Saudi Arabia... our allies... lucky us

[Savage Beatings]

The September 11th terrorists were largely Saudis... but we ignored that fact because attacking Saudi Arabia would have just been too hard. Luckily for us, they are completely reasonable and not at all anti-Western. Oh, except for stuff like this.

 

"It's not allowed for any woman to travel alone and sit with a strange man and talk and laugh and drink coffee together like they are married," it said.

 

"All of these are against the law and it's clear it's against the law. First, for a woman to work with men is against the law and against religion. Second, the family sections at coffee shops and restaurants are meant for families and close relatives,"

[yo mama]

The September 11th terrorists were largely Saudis... but we ignored that fact because attacking Saudi Arabia would have just been too hard. Luckily for us, they are completely reasonable and not at all anti-Western. Oh, except for stuff like this.

Hey, when in Riyad...

[rajncajn]

I hate to say it, but this goes back to the kid who got caned in Singapore. You live in their country, you better damn well know their rules and play by them. As stupid as they seem to us, that is the way it is there & if you can't live by them then pack your bags and come back to the sane world.

Edited February 19, 2008 by rajncajn

[Savage Beatings]

The double-standard just drives me a bit nuts I guess. We are outraged at the human rights violations of other nations, but we completely overlook any and all evidence that Saudi Arabia might actually be hostile towards human rights as well as towards America in general. But hey, they produce oil and are considered a strategic ally in the region. Right? It reminds me of how we supported Iraq for so long simply because they were strategic to our interests vis-a-vis Iran.

 

Our blind eye towards Saudi Arabia is going to bite us in the ass big time. Bush wants us to be afraid of Iran and of North Korea. Maybe we should be... maybe not... but I'm telling you that this is the snake in the grass just waiting to strike.

[Ursa Majoris]

I hate to say it, but this goes back to the kid who got caned in Thailand. Singapore.

Fixed.

 

Agreed - you've got to understand what the rules are when you go somewhere, however stupid they are.

[yo mama]

The double-standard just drives me a bit nuts I guess. We are outraged at the human rights violations of other nations, but we completely overlook any and all evidence that Saudi Arabia might actually be hostile towards human rights as well as towards America in general. But hey, they produce oil and are considered a strategic ally in the region. Right? It reminds me of how we supported Iraq for so long simply because they were strategic to our interests vis-a-vis Iran.

 

Our blind eye towards Saudi Arabia is going to bite us in the ass big time. Bush wants us to be afraid of Iran and of North Korea. Maybe we should be... maybe not... but I'm telling you that this is the snake in the grass just waiting to strike.

Have you seen 'The Kingdom' yet?

[isleseeya]

Starbucks did its part and really is the root of much evil in this world

[Savage Beatings]

Have you seen 'The Kingdom' yet?

 

No... what's that?

[yo mama]

No... what's that?

It's a good, fictional 2007 film about why Saudi Arabia is a major threat to US interests. It has a similar feel to films like 'Blackhawk Down' (i.e., fast-paced action, we're the good guys, etc). But it (somewhat) subtlety highlights many of the cultural, economic, and political problems that exist in the Middle East (Saudia Arabia, specifically) in regards to the west (US, mainly), as it relates to oil consumption and terrorism. However, it is not as political as Syriana. Jamie Foxx (from 'Jarhead'), Chris Cooper (from 'Bourne Identity' and a small part in 'Syriana'), and Jennifer Garner ('Alias') were all well cast for their action-orientated parts, and put some quality work in this captivating film. But it's not very family friendly; there's quite a bit of violence.

Edited February 19, 2008 by yo mama

[rajncajn]

Fixed.

 

Agreed - you've got to understand what the rules are when you go somewhere, however stupid they are.

Thanks...I should have gotten that as my Uncle lives there.

[The Holy Roller]

Might as well pull out of Iraq and head on south. I mean, as long as we're there already. I got no problem with a little colonialism.

[billay]

Hey, when in Riyad...

I doubt many western women would see it that way...

[yo mama]

I doubt many western women would see it that way...

Maybe, but that doesn't make them right. Only a fool travels abroad ignorant or in disregard of local law and custom.

Edited February 19, 2008 by yo mama

[billay]

Maybe, but that doesn't make them right. Only a fool travels abroad ignorant or in disregard of local law and custom.

She has lived in Saudi Arabia for eight years, and was aware of the customs.

