If you're of the opinion that the religious right has too much influence on American politics, you should check out Saudi Arabia. The royal family has relied for decades on the support of fundamentalist Wahabi clerics who, in return for their support to the ibn Saud regime, have insisted on ever more stringent laws. Among those measures has been a strict ban prohibiting women from driving that has been in effect for 75 years since the founding of Saudi Arabia in 1932, but the Saudi government is finally preparing to lift the ban.

The government decision reportedly stems from an effort to placate a mounting women's lib movement, whose activists have been mounting rolling demonstrations by leading convoys of women driving around in the kingdom despite the law prohibiting them from obtaining driver's licenses or automobile insurance. According to the Saudi government, the ban will be lifted by the end of the year. Critics point out, however, that previous government commitments towards reform have not been met.

[Source: The Daily Telegraph via Instapundit, Photo by HASSAN AMMAR/AFP/Getty]

During the development of General Motors' new GMT900 SUVs, the team in charge of design was taken out to the company's Milford Proving Grounds and made to dress in drag as an exercise. They wore high-heels, fake press-on nails and garbage bag skirts to simulate what The Car Connection refers to as "female handicaps" (are we really calling them that?) while operating various features of their new 'utes. The result was at least three features on GM's new SUVs that wouldn't have been there otherwise: retractable running boards for easier entry/exit in a skirt, a larger center console that can hold a purse and an easier to operate rear lift gate.

The idea for this excursion into androgyny came from Mary Sipes, a vehicle line director at GM and a woman with a mission to make her company's vehicles more user friendly for females. Since women comprise more than 50-percent of the buying public, she realized it would only help the company's bottom line to consider them more when designing new vehicles. Since the design teams are still very male dominated, Sipes decided to dress her teams in drag to force them to consider their vehicles from a female perspective. Hmmm... perhaps a better solution than playing dress up would be to just hire more women. Regardless, the intent was commendable, but we're wondering if our female readers can think of any other missing features that might make their lives a little easier.

[Source: The Car Connection]

As a male, I can't begin to imagine the many hardships that go along with being a woman. Under-wire bras, various forms of painful hair removal, and uncomfortable shoes are just a few of the things many women endure to fit our culture's current definition of beauty. Uncomfortable shoes, however, can cause more than just blisters. Stilettos, sling-backs, strappy sandals and driving barefoot can sometimes cause car accidents because wearing fashionable footwear often conflicts with using a good driving shoe.

Enter Sheilas' Wheels, a car insurer for women in the UK that has developed the Sheila Driving Heel. Quite a little marvel of design, the Sheila Driving Heel features a tall heel that folds forward into the shoe's sole at the touch of a button (we couldn't find the button in the pic above, though). This turns the pump into a flat that's much better suited to the rigors of driving. In addition to hiding the heel, Sheila's shoes feature discrete tread on their soles that gives a woman's heel some grip, which we suppose is helpful when performing a double-clutch shift and the like. We're not sure how attractive the patent leather black with hot pink trim will be to the Sheila Driving Heel's intended market, but we've also never claimed to know anything about its intended market, so who knows?

There's no word on pricing or availability, and the Sheilas' Wheels website only contains the press release for the Sheila Driving Heel, which we've pasted after the jump. We waited almost a week for them to send us a pic of the shoes, as their description was more than our imagination could conjure, so we're not expecting more info to be forthcoming.

[Source: ILoveSheilas.com]

It's not a new topic in the automotive industry -- women influence and even directly account for around 80 percent of automotive buying decisions, yet dealers still reportedly look over the woman's shoulders for a husband or father. Despite the industry's best efforts to recruit women salespeople to increase the odds of good communication, almost half of the auto dealerships in the country have no women on staff, and women only make up 8 percent of the sales force, according to the NADA. Dealers have also tried to make showrooms more female-friendly, including installing play areas for kids with toys and children's videos, yet complaints persist -- truth or mere stereotype, so what's a car salesman to do?

Enter AskPatty.com, a female-staffed online publication that seeks to educate women on vehicle buying and car ownership, while identifying female-friendly dealerships after showroom staff complete a training course on how to communicate with women. The training, conducted by Maddox Smye, includes an instructional course, a reading of How to Get Rich Selling Cars and Trucks to Women, and an hour-long test. About 225 dealerships have signed up.

AskPatty isn't all about bridging the gap between Mars and Venus, though -- it's a business as well. Training is $225 per person for 12 months, and dealers shell out $795 a month for certification. If it encourages one salesperson to alter his style, however, it might just be worth it in our book.

[Source: Detroit Free Press]

Well, here's an issue where people may want to seriously keep their mouth shut. According to a study by Kia Motor UK, 53 percent of drivers think they're the better half-in driving, that is, compared to their significant other (SO). Worse, nearly 20 percent would consider dumping or serving divorce papers if they felt their SO was too critical of their driving skills.

Kia Motor's recommendation? Share the driving, chose the traveling music together and plan plenty of stops. The latter not only gives relief to bodily necessities, but any tempers as well.

[Source: Pocket-lint]

A recent nation-wide survey by Jiffy Lube casts strong doubt upon the age-old image that men know more about cars than women. When asked, for example, where to find a tire's air-pressure, two-thirds of the men answered incorrectly as opposed to 45-percent of women. The percentages were the same when men and women were asked if synthetic oils increased mileage between oil changes.

Men fared better in a few questions: 78 percent of men surveyed knew the purpose of antifreeze versus 56 percent of women.

[Source: Jiffy Lube International via PR Newswire]

Writer Kristin Varela provides a unique review of the Mercury Milan, the middle triplet of Ford’s Fusion/Milan/Zephyr mid-size offerings. She takes a decidedly different tack than most reviews of this model. Instead of discussing how the Milan is based on the Mazda6 chassis or how the engine uses pushrods, Varela assesses the Milan from a young mother's perspective:

• The Milan is simple to operate. (Sometimes it's just nice to get into a car without feeling like one needs to be a computer hacker just to operate the vehicle.)

• She cannot fit her third child’s booster seat between her other two children when they’re in back.

• She likes the in-dash storage unit. (Accessibility rocks!) Same with the climate controls on the steering wheel.

• No manual release for the trunk or handhold to grip it.
  

• As a result of these shortcomings, Valera wonders if the Milan is a suitable vehicle for modern women and mothers.

The last reason is somewhat ironic, as there has been quite a bit of speculation that Ford is actually targeting females for its Mercury-branded vehicles.

[Source: ABC News]

Women with ample chests often find typical over-the-shoulder three-point safety belts (a.k.a. “seatbelts”) rather uncomfortable. Think about it – there’s a wide nylon strap stretched across your breasts that gets tighter and tighter with every tap of the brakes. It’s practically bondage on wheels.

A U.K.-based car insurance provider for women named Sheilas’ Wheels hired some engineers with a little empathy to design the ‘S-Clip’, a device that forces a seatbelt to take a detour between the dangerous curves, rather than going over them. The S-Clip has already undergone crash test dummy safety checks to prove it does not reduce a seatbelt’s effectiveness and Sheilas’ Wheels is currently shopping around for a partner to produce it.

Despite the occasional chauvinistic turn, some of us must take umbrage with the title of the linked press release – “Seatbelt Innovation For Real Women” – that implies only those gifted with abundant bosoms are “Real Women”. Ever hear of the 'Bro'? (Or was it the Manzier... we can never keep our Seinfeld straight). Regardless, real women come in all shapes and sizes, Sheila.

[Thanks ZeroZen for the tip]