Talk:Freedom of religion in Saudi Arabia

message: The main problem with this article is that most of it has been plagiarised word-for-word from the U.S. State Department's 2002 International Religions Freedom Report (see http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2002/14012.htm).  An astonishing proportion of Wikipedia articles seem to include, or to consist entirely of, cut-and-paste plagiarism.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.43.252.13 (talk) 14:46, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Plagiarism 

message: Saudi Arabia article says 25 million, this one says 19. Some gap. Medico80 10:43, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Population

message: This merge tag has been sat on Religious Freedom in Saudia for ever but no tag had been added to this page. This could do with being sorted - by someone with expertise - sooner rather than later to avoid any more parallel development. Madmedea 21:51, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Merge proposal

message: I provided a source for the Shia Muslim minority forming 15% of the NATIVE population, so please stop changing it to 3% without even providing a reliable source. KMF
Lol 15%, what made you think that there are 12% more shiites? --Yu5uF 20:06, 2 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Just observing from the sidelines here, I see that the cited source (a Council on Foreign Relations background paper) said: "Shiites make up strong majorities in Iran (90 percent), Bahrain (75 percent), and Iraq (close to 60 percent); Lebanon, too, is primarily Shiite. Small but potentially powerful Shiite are found throughout the Gulf States, as well as in Pakistan (17 percent), Saudi Arabia (15 percent), and India (around 2 percent)." I would nitpick that the cited source does not appear to suport the assertion in the article that "They form around 15% of the native population." The cited source appears not to distinguish between native and non-native residents (however the difference between "native" and "non-native" might be defined). If the word "native" were removed, it would seem to me that the cited source supported the assertion made in the article. -- Boracay Bill 22:23, 2 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Religious Demography

message: I move that the content of Allegations_of_Saudi_Arabian_apartheid#Religious_apartheid be merged into this article as this has the more neutral title and as there is already conent on this topic here. Lothar of the Hill People 15:08, 4 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: i agree. i see no reason for the content forking. ITAQALLAH 16:28, 4 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I disagree.  Religious freedom = ability to PRACTICE one's religion freely.  This is not the same as what exists in Saudi Arabia where those who practice other religions are not allowed in the country or into certain parts of the country.  This is like South African apartheid (certain areas only for Whites, etc) and not simply a "freedom" issue.  Bigglove 15:47, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That's what any article named "Status of religious freedom" is about. Why do you think that "Status of religious freedom" would only apply if religious freedom exists? The word status is about the state of the concept,ie whether it not it exists, not an assertion that religious freedom exists. Lothar of the Hill People 20:33, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No, sorry, you missed my point because I didn't phrase it well.  If it were a religious freedom issue, then people of other religions could go where they wanted in the kingdom, albiet while not free to practice Christianity, Judaism, other schools of Islam, etc.  In Saudi, however, Jews can't even enter the kingdom and no one except Muslims can use certain roads or go to certain places.  That is why it is Apartheid.  There is country wide separation between a certain kind of Muslim and everyone else.  The people are kept apart or are excluded.  Bigglove 00:54, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

text: A precedent has been set in various AFD articles to deal with the articles separately - that's why some of them have been deleted while others have not. Lothar of the Hill People 20:33, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: 6SJ7 said it best. Just to repeat what I said before: Saudi has got be the closest to an apartheid state there is on the planet, to the best of my knowledge. If any country practices apartheid, they do. IronDuke 00:46, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merger proposal 

message: I wonder if the current title of this article ("Limitation of religious freedom in Saudi Arabia") might be improved if it were simply "Religious freedom in Saudi Arabia."
The current, clear concensus of the editors is that the state of religious freedom in Saudi Arabia is indeed limited -- a position supported by a large amount of referenced sources.  However, it appears to me that any possible future changes in laws increasing religious freedom in Saudi Arabia, or in granting limited religious freedoms to particular groups, may fall outside the scope of this article, because the title specifies limitations only and not the state of religious freedom in general.
Since the article in its current state does, nevertheless, address some of these issues, it appears to me that widening the scope of the article's title may have the dual benefit of bringing it in line with the article's content and reducing any appearance of POV forking.  I'm not sure that an argument of POV forking is likely, given the evidence of limitation, but given that a search for "Religious freedom in Saudi Arabia" currently redirects to "Limitation of religious freedom in Saudi Arabia," this issue may come up.  We may be able to preempt such a discussion by making the title more comprehensive.  
In addition to the rationale mentioned above, my other motivation for doing this is that having a "Religious freedom in..." for all countries would seem more encyclopedic to me (and actually a pretty good idea) than having a "Limitation of religious freedom in..." for all countries.  This would go along with having separate articles for each country on the state of their economies, criminal justice systems, human rights, etc., rather than articles specifically detailing only their limitations in these areas.  Any thoughts? -DavidGC (talk) 05:16, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The title as it now stands, Religious Freedom in Saudi Arabia, is Orwellian.  Saudi Arabia has, by most measures, the least religious freedom of any state on the planet.  The  article is almost entirely devoted to detailing all of the ways in which religious freedom is restricted.  We should call a spade a spade.Historicist (talk) 02:50, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article's Title 