Two weeks before Yara, an American businesswoman, was arrested by Saudi Arabia's religious police for sitting with a male colleague at Starbucks, she said she strolled past the very same cafe with another businessman: Neil Bush.

 

Bush, President George W. Bush's younger brother and CEO of the education software company Ignite!, was in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, speaking at an economic forum hosted by King Abdullah for hundreds of influential business leaders.

 

Yara, who does not want her last name revealed because of safety concerns, is a managing partner at a Saudi financial company. She went to hear Bush speak, and she said she invited him later to tour her company's offices, to give him a sense of what life was really like for women living in the capital.

 

"I was boasting about Riyadh, telling him it doesn't deserve its bad reputation," she said. "I told him I never experienced any harassment. I'd had no trouble as a woman. It was business as usual."

 

But on Monday, Yara learned that she had been wrong. She was thrown in jail, strip-searched, threatened and forced to sign false confessions by the kingdom's "Mutaween" police.

 

"When I was arrested, it was like going through an avalanche," she said. "All of my beliefs were completely destroyed."

 

Yara's crime: sitting with a male business partner in the "family-only" section of the Starbucks -- the only area of the café where women and men can sit together. In Saudi Arabia, public contact between unrelated men and women is strictly prohibited.

 

Yara, who was born in Tripoli, Libya, to Jordanian parents, grew up in Salt Lake City. She moved to Saudi Arabia eight years ago with her husband, a prominent businessman.

 

The 37-year-old mother of three said she had an "all-American" upbringing in Utah and lived most of her life in the U.S. before moving to Riyadh.

 

She described herself as secular, and apolitical. "I am anti-political," she said. "I have never advocated for anything in my life."

 

She said she made a point of wearing an abaya and a headscarf, like most Saudi women, "out of cultural respect."

 

"I observed the rules and tried not to stand out in business settings," she said.

 

But on Monday, when the power failed in her company's offices, Yara and her male colleagues decided to use a nearby Starbucks, which has wireless Internet, as a temporary workspace.

 

She settled into a booth with a male colleague and opened her laptop. Moments later, she was arrested.

 

"Some men came up to us with very long beards and white dresses. They asked, 'Why are you here together?' I explained about the power being out in our office. They got very angry and told me what I was doing was a great sin," Yara recalled.

[yo mama]

She has lived in Saudi Arabia for eight years, and was aware of the customs.

And yet, she broke them anyways. While I disagree with the law she broke, I don't really have a lot of sympathy for someone who knowingly breaks the law in another county, then gets upset with the punishment they receive. It's an F'd up result by our standards, I grant you. But the Saudis don't go by our standards, and anyone who has been there for 8 years should know that.

Edited February 20, 2008 by yo mama

[muck]

It's a good, fictional 2007 film about why Saudi Arabia is a major threat to US interests. It has a similar feel to films like 'Blackhawk Down' (i.e., fast-paced action, we're the good guys, etc). But it (somewhat) subtlety highlights many of the cultural, economic, and political problems that exist in the Middle East (Saudia Arabia, specifically) in regards to the west (US, mainly), as it relates to oil consumption and terrorism. However, it is not as political as Syriana. Jamie Foxx (from 'Jarhead'), Chris Cooper (from 'Bourne Identity' and a small part in 'Syriana'), and Jennifer Garner ('Alias') were all well cast for their action-orientated parts, and put some quality work in this captivating film. But it's not very family friendly; there's quite a bit of violence.

 

Good movie. Thought provoking ending. Very thought provoking (to me, at least).

[Randall]

I hate to say it, but this goes back to the kid who got caned in Singapore. You live in their country, you better damn well know their rules and play by them. As stupid as they seem to us, that is the way it is there & if you can't live by them then pack your bags and come back to the sane world.

 

 

Really. There was a woman recently who was gang raped and what did the authorities do? They gave her lashes because she ttraveled in a \car with a man she wasn't married to.

 

"November 23, 2007

 

Following her appeal, a Saudi Court has increased the sentance of a gang rape victim to 200 lashes and six months jail, punishment for travelling alone in a car with a non-relative male prior to the attack. Her seven attackers sentences now range from two to nine years.

