Saudi Women Fight For Right To Drive October 15, 2007

After almost 17 years after their last public outcry, Saudi women are again reviving their cause about their right to drive.

 

With the help of text messages and e-mails, these women were able to spread the world and gain support from various communities. In fact, they have gathered about 1, 100 signatures through convincing people on the malls and also the online community. With these signatures, a petition has already been sent last Sunday to King Abdullah.

 

Saudi women are again staging these demonstrations because of the difficulties they encounter everyday due to the ban on women drivers. In fact, in Saudi Arabia, women are not allowed to travel, marry, and rent a hotel or apartment without asking permission first from a male companion or guardian.

 

Moreover, women have a hard time commuting because of the lack of public transportation. And although the big cities are abundant with taxis, women are not comfortable riding due to concerns for safety. Also, not all Saudi women can afford personal drivers.

 

These women, with the help of the internet and satellite television, are gaining worldwide support for their right to drive.

Male Drivers Encounter More Major Accidents Than Women Drivers October 15, 2007

In a survey released last October 7, it was found out that more men are involved in major motoring crashes while women are often involved in minor ones.

 

According to the survey by Elephan.co.uk, male drivers have 42% likelihood in head-on collisions compared to women. Women, on the other hand, are 55% more likely to encounter an accident in a car park. This finding is based on data from 270,000 insurance claims. The survey also revealed that women are 47% more likely than men to be involved in a traffic light accident and 78% tend to lose their car keys.

 

 

Further survey results also concluded that men are have 36% more probability than women to hit a pedestrian on a pavement, have49% more probability to hit an animal on the road, and have 37% more probability to hit a tree. But women have 18% more potential than men to hit a cyclist and 15% more likely to hit a parked car.

 

Brian Martin, the managing director of Elephant.co.uk, stated that the company hold a huge amount of data on accidents and wanted to find out if there was a difference between how men and women crash. After the survey, it was sound out that there really was such a difference. He also added that generally, men drive faster and more aggressively than women, while women are more easily distracted than men behind the wheel.