message: I've added this    to many unreferenced statemnts I've removed an unreferenced statement tagged in 07,added templates too--NotedGrant Talk 09:52, 22 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I changed "morals" back to "mores" (The accepted traditional customs and usages of a particular social group.), which better reflects the info in the cited supporting source. Wtmitchell  (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 21:20, 22 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for correcting my edit --NotedGrant Talk 14:50, 24 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: It looks to me like most of the changes that were suggested in the above discussion were made, and that your changes have been kept.  Do you think it's okay to remove the neutrality-dispute header now? 64.134.66.137 (talk) 01:13, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  --Metallurgist (talk) 20:06, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Clean up 

message: I do not think this article has been written in an NPOV there are blatantly obvious statements here which seem to be non neutral .I wont make this some sort of a debate or anything if you do not agree with my changes simply revert them and explain them here if your explanation is satisfactory I won't argue --NotedGrant Talk 09:59, 22 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I changed "morals" back to "mores" (The accepted traditional customs and usages of a particular social group.), which better reflects the info in the cited supporting source. Wtmitchell  (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 21:20, 22 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for correcting my edit --NotedGrant Talk 14:50, 24 September 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: It looks to me like most of the changes that were suggested in the above discussion were made, and that your changes have been kept.  Do you think it's okay to remove the neutrality-dispute header now? 64.134.66.137 (talk) 01:13, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  --Metallurgist (talk) 20:06, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Neutrality

message: A 2007 article in the Jerusalem Post asserted that Bibles and other non-Islamic religious items were subject to confiscation upon entering the country.  Per this source, the United States State Department disputes the claims made in the article as based on outdated information.  Accordingly, I've removed the claim.  -- Heath 198.82.18.203 (talk) 23:44, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I've added the info back in, along with the info about the State Department disputing the reports, and along with additional information and more supporting citations. Wtmitchell  (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 00:47, 14 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removed link to Jerusalem Post article 

message: I just saw this recent edit. I would have congratulated the editor involved on his talk  page for making a good catch but, since the editor involved was an anon, I'm commenting here.  The edit removed some text which previously read "The country’s total land area is about  and before the recent land transfer to Yemen), and a population of more than 27 million, of whom approximately 19 million are citizens. ...", and replaced it with less-garbled text. Aside from fixing the garble there, the good catch of which I speak relates to the word "recent". Saying "recent", of course, flouts the style guideline enunciated at WP:DATED and begs the question "recent in relation to what date?" A reasonable answer to that question would be "recent in relation to the date the user is reading the article", but the actual answer is "recent in relation to the unstated date on which some unidentified editor entered this info into the article."  As it turns out, this particular information was entered into the article, punctuated differently, in this January 2006 edit; "recent", apparently, is in relation to that 2006 timeframe — which is the reason for the oft-flouted WP:DATED guideline.  Anyhow, nice catch. Wtmitchell  (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 17:32, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Comment on dated info and garble 

message: There's been a mini WP:EW developing involving myself and others about this. I'm going to ask that the point of disagreement be discussed here. Relevant edits and their summaries are:
* User:Morbenmoshe: the law in saudi arabia require that all the citizens have to be muslims source: http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/irf/2004/35507.htm
* User:Wtmitchell Undo edit which relied on 2004 source http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/irf/2004/35507.htm. Add cite of current (2013) source [note: I botched the links in the cite I added]
* User:109.253.136.58 you didnt read the source it said "In Saudi Arabia, the public practice of any religion other than Islam is prohibited;" and it is does not support the claim that there is no law in sadui arabia that required all the citizens be muslims.
*  User:Wtmitchell Actually, I had read the relevant part of the source I cited, but I botched the link to it in my cite. Please, let's not edit war. Please discuss at "Legal requirement (or lack thereof) that citizens be Muslims", soon to appear on the talk page.
I had read the relevant portion of that 2013 source, but my botching the link in the cite may have introduced confusion about what it says. The relevant paragraph reads as follows:
I'm pretty sure that that last mentioned edit above by me is currently correct, so that's where I've left the article for now. It is possible that other sources contradict the one I have cited there (hopefully with the correct link this time). If such sources exist, WP:DUE describes the relevant policy about what the article ought to contain. Wtmitchell  (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 03:48, 10 May 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: this source is 2012 report this is newer source that say about the law of citizenship to saudi arabia since 2013 "non-Muslims are not allowed to have Saudi citizenship and non-Muslim places of worship are not permitted" https://www.cia.gov/Library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2122.html this is from the cia site.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.246.133.227 (talk) 04:29, 10 May 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I've indented the above paragraph for readability. I see that in this edit you have removed assertion either way about religious requirements for citizenship. I'd say that not mentioning the point satisfies WP:NPOV on it, though one could say that it flouts WP:DUE, and I expect that if the disagreement between sources goes unmentioned here a POV edit one way or the other supported by one or the other of the disagreeing sources will resurface here at some point. Wtmitchell  (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 05:36, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

