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Originally Posted by A'isha Azar
Dear da Sage,
Could you please quote for me where I stated that women are not harassed in public for crossing the "respectable comportment" line?
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This is the quote I was thinking of:
A. writes (Previously)- Oh please, no one is beaten for being alone in public, because the law is that men and women must not be alone together unless they are related. Believe me there is hardly anyone who is Saudi that does not have vast amounts of family. Your 33rd cousin will take you in even if he does not know you, because it would be shame on his family not to.
Quote:
Originally Posted by A'isha Azar
Are you also willing to see that I would be arrested for not wearing a shirt, which would be considered "respectable comportment" here?
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This is quite beside the point I made, that
it's not the veiling laws that are so bad, but the other "respectable comportmant" laws (and social restrictions) that go along with them. You may or may not be arrested for not wearing a shirt, but I see shirtless women every day in summer. They jog in public, beside the road, wearing just a sports bra and shorts. 25 years ago in the USA, you would have only seen such garments at a beach, or inside a dance or exercise studio. Why are you asking me to "admit" something, that has nothing to do with my own argument?
Quote:
Originally Posted by A'isha Azar
And, as Gypsy pointed out, often what the English caption SAYS is happening, is not what is going on at all.
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Again, why are you bringing this up to
me? I always take translated news stories with a grain of salt, especially if the visual doesn't seem to match the text. I don't think I have ever said anything here to make a logical person think otherwise.
Quote:
Originally Posted by A'isha Azar
I think people in the U.S, have a little bit of an incorrect view about the mutawwah, or morals police in Saudi. First, the people often yell at them and cause a scene if the mutawwah bother them. They are just as likely to harass men as women, perhaps more so since often the male family membess can get pretty uptight about the mutawwah bothering their female family members. I have a friend who was wearing some tight pants under her abaya and a mutawwah tried to bother her about it. She just started giving him hell and her brother came over and told the jerk to let her alone and quit looking at his sister, etc. From what I hear from various Saudis, this is a pretty common occurance. The mutawwah are considered by both the government and the people to be a but of a nuisance, and they are often barely tolerated by either group. Many times, according to several Saudis with whom I have discussed the matter, the mutawaah are people who could not get through religious school, and so can not teach or make their livings a imams or whatever. They are in some ways outcasts in the society. People do not take them nearly as seriously as we have been led to believe.
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This explains a lot. Thank you for this informative comment. The religious police apparently do have SOME power though...otherwise we would hear much less about them.
Quote:
Originally Posted by A'isha Azar
Now, the Taliban in Afghanistan are another story all together.....
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They're the same brand of idiot as the Saudi religious police, just with more guns and power. In my (admittedly biased) Western opinion.
I'm not saying KuteNurse is completely right, but she's not completely wrong either. I don't mind saying that I'm prejudiced, because I certainly am, on several matters. I work hard to keep my prejudice to a minimum, but I don't fool myself that I can eliminate every kind of prejudice from my thought processes, and I doubt anyone else can, either.
Please don't address low-concept-level posts to me with the idea that you are going to save me from my close-mindedness. I am already putting much more work into that for myself, than you could possibly have time for.
The horse is dead. Seriously, people.