Jim Crow alive and well in Saudi Arabia
PJ_Saluki
Posts: 1,006
Man, these folks need to step into the 20th century. I'm not even asking for the 21st century. Just a little respect for their fellow humans. I guess women are good enough to fuck and raise children but damn them if they want a cup of coffee.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-women6jun06,0,4669523.story?coll=la-home-center
Am I a bigot for wondering if Islam is a bad thing for humanity?
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-women6jun06,0,4669523.story?coll=la-home-center
Am I a bigot for wondering if Islam is a bad thing for humanity?
"Almost all those politicians took money from Enron, and there they are holding hearings. That's like O.J. Simpson getting in the Rae Carruth jury pool." -- Charles Barkley
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Thanks, this was a great read. It's amazing to see how ingrained people can be. It seems people in Saudi Arabia can't imagine life another way. It reminds me that only a few decades ago many in America couldn't fathom equal rights for blacks. I think the MOST important thing is to have a political system that allows and fosters change. I can't wait for the day when we no longer have to buy a drop of Saudi oil!!!!! Here is a great quote below...
"I am a democrat because I believe that no man or group of men is good enough to be trusted with uncontrolled power over others. And the higher the pretensions of such power, the more dangerous I think it both to rulers and to the subjects. Hence Theocracy is the worst of all governments. If we must have a tyrant a robber barron is far better than an inquisitor. The baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity at some point may be sated; and since he dimly knows he is doing wrong he may possibly repent. But the inquisitor who mistakes his own cruelty and lust of power and fear for the voice of Heaven will torment us infinitely more because he torments us with the approval of his own conscience and his better impulses appear to him as temptations.
And since Theocracy is the worst, the nearer any government approaches to Theocracy the worse it will be. A metaphysic held by the rulers with the force of a religion, is a bad sign. It forbids them, like the inquisitor, to admit any grain of truth or good in their opponents, it abrogates the ordinary rules of morality, and it gives a seemingly high, super-personal sanction to all the very ordinary human passions by which, like other men, the rulers will frequently be actuated. In a word, it forbids wholesome doubt. A political programme can never in reality be more than probably right. We never know all the facts about the present and we can only guess the future. To attach to a party programme -- whose highest claim is to reasonable prudence -- the sort of assent which we should reserve for demonstrable theorems, is a kind of intoxication," - C.S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms, ch. 3.
Awesome quote !!!!
my godfather worked out there and its all true, in mcd's they have separate, partitioned booths for women.
Its not just in saudi though. in the uk we have been seeing an awful lot of honour killings. male relatives kill a daughter, sister, mother, wife, because she has somehow violated their traditions.
i thought that piece was extremely well written and brave.
In my humble opinion, condemnation of this sort of thing needs to come from within Islam itself.
To the original question: the type of islam in saudi arabia is a different type to most other islamic countries and believers. Mecca is there,so im not sure if its sort of like how the vatican is v strict and closed off from the rest of italy. but you are not bigoted to condemn this type of islam as long as you recognise it is only one face of islam,
Much like how our government doesn't really care about how fucked up things are over in the Kingdom of th Al Sa'uds.
saudi arabia. what a fucked up place. we NEED their oil. I hate that fact. i just dont know how to tolerate such a place when we are so dependent on what they have.
Well there is the crux of the problem. Saudi Arabia is the home of militant Islam. They teach it in their state run madrahas. The Al Sa'uds fund it to keep the jihadist from lopping their heads of in front of all of Riyadh. Yet we turn a blind eye because of the oil. That is why I can't buy into this war on terrorism when one of the biggest supporters of terrorrism is still conducting business as usually. If our government was serious about combating militant Islam then we should be starting in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan not fucking Iraq.
We should be starting with a new comprehensive, all-encompassing plan to get this country free from imported oil. Then we can cease all business with the Saudi's and whoever else we need to. In 1961 JFK announced that man would go to the moon before the decade was out, and Americans rallied behind his bold vision.