text: I want to mention here for future reference in case discussion on this picks up again that the Basic Law of Saudi Arabia article says, "the Basic Law contains many characteristics of what might be called a constitution in other countries", Royal Order No. (A/91), 27 Sha’ban 1412H (or 1 March 1992), titled "Basic Law of Governance", says in Article 35, "The Law shall set forth provisions for Saudi Arabian citizenship." As far as I can tell, this document (widely available), titled Saudi Arabian Citizenship System,  sets forth in English the legal provisions concerning Saudi citizenship. It says, "The Saudi Citizenship System was approved by the Cabinet according to the Decision no. 4 dated in 25/1/1374 Hijra, as follows: [explicit detail follows]" (25/1/1374 Hijra seems to be 38 years prior to the aforementioned royal order but, AFAICS, those are the current provisions). That is pretty primary sourceish, though, so there ought to be absolutely no editorial interpretation of that. Wtmitchell  (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 07:44, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

text: Just removed that as poorly written and unsourced. Looking at the history - seems an ip added that with an edit summary citing the CIA factbook. Vsmith (talk) 02:18, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Concur with the removal. The CIA factbook isn't a great source for this sort of thing and there are is a resonable amount of sourcing suggesting the law doesn't require citizens are Muslims. See also Human rights in Saudi Arabia#Freedom of religion and belief Nil Einne (talk) 20:07, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Yup. The CIA factbook is a questionable source to be using for such issues - it offers no sources for the assertion, and there are other sources covering the issue in greater depth. One only has to look at the data on religion they give for other countries to see why it is problematic - the data for Cuba for example is "prior to CASTRO assuming power". I see no reason to assume that any of this is anything more than a repetition of census or similar data (in some cases this is explicitly stated), and as such can be no better than the original source - which can of course be cited properly if located. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:31, 21 May 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Legal requirement (or lack thereof) that citizens be Muslims 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 6 external links on Freedom of religion in Saudi Arabia. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120710083600/http://www.ceylontoday.lk/16-9052-news-detail-arrested-for-idol-worship.html to http://www.ceylontoday.lk/16-9052-news-detail-arrested-for-idol-worship.html
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.cpj.org/2012/02/saudi-arabian-columnist-under-threat-for-twitter-p.php
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/02/08/twitter-aflame-with-fatwa-against-saudi-writer-hamza-kashgari.html
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/saudi-arabia/mystery-about-controversial-saudi-columnist-s-location-deepens-1.978517
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.emirates247.com/news/region/sacrilegious-saudi-writer-arrested-in-malaysia-2012-02-09-1.442198
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2012/0210/Malaysia-may-repatriate-Saudi-who-faces-death-penalty-for-tweets
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 21:27, 3 September 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 6 external links on Freedom of religion in Saudi Arabia. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20131020045056/http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/MDE23/004/1993/en/2c19d3ca-ecc7-11dd-85fd-99a1fce0c9ec/mde230041993en.html to https://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/MDE23/004/1993/en/2c19d3ca-ecc7-11dd-85fd-99a1fce0c9ec/mde230041993en.html
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.cpj.org/2012/02/saudi-arabian-columnist-under-threat-for-twitter-p.php
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/02/08/twitter-aflame-with-fatwa-against-saudi-writer-hamza-kashgari.html
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/saudi-arabia/mystery-about-controversial-saudi-columnist-s-location-deepens-1.978517
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.emirates247.com/news/region/sacrilegious-saudi-writer-arrested-in-malaysia-2012-02-09-1.442198
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2012/0210/Malaysia-may-repatriate-Saudi-who-faces-death-penalty-for-tweets
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 21:20, 14 September 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified one external link on Freedom of religion in Saudi Arabia. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20111107025636/http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1012.html to https://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1012.html
*Added  tag to http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Two-men-arrested-for-forced-conversion-of-a-young-woman%3A-they-gave-her-religious-books-25400.htmlarchiveurl%3D
*Added  tag to http://www.salafimanhaj.com/pdf/SalafiManhaj_Saudi.pdf
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 17:42, 7 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified