Saudi Arabia bans men from selling lingerie, then reverses ban

[Al-khiyal]

RIYADH - The Saudi government warned store owners Tuesday that they have two months to comply with a decree banning men from selling lingerie and other women's apparel or face punishment.

In ads published in several Saudi papers, the ministry of labour called on all women's clothing shop owners to comply with the decree issued two years ago "in order to increase employment opportunities for Saudi women."

"Penalties and fines will be levied against store owners and male clerks who violate the ban," said a statement by the ministry adding that it will go into effect on June 19....

Saudi bans men from selling lingerie

[nouha]

its abt time..

they should do it to the rest of the world too ..

its soo umcomfortable walking into a undergarment store and having a guy tell u what UR size is...

[Bent_Bladi]

FINALLY!
omg it was so embarrassing trying to shop for our "hajj needs" there... and its funny cuz the ppl who work there don't even know arabic so we had to motion w/ our hands what we were looking for... *shudder*

[Al-khiyal]

RIYADH (Reuters) May 15, 2006 - Saudi Arabia has postponed plans to replace male sales assistants in lingerie shops, saying it wants to give outlets more time to prepare for the move which has irritated the influential religious circles.

The government, which wants more women to work as part of its efforts to reduce reliance on foreign labor, took the decision last June and businesses were given a year to prepare for implementation.

"Based on pleas by shop owners ... that they were unable to comply with the deadline, the ministry's decision is postponed until all the required preparations are finalized," state news agency SPA quoted the Labor Ministry as saying.

While women in Saudi Arabia are forbidden from mixing with men outside their immediate family in public, they have little alternative to buying their most intimate items of clothing from men.

Many clerics and Islamists in Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam which imposes a strict version of Sunni Islam, have opposed the idea as the start of reform process promoted by King Abdullah that they fear will liberalize the stringent system.

A Western diplomat said the move had irritated some of the most influential clerics in kingdom, where women are not allowed to drive and face employment restrictions because of the need to segregate sexes.

"The ministry may very well be honest in its argument (for the postponement). But the facts hint at a setback for the ministry future efforts in integrating Saudi women in the job life," the diplomat said.

Labor Minister Ghazi Algosaibi, who is despised by hardline Islamists as a liberal reformer, said plans to allow women to work in other sectors would go ahead, citing a group of government-backed clerics who have approved the reforms.

Lingering longer in the lingerie

[Al-khiyal]

Controversy over lingerie saleswomen in Saudi

RIYADH, December 23, 2008 -- The head of Saudi Arabia's religious police has denied banning women from working in lingerie shops, as complaints from female customers about male-only sales staff rise, newspapers said on Tuesday.

Sheikh Ibrahim al-Gaith of the powerful Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice stressed that he does not oppose women sales personnel in lingerie stores per se.

But he said shops with female clerks had to be in malls restricted to women only, so the saleswomen did not come into contact with men.

"We don't reject the work of the women in lingerie stores if they are not next to men's stores," Gaith said, adding that this was government policy.

Saudi women have long complained that they feel uncomfortable having to buy lingerie from men and would prefer female sales assistants.

But the kingdom's ultra-conservative clerics have opposed allowing saleswomen in shops where men are allowed on the grounds that it would violate restrictions on contacts between opposite sexes not from the same family.

Those rules do not extend to salesmen and women customers, however.

In 2005 the labour ministry, in a bid to establish more job opportunities for Saudi women, urged lingerie shops to employ female staff. Minister Ghazi al-Gosaibi said this would serve to limit contact between men and women.

In October Reem As'ad, who teaches economics at a Jeddah college, called for a boycott of lingerie stores that do not replace salesmen with saleswomen.

"We urge every man and woman to help our privacy from being violated by men from whom we are obliged to buy our intimate clothing," she told Arab News.

"Women walk around covered from head to toe, and yet they have to discuss the size and material of their undergarments with strange men. Isn't this odd?"

[Al-khiyal]

Saudi mufti says no to lingerie saleswomen

RIYADH, December 24, 2008 - Saudi Arabia's grand mufti has objected to women working in lingerie shops, despite the labour ministry's approval and rising complaints from female customers about male-only staff, papers said Wednesday.

"Women are entrusted to us, we should not involve them in matters far from their nature," mufti Abdul Aziz al-Sheikh said.

The mufti's disapproval came after the powerful religious police, the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, announced on Tuesday it does not oppose women sales personnel in lingerie stores as long as they worked in malls restricted to women and did not come in contact with men.

Saudi women have long complained that they feel uncomfortable having to buy lingerie from men and would prefer female sales assistants.

But the kingdom's ultra-conservative religious leaders have opposed allowing saleswomen in shops where men are allowed on the grounds that it would violate restrictions on contacts between opposite sexes not from the same family.

[Bent_Bladi]

OFCOURSE THEY WANT THE PERVS BACK IN THE SHOPS EYE RAPING EACH AND EVERY GIRL THAT GOES IN THEIR YIKHRIB BAITON SHOU MABI KHAFOU ALLAH!!!!!!!!!!!!