We need a president to do the same thing, but the goal being green energy independence! But you are right, as it is now we are talking out of both sides of our mouth with our foreign policy.
why do they allow this and also fund and encourage its young people to kill infidels in the name of allah. just so fucked up.
I think there are two different entities at work. One, you have the Saudi royalty who need a good relationship with the US for business and political purposes. We are the ones who are going to go to war to pacify their neighboring Shite threats in Iraq, Syria and Iran. So we protect Saudi Arabia and we make them rich.
In return, the Saudi royatly gives us double-speak with regards to entity number 2 - the religous leaders who push Sharia on society. The royals cannot divorce themselves from the religous leaders without a cultural/religious war - wich would destroy the country and make it look more like a war-torn Lebanon. So they pay them off. They finance the Madrasas and religous leaders, etc and the religious leaders promise to export their terrorist plots rather than turn their martyers loose on the Kingdom. All the while, the royals promise us they are doing "everything they can" to fight terrorism. And the US just eats it up and encourages this relationship becuase if the royals did try to institute too much reform on their devoutly religous society, then riots/pushback would result - which would threaten the oil supplies.
The day Saudi Arabia runs out of oil, our relationship with them will change 180 degrees. Everybody knows it, but everybody benefits too much from the current relationship among all the different entities.
If you think about it, this only encourages the religious leaders to defeat America on other fronts around the world. Because they know they are on borrowed time as well.
Also, it is probably a good thing that we are giving these jihadist a foreign battlefield to fight on in Iraq. It's much better for Saudi Arabia to ship their militants into Iraq to fuel Sunni militias so we can respond to them with our military rather than our domestic firefighters, police, emergency personell - becuase they have been sitting in Saudi Arabia, twittling their thumbs, and foaming for Jihad - so they plan another 9/11. Let's give all the hotheads a place to get killed.
People say, "America brought terrorism to IRaq". And I say you're damn right we did. It's called the fly-paper strategy. let's bring them to a battlefield where we can fight them! We may have created more terrorist by going to Iraq, but we also created a way to kill them too. No doubt, terrorist would just breed on their own without our intervention in IRaq. At least this way we have a means to defeat them, or at least their foot-soldiers.
Well they allow us to build the bases there because it is their protection. Regardless of how much money they throw at "Muslim charities" there are still militants out there that want to bring down the Saudi royal family. So the Al Sa'uds need our military hardware and military presense to finalize their protection. We do it for the cheap oil. I'm sure if it wasn't for the oil we wouldn't give a shit as to how many Saudi princes where beheaded in public by radical imans and their followers.
A few years ago there was a Saudi prince building a 6.1 billion dollar amusment park, with water rides and all, for his personal use. Meanwhile you have people living in the kingdom who don't even have running water. The madrahas, against built and finaced by the royal family with the money we pay to fill our gas tanks, take advantage of the people in this situation. Through their doors come the hundreds, if not thousands, of desperate poor Saudi men and out comes jihadist with pure hatred towards the royal family and the American government that keeps them safe and in power.
We continue to allow this. We actually finance the very people that want to kill us. Our very government refuses to deal with it, and I'm not just talking about Bush. This love story started way back in 1945 when FDR met with Abdul Aziz al Sa'ud aboard the USS Quincy after the Yalta Conference to discuss a deal of US purchase of Saudi crude. Like NCfan said untill we ween ourselves off the Saudi tit we will never be able to truely combat terrorism, or militant Islam which ever you prefer to call it. If in less than 10 years we where able to put a man on the moon, I think we can develope and mainstream an alternative fuel source in equal or less time. The problem is, and this is where I am puzzled, is why we haven't done this yet.
A majority-muslim country like India is a perfect example of how a country can improve itself from within over time... They still have a lot of work to do, but it's amazingly powerful when the citizens of the country and their intelligence are more prized and utilized resources then some fossil fuel in the ground.
was like a picture
of a sunny day
“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.”
