Used, Silenced, Branded: How Saudi Arabia Recycles Its Women

By Maryam Aldossari

As the Saudi regime showcases handpicked women as proof of its modernity, others are locked away in places like Dar Al Reaya—grim state-run “care homes” that function as prisons for the disobedient, the outspoken, and the inconvenient. A new Guardian investigation has exposed the harrowing testimonies of women locked inside these facilities—beaten, drugged, and punished not for crimes, but for seeking freedom. Stories like these rarely pierce the surface of international media—but headlines celebrating Saudi women driving race cars or joining boardrooms make daily rounds. You can’t blame people for being confused: is this reform, or just a more polished form of repression?

For years, Saudi women were burdened with carrying the weight of family and tribal “honour”—their behaviour policed as a reflection of their fathers’, brothers’, and nation’s morality. The state turned this ideology into law, propped up by religious clerics who issued fatwas (religious edicts) banning women from driving, working in mixed-gender spaces, or even showing their faces in public. But when it suited the regime, the rules vanished overnight. The fatwas were forgotten. The religious police disappeared. Women got behind the wheel—and the regime’s excuses crumbled. Society didn’t implode. The resistance never came. The sky didn’t fall. Let’s not romanticise it: this wasn’t reform. It was rebranding. A top-down shift, driven by PR, international pressure after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, and Mohammed bin Salman’s desperate push to market Vision 2030 as modernity

Women’s visibility in Saudi Arabia is not a sign of progress—it’s a spectacle, carefully choreographed for an international audience. Every headline about a Saudi woman climbing Everest, flying a plane, or becoming an astronaut is less about empowerment and more about optics. These “firsts” are designed to dazzle diplomats, seduce investors, and win applause from Western media. But scratch the surface, and the pattern is clear: these women are overwhelmingly drawn from elite, well-connected families. The first female ambassador to the US? A royal. The woman appointed as head of the  Human Rights Commission? Handpicked insiders. This isn’t grassroots change—it’s top-down branding. A gendered PR campaign masquerading as reform.

Visibility doesn’t guarantee freedom. In Saudi Arabia, being seen is celebrated—until you step across the regime’s invisible red lines. Take Manahel al-Otaibi. Her crime? Believing the rhetoric. Trusting the language of reform. Removing her abaya. For that, she was sentenced to 11 years in prison on “terrorism” charges. Yes, women drove. But many of the feminists who fought for that right are now silenced, surveilled, or still behind bars. Visibility isn’t the problem—it’s that it’s granted only on the regime’s terms. This is the reality behind the façade: obedience wrapped in optics, punishment masquerading as progress.

We were told this was empowerment. But the price of entry is silence. Yes, women are now in jobs once deemed off-limits. Gender segregation is no longer the default. But this visibility comes at a cost. Harassment is routine—normalised, dismissed, and unpunished. Reporting it risks your job. Speaking to family brings blame. The message is unmistakable: stay quiet, or be labelled “disobedient” and disappear into Dar al-Reaya. In a system built on silence, the law punishes not the abuser, but the woman who dares to speak.

The law hasn’t freed Saudi women—it’s simply learned to speak the language of reform. Legal changes like lifting the travel ban for women over 21 are paraded as milestones, but the foundations of control remain firmly intact. The new Personal Status Law doesn’t dismantle male authority—it rebrands it. Judges still have the power to block marriages. Wives are legally obliged to obey their husbands. Domestic violence shelters cannot release women without a guardian’s permission. And “disobedience”? Still as vague and dangerous as ever—a catch-all used to revoke rights and restrict freedom at a whim. So why the sudden spotlight on women after decades of silence and subjugation? Because now, their visibility serves the regime. They are not being empowered—they are being deployed.

Saudi women have always been tools of the regime—veiled or unveiled as politics demand. First, to appease Wahhabi clerics, they were erased: silenced, segregated, and patrolled into invisibility. After the 1979 Grand Mosque Seizure, the state clamped down harder—turning women into living symbols of religious legitimacy. Then came 9/11, and with it, international scrutiny. Suddenly, women were dusted off and paraded as proof of progress—appointed to councils, given votes, flown onto foreign stages. And now, under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the cycle rolls on. Women’s rights are not a moral imperative—they’re a marketing strategy. Reforms are curated for investors and diplomats, while those who demand real change are silenced, jailed, or exiled. Enough. Women are not props for diplomacy or branding tools for Vision 2030. They are not to be used, covered, and uncovered on command.

Saudi women are fleeing—not for freedom, but survival. Each year, over a thousand risk everything to escape a system that treats them as property, not people. They flee forced marriages, domestic abuse, and the suffocating grip of male guardianship. Yet, instead of addressing these abuses, the regime tightens its hold. Surveillance apps like Absher track their movements. Their passports are revoked, assets frozen, and foreign governments pressured to send them back. In official rhetoric, the state has likened these women to terrorists, branding their escape as betrayal. This is not reform; it's repression repackaged. The world must see past the façade and confront the systemic abuse that drives women to flee.

To Western audiences: stop being fooled. A woman in a racing suit doesn’t cancel out the woman in a cell. Every time you repost a glossy campaign or cheer a “first,” you help bury the truth. While the regime jails feminists and brands dissenters as terrorists, it’s bidding to host your World Cup. If you celebrate the spectacle and ignore the system, you’re not a bystander—you’re complicit.

To Saudi Arabia’s allies in London and Washington: stop treating our lives like a line item on a trade deal. From Trump’s Riyadh photo-ops to his latest pledge of ‘no more lectures on how to live,’ the message is clear: authoritarianism is culture, and repression is tradition—as long as the oil keeps flowing. And from Keir Starmer’s silence, it seems Britain agrees. The economy comes first, human rights second. We’re not asking for heroism. We’re asking you to stop hiding behind diplomacy while our rights are crushed. If you can put human rights on the table when it's Russia or Iran, you can do the same with Saudi Arabia. If you can leverage deals for weapons, oil, and football, you can do it for freedom.

Originally published as a Feature piece in The Morning Star.