be representative of the limited role of women in other areas of Saudi and Bruneian society.
Until Saudi Arabia and Brunei are prepared to allow women in the Olympics, and hopefully in other activities as well, they shouldn't be permitted to compete in the Games. They are breaking the Olympic rules and going against the Olympic spirit. U.S. Representative Rose DeLauro (D-Conn.) plans on introducing a resolution when Congress returns from summer recess that will call on the IOC to make it mandatory that all countries participating in the London Games of 2012 have both women and men on their delegations. Congress should pass this resolution and the IOC should listen. Countries that don't want to play by the rules shouldn't be allowed in the game.
