Is Saudi Arabia more than just a source of Oil?
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- Published on Wednesday, 30 May 2012 06:09
- Written by John Draper
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Pat Condell says that some citizens of Saudi Arabia seriously wonder why he criticizes their country. He goes on to explain in lurid detail why it's as bad a country as they come. In my view, he goes too far and gets caught up in a discussion of gays in Muslim countries. You can see his rant here - but he does have some points. Western countries tend to leave Saudi Arabia alone - after all they do have a lot of oil and they don't talk aggressively or secretly make nuclear bombs. They also buy a bunch of American exports like fighter jets. So what do they do that's objectionable - apart that is, from having the wrong religion? This site has discussed these issues in many articles - let me try to collect them together.
What is wrong with Saudi Arabia and its culture?
- They suppress women - only men have any rights to vote, drive cars, go out alone, have a real social life. Women live in a virtual prison. Read "Saudi Arabia - the world's largest women's prison".
- They do not allow the sexes to meet freely - this could easily backfire on them as young people learn how other societies live. Read "Saudi Unrest due to Islam"
- Being gay in Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries is dangerous - you could be executed for it. Read "Islamic Countries dangerous for gays". Also "Islamic Culture can encourage homosexuality
- They live almost entirely on their oil - yet because they have so much of it, no country is willing to stop buying their unethical oil. Instead they talk about refusing to buy Canada's Oil-sand oil for much lesser environmental sins. Read "Ethical Oil or Dirty Oil"
- They export their hatred of other religions to other countries through subsidizing hate filled text books that originate in their own schools where they teach hate. These are used in the U.K. and other countries yet no country wants to stop them. Read this article: "Saudis also intolerant in their own schools". Read a U.S. report on this activity with a list of many examples of their hate teachings. Download pdf here
- They also export their religion by subsidizing mosques which often are hotbeds of terrorist activity. Read "Muslim Missionaries in Canada"
- They are totally intolerant of any religion other than Islam and even other versions of Islam are not really acceptable. Criticise Islam and you are likely to get 500 lashes, years in prison or maybe decapitated.
Pat also says that Saudi "executes people for things that are not even crimes in the civilized world" (like sorcery); he says they'd all be starving if they didn't dig money out of the ground and that they (and the whole Arab world) are pathetically dependent on western technology - some of which came from Israel! These plus the points above are valid observations - instead of defending their status quo, Saudis should be asking themselves why should this be?
So far, they have not used a whole lot of force to suppress dissenters - imprisoning and a 500 lashes slows down the dissent. But it may not be long before their citizens want to follow Egypt. Unfortunately, they have the wrong idea of democracy - it's not compatible with Islam so won't by itself solve anything. (See "Islam not compatible with democracy" and "Islam incompatible with democracy") The basic problem is that like fundamentalist Christians, they think that any law or majority or consensus amongst men is over-ruled by God's law (Sharia) which is of course decided by the clique of imams.
Some have decided with their feet and emigrated. Others are taking longer to see the light. The short answer to the question: "Is Saudi Arabia more than just a source of Oil?" Yes, they export their primitive lifestyle and hatreds and buy technology from the west. But they don't have anything else good to offer the world. Or if they have, it's hidden under the veil of Islam and their export of hate.