Here is something I bet you never thought you would see in a million years.
The Jerusalem Post: It was a scene Saudi women’s rights activists have dreamt of for years.
When a Saudi religious policeman sauntered about an amusement park in the eastern Saudi Arabian city of Al-Mubarraz looking for unmarried couples illegally socializing, he probably wasn’t expecting much opposition.
But when he approached a young, 20-something couple meandering through the park together, he received an unprecedented whooping.
A member of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, the Saudi religious police known locally as the Hai’a, asked the couple to confirm their identities and relationship to one another, as it is a crime in Saudi Arabia for unmarried men and women to mix.
For unknown reasons, the young man collapsed upon being questioned by the cop.
According to the Saudi daily Okaz, the woman then allegedly laid into the religious policeman, punching him repeatedly, and leaving him to be taken to the hospital with bruises across his body and face.
I think it is safe to say the young lady wears the pants in that relationship. I hope these so-called “women’s groups” around the world speak up for this woman. We all know the young lady is in for one hell of a beating under Saudi law.
Should the woman be charged, she could face a lengthy prison term and lashings for assaulting a representative of a government institution.
Saudi law does not permit women to be in public spaces without a male guardian. Women are not allowed to drive, inherit, divorce or gain custody of children, and cannot socialize with unrelated men.
From what the article says, cracks are starting to form in the whole religious police idea thanks to the Internet spreading word of the police’s abuses. It will be interesting to see if this young woman’s actions become a catalyst for further social change.
Via: Memeorandum
Via: The Jerusalem Post
Photo h/t: Jihad Watch