The woman’s lawyer Mr Lahem, whose license to practice has been revoked, has stated that in the Court’s view the woman who was 18 at the time was guilty because she was in the car with an unrelated male and the gang rape would never have happened if she had not met up with the non-related friend. "

 

And these-

 

 

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/worl...icle3321637.ece describes how a married mother of three was stripped, searched and humiliated after being found sitting in a Starbuck’s with a business colleague.

 

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1874471.stm describes how 15 girls were burnt alive in a school in Mecca because they were not allowed to flee (they were not properly covered in head scarves and black robes and unrelated males were proximate).

 

 

I understand cultural differences, but these cases go way beyond that.

[Pope Flick]

Really. There was a woman recently who was gang raped and what did the authorities do? They gave her lashes because she ttraveled in a \car with a man she wasn't married to.

 

"November 23, 2007

 

Following her appeal, a Saudi Court has increased the sentance of a gang rape victim to 200 lashes and six months jail, punishment for travelling alone in a car with a non-relative male prior to the attack. Her seven attackers sentences now range from two to nine years.

The woman’s lawyer Mr Lahem, whose license to practice has been revoked, has stated that in the Court’s view the woman who was 18 at the time was guilty because she was in the car with an unrelated male and the gang rape would never have happened if she had not met up with the non-related friend. "

 

And these-

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/worl...icle3321637.ece describes how a married mother of three was stripped, searched and humiliated after being found sitting in a Starbuck’s with a business colleague.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1874471.stm describes how 15 girls were burnt alive in a school in Mecca because they were not allowed to flee (they were not properly covered in head scarves and black robes and unrelated males were proximate).

I understand cultural differences, but these cases go way beyond that.

 

http://forums.thehuddle.com/index.php?s=&a...t&p=2381046

 

 

You seem to somehow lay the blame on the victim when it happens here though.

[billay]

Well, I don;t know squat about Saudi law, but there certainly seems to be some inconsistencies in enforcement from one place to another. Otherwise, you'd think with all this contempt she has for Saudi Law, she would've had other problems in 8 years.

[rajncajn]

Really. There was a woman recently who was gang raped and what did the authorities do? They gave her lashes because she ttraveled in a \car with a man she wasn't married to.

I never said it wasn't wrong. Those people over there have some seriously messed up ideas in what is right & wrong, but it's not like we haven't known that for years & years and yet people still get upset when Americans go over there and get treated this way. To me that's like putting a naked woman in the middle of a prison with no guards & expecting her to be ok.

[isleseeya]

really as nutty as it is can be here in the end , i say God Bless America

[I Like Soup]

Well, when the oil dries up and/or we find other alternative means for fuel, Saudi and the rest of the Middle East can fall back before the Middle Ages and be a non-factor in the world (read: run around with their ignorant religious dumb asses trying to figure out why they don't have any more money coming in because they have nothing left to offer the world).

 

But, besides that, I agree with most posters, you have to know the customs, etc. when traveling abroad no matter how stupid they are to us. I'd never go work in the Middle East, no matter how much money was thrown my way, for what it is worth.

[Randall]

I never said it wasn't wrong. Those people over there have some seriously messed up ideas in what is right & wrong, but it's not like we haven't known that for years & years and yet people still get upset when Americans go over there and get treated this way. To me that's like putting a naked woman in the middle of a prison with no guards & expecting her to be ok.

 

 

I understand but some things go way beyond culture and right and wrong. I don't get mad at how we are treated there. I get mad when young girls are forced to burn to death by their own country just as I was mad when Saddam killed innocents.

 

It creates more terrorists.

[rajncajn]

I understand but some things go way beyond culture and right and wrong. I don't get mad at how we are treated there. I get mad when young girls are forced to burn to death by their own country just as I was mad when Saddam killed innocents.

 

It creates more terrorists.

I agree, but that has little to do really with the woman in question. That goes back to whether or not you think the US should be the police for the world. As it stands right now I think our interference has caused us just as much, if not more harm than good in the Middle East. Personally I think we should just let change happen on it's own there.

[Savage Beatings]

 

Remember the Star Trek TNG episode where they are all enjoying this luxurious planet which seems like paradise? But then Wesley goes to chase a ball and walks through some forbidden area... so they were going to execute him. Technically Picard should have let the planet exectue him, because he broke their law, and that was the prescribed punishment. But instead they rescued him and then ran away. That's kinda what this reminds me of. I know it's not a perfect analogy (since the woman has been living there for 8 years and knew the law)... but its still similar.

 

That's all... just bustin out some nerd cred here.