― Abraham Lincoln
Unfortunetly that day will not come in our lifetime.
it's sad how women still have it rough all over the world, in different ways. i agree with all you say and it makes me so angry that the US supports saudi arabia and gives them so much money. i hate that when the war on terrorism began laura bush was all about helping those afghani women and people made a big deal out of that (this is why the war is good! we're liberating the ladies!), but what about the saudi women? how could they make themselves out to be so benevolent and totally ignore the state of the saudi women? do they think americans are too ignorant to notice that?
ugh. but i understand how c.j. felt when the bartlett administration renewed that air base and arms sales to qumar.
"Three weeks ago a woman in Qumar was executed for adultery. She didn't need a lawyer 'cause there was no trial. It was her husband's word against hers. . . . Later today I'm going to be announcing that we're selling them tanks and guns."
cross the river to the eastside
Art imitating life.
hey chief, saudi arabia is one of our main ally's. so, um, what do you have to say about that? we fucking support them!
so much for spreading "freedom and deomocracy"
you are like a broken record that refuses to look at your government in an honest fashion and call it out on its faults. dont you want your government to betetr represent you and your ideals? if you do then stop with the "hating america" bullshit.
some people just choose to take off the 3rd grade nationalistic beer goggles and call it how they see it. you can stay in your little fantasy land where the USA government can do no wrong and is always fighting for truth and justice, like supporting this saudi monarchy that oppesses its people :rolleyes:
Grow up already! Let me break it down for you...
I'm not gonna speak for Jlew, but I'm pretty sure he would agree with me in having NO PROBLEM AT ALL pointing out the faults of our government. I will say it plain as day here that we speak out of both sides of our mouth in regards to foreign policy to serve our own interest and further our own agenda. Are you happy now? Do you care to go on about our "fantasy land" and "3rd grade goggles"??????????
The bottom line is that America and the rest of Western civilaztion benefits more for a stable flow of oil and a stable governement in Saudi Arabia than if we tried to put sanctions on them in order to force social change. Do you have any idea what would happen in the world, if the price of oil shot up to $100/$120 a barrel? Do you know what kind of economic repercusions that would have on the world economy and how that would undermine our own governemnt?
If we went into a major recession or depression, it would be extremely detrimental to our security becuase for one reason, we would be in a vulnerable position of weakness and our enemies would be floating in money, literally, making them much, much stronger. Does that make sense to you?
Can you not see how our hands are tied at the moment with regards to Saudi Arabia????
I have no idea but how abundant is natural gas and propane in north America?
There's gotta be better way to do it than with a caveman club and boomstick
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and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
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I will and do call out our government for their faults. but in the case of the kingdom we are fucked. their oil is needed to maintain economic stability in the world.
so what would you suggest with the saudi's ? sanctions? war?
80% Hindu in India. Maybe 10 to 15% tops of Muslim.
Edit: Page one of the story was good, but I have to sign up to read the last three pages.
1. anytime someone says something critical of the US government he turns to the old "you hate america" bullshit. sorry dude, that doesnt fly with me. this country was founded on dissent, and will continue to evolve because of open dissent. period. and this thread was about saudi arabia and not even the US?
2. let me take your logic and expand on it for a second. basicly you say it is in our economic interest to turn a blind eye to their brutal oppression and lack of freedom. so how far are you willing to take that? how much do you value your economy over human rights? who/what would you support in the inerest of your economy? where do you draw the line? how many of your ideals and morals are you willing to trade for some oil? i am not willing to sacrifice any myself, they can keep their fucking oil. i always find it funny when the educated explain or excuse absurd behavior so rationally and calmly, willing to place profit over people like it is the sensible thing to do. willing to sell themselves out for a few dollars.
would you be willing to sell out your mothers rights and freedoms for some oil?
and your right, the Government does talk out of both sides of their mouth..."freedom, deomocracy" and then they suppport and arm some of the most opprseive regimes in the world. you can justify that however you want, i am not interested in selling out my ideals.
