There’s a YouTube video that has gone viral recording quite vividly up to about 20 Saudi men harassing a small group of women at an Eastern Province mall.

The men chased the young women out of the mall shouting vulgar epithets, and then followed them deep into the parking lot. At one point, some men were shouting, “My turn! My turn!” as they elbowed their way to the front of the gang so they could call the women more horrible names. It was a disgusting and frightening display of lawlessness. No police or mall security officials were present. The video depicted Saudi society at its worst.

Social media comments that followed included some men who were also disgusted by this cowardly behavior. But it also led to a discussion that if men could easily attack women in a public place, then why should Saudi women be allowed to drive cars that will make them vulnerable to similar outrages.

So the issue is not if men should be held accountable for assaults on women — whether verbal or physical — but that women should just stay out of their way.

A casual read of social media sites today reveals hundreds of examples of illegal conduct in which men are advocating violence against women who plan to drive.

An online campaign has been launched by some men who suggest that men use “drifting” techniques with their cars to frighten any female driver who takes to the road on Oct. 26. Drifting is a technique in which young drivers manipulate the steering, braking and acceleration of a car to “drift” sideways, backwards or even on two wheels. It’s used to be called stunt driving. But in the end, it’s a dangerous sport that has led to the deaths of drivers, passengers and bystanders. It’s outlawed in Saudi Arabia.

No individuals have been held accountable for advocating these threats on women’s lives. Yet it’s women who are branded as outlaws because they want to drive a car, or worse, they want to shop at a mall without being harassed.

Are Saudi women really breaking laws and fermenting revolution as implied by some people? No, they are not doing so.

The real outlaws are the men who threaten, harass and intimidate women who only want their rights. These guys are given tacit approval for their conduct by an indifferent government. What does it say about local agencies, such as the traffic police, which do not enforce laws to protect the citizens? Agencies allow male motorists to drive recklessly on Saudi roads with a carload of unrestrained children and their mother jumping center medians, hopping lanes and traveling at excessive speeds.

Of course it’s dangerous for women to drive the streets. It’s dangerous for anybody. But we are supposed to live by the rule of law and stop thinking of ourselves as a Third World country. Or perhaps that’s why we think of ourselves as living in an undeveloped nation. It gives us an excuse to behave crudely.

I hear the police in the Eastern Province are conducting a full investigation into the mall incident. The police are confident that arrests will be made. It’s telling that no Saudis confronted those thugs in the parking lot, or that mall security officers were more alert. It’s also telling that only the shame of a video gone viral brings the police to action.

It doesn’t matter whether the government passes a law that allows women to drive. What is more important to me as a woman is that the Saudi government accept responsibility and stop this ugliness of shaming women whether they are on foot or driving a car. This is not Afghanistan, but some people act like the Taleban when it comes to women’s issues. If only the religious scholars can for once take a look at the big picture and act as role models and not take sides on issues that clearly belong in the government arena.

Some 50 years ago, a group of conservatives petitioned then-Prince Faisal to ban women’s voices on the national radio network because hearing them would be shameful. The prince replied that the Prophet (peace be upon him) listened to the great woman poet Al-Khamsa. He loved her poetry and loved listening to her voice. So, the prince asked, “what so shameful about women’s voices now?”

Perhaps this wisdom needs to be instilled on the idiots harassing women and threatening to harm them.

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