by spwa4 | 2025-06-28 17:17:21+00:00
I keep finding this baffling. An arab muslim criticizing OTHERS for practicing slavery? And a Saudi at that. WTF. I mean how hypocritical can you get?

> You've historically been the biggest mass murders and genocides from killing off the natives in North America and Aborigines in Australia and the recent wars in the middle east

Really? Who colonized the middle east, Asia and Africa? Look it up, the Roman Empire did, somewhat, and the actual colonizing (meaning conquering, taking free people and turning them into slaves, usually by mass-murder) was done by the successive Caliphates. Have you somehow missed the many paintings made by the slave trade, missed WHAT the slave owners are wearing? The west took over after the last caliph fled islam (the state, not that anyone at the time made any distinction between state and religion at all. And if we're being very honest, not many muslims were sorry to see it end)

The West then proceeded to end slavery and what's left are a bunch of separate states, with some very badly chosen borders, after stealing resources for a couple of decades.

Which state today would have more to do with these Caliphates that did the colonizing and extracting for >1000 years? The western states, the US? Or can you come up with a more responsible party? Perhaps a specific country, claiming to have been the center of islam for said millenium (they're lying, of course. Any time that it actually mattered the center was Baghdad, Cairo, Damascus or Istanbul, never even close to Saudi Arabia. We happen to be in the only incredibly exceptional moment in history Saudi Arabia is not a desert hellhole. That includes the future)

> crappy infrastructure, illegal drunks & junkies roaming the streets and other stuff ...

I once roamed around, by accident in Ryadh, by getting lost. Don't tell me you have any trouble finding the poorer neighborhoods, drunks and junkies (yes not on the streets, same reason you don't find drunks on the streets in Sydney during summer either) ... and, let's be honest, slaves. It is very much NOT the case that everyone has airco in Saudi Arabia.

And I keep hearing about stuff I haven't seen, like the "divorce prisons" of Saudi Arabia. Also, Saudi Arabia has debtor's prisons. Very progressive you people are.

> after its support and financing of the current genocide in Palestine

"The west" isn't supporting that, with some exceptions (Saudi Arabia IS, by the way). Second, Saudi Arabia has genocided more Jews in Saudi Arabia than the ENTIRE Israel-Palestine conflict made in it's >100 years of on-off fighting on both sides. By the way, a genocide, far bigger than the Israel-Palestine conflict is what brought in the current rulers and created Saudi Arabia not 100 years ago, do you even know that?

I mean, I know the answer to that. You learn that quickly when you're there. No, Saudis do not know the history of Saudi Arabia, not even a little bit. Saudi men (you don't see the women) know more about the history of perfume brands than their own history.

> Saudi citizens are doing just fine and are being greatly supported and have a bright future with the Vision 2030 work ... No one gives a crap about some fat old attention whore journalist ...

You mean when the current Saudi government had it's embassy staff kill and chop into pieces an American-Saudi dual citizen? Yes, that government is taking real good care of human rights. I really trust them to treat other Saudi citizens well into the future ...

And Vision 2030, which boils down to "tourism will replace oil revenues", is about as realistic as an umbrella manufacturer's plan to branch out into delivering hot soup during hurricanes. Wait, why am I even making a comparison. Let me repeat the vision: "tourism will replace oil revenues". That's also a joke, just so bad it's not even funny. So at least there's that: in 20 or so years when oil demand has dried up, Saudi Arabia will once again be the desert hellhole it was for most of it's existence. Maybe more like 10 years, or even less, because frankly I doubt oil demand will survive the next recession in the west, whenever that is.