Well B the sun has only been around FOREVER, but that is free for the most part. So no use harnessing that. There will be a new fuel when somebody can control it and make a huge profit on it. In the 70's when fuel stations in the States were closed due to the flow being slowwwwwwwed down, should have started the ball rolling. 70's to 00's is about 40 years.
If it were not for the States and friends, there would be no "royalty" in the "kingdom" and they wouldn't fear for their lives having to let the radicals move at will while smiling to their friends in the west. How long ago was that place a barren wasteland with a crap load of oil on it? To appease the locals they now have a thing called royalty and even the locals can see the charade.
this is an extremely easy answer. public transportation and alternative fuels. such as the thing that has powered this entire solar system for millions of years. solar power, AKA the sun. big picture folks, big picture. no need for intervention, why are americans always loking to intervene with sanctions and war? just get off the fucking oil. it is that easy. but that will never happen since the energy industry owns this fucking country. another way to look at it is the fact the we consume the most oil of any country on the planet (i think) and i think that should give us some clout. supply and demand? the customer is always right? the problem is we do not want to use that clout because we like our situation with our friendly client regimes. whether you want to believe it or not
by the way, corporate america and its puppet government love oppesive regimes. they control the people with an iron fist so business can keep on going without the people demanding something in return for the profits being pumped from under it's soil. we like obedient clients, especially in the middle east.
see The Shah, Sadaam, The Saudi Royal family, the Kuwait monrachy, etc...
so speaking the truth about my government is not childish?
which is it, am i hating america or am i being childish for demanding my country have higher ideals then profit over people?
For the love of Pete, NO you are NOT childish for calling out your government!!!
You are childish for acusing JLew and others of having "3rd grade nationalistic goggles on", because he has a different view than you do.
Look, I agree with you about selling out your values and morals for money okay? I'm sure all of us do. But the world isn't that simple. I wish it were.
Beucase I condone something like buying Saudi oil even though there society is oppresive, I don't need people like you screaming and pitching a fit that I'm blind and don't understand the "real truth" or my head is stuck in the sand, or I'm just a hard-core conservative, war-mongering hypocrite.....
The reason Jlew and people like me have issue with you and many others on this board like you is becuase ya'll are so blind to your agenda of blowing the whistle on American hypocrisy that you can't even have a reasonable discussion about issues.
We fucking get it already okay??? Isreal is oppresive too, Amreica is oppresive too. We have a long and bloody history of fucking people over around the world. We got it, right? We all understand!!!!!!
It's impossible for me to get across to somebody like yourself that we need Saudi oil because it upholds the economic stability of western civilization.
For all of America's shortcomings, I realize that we are the most open, free society on the face of the earth. We are liberalizing everyday. Progress is being made here, becuase we have a political system in place that not only allows, but fosters change. I happen to think this idea of Democracy trumps everything, in that for now, the ends justify the means in some but not all cases. If it means buying Saudi oil then so be it. If it means starting WWIII then not so much. There is a fine line. I guess I can live with much more than you can. It just seems that ANYTIME America does something wrong, it alomst appears as if you feel vindicated by your feelings toward this country. Whereas I feel embarased for my country, you seem to take pride in being the one to point out how fucked up we are...
perhaps you should ask jlew why he has used the term "hate america" so many times on this board instead of hopping down my shit when i call him on it? i have respect for his views, as long as he doesnt accuse me of hating my country becuase i disagree with their policies
as for the rest, i am not even going to read it. i am sure it is more of the same "we have forget our ideals for our economy" bullshit they teach in lame economic 101 classes. i remember my first economics class in college the prefessor stated that layoffs or massive firings were ultimately good for the country and economy... this all reminds me of that mentality
and its not just jlew with this hate america bullshit. i have been hearing it from the fucking frauds on the right for 6 years. and you know what, they can suck my dick. i am tired of that shit. i saw a guy on Scarborough do that to a lady the other day. she was questioing the surge and this "pundit" said she hated america. she fired right back at his ass and made him look like the fool that he is.
a piece of shit.
same thing, just on a different level because they are smacking around hundreds of thousands of mothers