DAMMAM: Former Shoura Council adviser Dr. Umayma Ahmad Al-Jalahma said on Sunday that Islam encourages and supports working women and that there is no reason for women not to work.
“There is nothing in Islam that says that (women) working is forbidden,” she said. “God has given us the right to work, to earn a living and to develop our talents.” Al-Jalahma made the remarks to a gathering of young Saudi women at the Asharqia Businesswomen’s Center as part of her speech, “Women’s Rights in the Workplace.” She stressed that women should know their rights and that their right to work is one of them. “If a woman wants to work, she should be able to. She should be able to tell her husband that she doesn’t want to just sit around the house,” she said. “Some men and women deny the right of women to work, and this is either a result of ignorance or holding on too tightly to tradition.”
However, Al-Jalahma said, unlike Western societies, the basic unit of Islamic society is the family and not the individual. “Women play an important role as mothers of our society’s daughters and sons,” she said. “Working mothers are doing a service to their communities and should be appreciated. Motherhood is also a job.”
She said that workingwomen in the West are not appreciated as such and that the focus on the individual creates a constant struggle between men and women. “To this day, working women in the West demand equal pay between them and their male counterparts,” she said. “The logic is that a woman may start a family and take time off of work, and so a woman may do the same work that a man does but still get paid less for it.”
This, she said, distorts the natural difference between the sexes and breaks up the family. “Women in the West are demanded to transform into men if they want to be appreciated,” she said, “and the family is no longer made up of a mother, father and the children, but of a woman, man and family members.”
However, ideas should not be rejected just because they come from the West. “We need to evaluate everything that is on the table and be open to new ideas,” she said. “It is against our Islamic teachings to reject something just because it comes from the West.”
She said that men also have their role, as well. “Men have a responsibility toward the women in their life, and women should respect that, but this is toward one man in your life — your husband or your father — not to all men. And this doesn’t mean absolute obedience,” she said.
“Men must support their women, it’s a form of spoiling women,” she said. “Men can help in the kitchen; there is no shame in that.” She also addressed claims that Islam does not treat women and men equally. “Absolute equality between two similar groups is fair, but when it is between two different groups, it is not,” she said. “If absolute equality is possible, then men should be able to breast-feed.”
Above equality, she said, Islam values justice. “Islam understands the differences between men and women and demands fairness and justice,” she said. “We can’t all be the same and have the same role. Women and men complement each other, and we need to work together and cooperate for the benefit of the family and the society.”
Women also have the responsibility of passing these lessons to the next generation. “It is true, we have a masculine society, but who let it become that way?” she asked. “It is not men’s fault. Everything starts at the home.”
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