The life and Saudi logic of 'home arrangers'

In 2006, Ali Schmidt went undercover as a fat person to see for herself how others – friends, family members, classmates, teachers, complete strangers – treat overweight people. It wasn’t a pretty experience.

But Schmidt’s experience pales in comparison to that of a Saudi journalist when she went undercover as a Saudi maid in a Saudi household.

(You might remember that it was about this time last year that the Ministry of Labor made a proposal allowing Saudi women to work under very specific arrangements and guidelines as “home arranger”. The term ‘maid’ was abandoned in this case because it wasn’t ‘dignified’ enough when applied to the domestic activities of a Saudi woman.)

Anyway, back to the undercover ‘home arranger’s’ experience.

It started with a body search before she was even allowed into the house and ended with thinly-veiled sexual propositions by the so-called men of the house. (And yes, men as in plural – the husband and the sons!)

In between those two highlights, the journalist was told that the previous maids who’d worked in the house had all been “immoral” and had had private relationships with the husband. The wife’s response? Revenge -not toward the immoral husband, but toward the maids!

“She also told me how she would get her revenge by being cruel to them until they either fled or she kicked them out.”

Throughout the day, that same woman teetered manically between friend and foe, confiding in the journalist one moment and chiding her sharply the next. Her suspicion and paranoia, however, never waned.

The journalist was lucky. Her employers did not abuse her or torture her or kill her. She was not raped. And, by fact of omission, it would seem she was also paid for her time.

That’s not what makes her lucky, however. She was lucky because, like Schmidt who took off her fat suit, at the end of the day the journalist could take off the maid persona and just be herself: she’s not really one of the hundreds of thousands of maids here in Saudi.

It’s interesting to note that the journalist’s take-away from the piece is decidedly Saudi – and (imo) says more about the culture and society here than the way the maid-for-a-day was treated.

“Without wishing in any way to detract from the value of the profession and those who pursue it, I find it difficult to see how Saudi women can be encouraged to take it up at this point in time without society at large being made aware of how to treat others and learning to feel for them and appreciate them as people.”

As if that wasn’t enough, there’s this reinforcing quote from Sheikh Hassan Al-Shamrani.

“I support Saudi women working as housemaids,” Al-Shamrani says, “but only if she is in desperate need of the work and can find no other… She must not mix with male members of the household and must spend the night in her own house, but most importantly she must not abandon her hijab and her modesty. If any of those conditions fail to be fulfilled, then it would be better for her to not work.”

Mmm. So it's acceptable to deny a foreign maid her dignity and humanity, but unacceptable to deny a Saudi maid the same?

The message seems to be that if a foreign maid is forced to work 24/7, sleep in the proverbial closet under the stairs, put up with unimaginable abuse from the women and sexual harassment, abuse and assault from the men of the household it's okay - simply because she is not a Saudi.

At a tangent to the topic of maids, I can’t help but point out another logic flaw, one which Bashayer Muhammad brilliantly addresses in today’s Arab News.

Apparently there was a recent op-ed piece in one of the Arabic papers expressing indignation at the mistreatment of maids in Saudi households – specifically the fact that many maids are not allowed outside the house unless there is an emergency.

While neither diminishing nor denying the often times horrid treatment of maids here, Bashayer notes that their freedoms often outstrip the freedoms afforded Saudi women.

“I am surprised at why he is upset at the condition of maids when women are demanding the same thing that he demands for maids? Does this writer know that the condition of some maids is better than housewives? If maids are held inside their homes for two years, then housewives are being held for longer periods having left their families to come and live with their husbands. If they do leave home in extreme cases, then they do so with their husbands. Some families do not find any difficulty in sending their maids to the supermarket alone while their womenfolk are banned from leaving alone. A housewife told me that she wishes she were in her maid’s shoes. She said she would be willing to trade all her luxury, including her cell phone and Internet, just to regain her freedom.”

Let me get this straight…on the one hand, Saudi women are too good to serve as ‘home arrangers’ unless afforded special and humane treatment maids of other nationalities are not afforded, yet if they did lower themselves to such positions, they would, in fact, often have more freedom than they have as the lady of the house!

Wow! That's some kinda logic!

What does how we treat other people say about us? Is there a standard of expectation when it comes to human dignity and respect? What happens when those standards are not met? Are all people worthy of dignity?