Government

‘None of Your Business!’: Watch a Brave Saudi Woman Berate the Religious Police in Riyadh

Saudi Arabian Woman Berates Religious Police at Hayat Mall in Riyadh

Many women in Saudi Arabia juggle Western influences, strict religious beliefs (Photo: AP)

As anyone familiar with Middle Eastern politics is aware, standing up to the so-called “religious police” is not recommended.

Called the “mutaween,” one of their main priorities is essentially to harass and accost people who are not behaving in a sufficiently religious manner– though in places like Afghanistan under the Taliban, they were known to dish out violent beatings, instead.

In Saudi Arabia, the mutaween are granted their authority by King Abdullah, and their ranks include thousands of members and volunteers.  In 2002, the group drew fierce international criticism after they would not let school girls escape a burning building because they were not properly covered, and fourteen perished as a result.

Now, it seems, at least one woman in Saudi Arabia has had enough.

Angry that a “vice preventor” would not stop accosting her about her new manicure, the unnamed woman flipped on her camera phone and gave him a thorough berating:

“Get out of the mall?” she says.  “I‘ll show you who’s getting out of the mall!”

“This is none of your business!” she continues.

As the religious police follow the woman and tell her that no other women are acting in such an impertinent manner (”You don’t see other women here showing their hair”), she reiterates: “None of your business!”

The woman proceeds to inform two security guards at the mall about the religious police’s behavior, saying: “I don’t trust them…They may hit me with their car.  You are two security men and you got a report from a citizen who is being harassed.”  Apparently, they responded that the religious police are good men, and she should listen to them.

Now, the mutaween may seem relatively mild-mannered compared to the woman’s incensed Arabic, but keep in mind their relative positions of authority, and how little power women still possess even in Saudi Arabia.

“For your information, this video is on its way to Twitter and YouTube as we speak,” she warns.

And indeed, according to the Saudi Gazzette, even this token protest went viral in the kingdom, prompting an official inquiry into the commission and the mall’s security guards.

What remains to be seen, is whether it makes any difference.

(H/T: Gawker)

Comments (108)

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  • oldduffer
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 11:05pm

    Every feminist in America should watch this. Actually every liberal should too. This is what they want here. instead of conforming to our laws that are on the books and the Constitution.
    Where you at Gloria Allred? Where are you N.O.W.? With your heads up your #sses that’s where.

    Report Post »  
    • rickc34
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 12:37am

      Let them go live there awhile maybe it will change their mind

      Report Post »  
    • v15
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 1:36am

      If I remember correctly, “the Arab Mind” talks about how women are covered in an attempt by the men to think clean thoughts; however, it is Arab men that are more likely to rape women than men of other cultures and religions. It definitely doesn’t help that many males are breastfed until age 3 or 4, which teaches them to demand what they want from women by the time they are learning their first words. The Saudis are a pretty hypocritical people – it has been observed that when they fly out of the country on vacation, they all take their robes off, wear normal clothes, and break out the alcohol as soon as the plane has left the ground, only to put them on again when they return.

      It really blows my mind to see Liberal women in the United States, such as women in Code Pink, help groups like Hamas that are notorious for pushing Sharia Law upon regions in Iran, Gaza, etc. I’m not sure what goes through the minds of Liberal women, but if they feel oppressed, then they should check out the oppression that women, like this one, are subjugated to in the Muslim world.

      Report Post » v15  
    • do_it_all_again
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 1:42am

      unfortunately, there is a big chance, in a couple of months, you will read about this woman being stoned to death.
      I hope it doesnt happen, but it is a very real possibility.

      Report Post »  
    • lukerw
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 3:04am

      Agreed; My Heart goes out to her!

      Report Post » lukerw  
    • Thevoice
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 5:04am

      Really at this point I could care less …I really wish the entire Muslim world would kill each other..Come on we lost our balls with weak progressive leadership after 9/11 and never decided to do what needed to be done…Make the sandal wearers stand up and die for their misguided beliefs on our terms or have the option to wave a white flag of surrender submit to our will and join humanity in the 21 century and leave the bed sheet on the bed instead of wearing it to the mall. So at this point this woman sending out this video or some poor black christians getting their church bombed and people machined gun down…. Can cry out all they want…. The only real superman we had the entire US armed forces you know the one that brought ..PEOPLE THEIR INDIVIDUAL FREEDOM BACK.. is now reduced to a world wide aid logistics company. and neighborhood night watch security.. So the only real help we can offer is a sack of rice or some bottled water. But listen if your Muslim $hit hole needs a new soccer field that might be doable.

      Report Post » Thevoice  
    • Marrabella
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 7:46am

      NOW? What an irrelevant joke they are. So in the tank for the Dems they are reduced to a mass of illogical contradictions. I wrote to them about treatment of Muslim women in America and they wrote back they don’t get involved in “religious” issues. What garbage! They bash Christians all the time. Lol

      Report Post »  
    • wayner4162
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 7:47am

      somebody tell debbie wasserman shutltz to watch this video and then go vote for obama in november

      obama, closet radical muslim, if you are his enemy, his god allows him to lie to you, and he is the worst of the worst to practice deception.

      watch out all you hollywood bimbos, they are coming for you, all you hollywood babes who think all of us should line up to kiss your buts just because you think your beautiful outwardly,

      King Solomon wrote that a beautiful woman is like a rare and precious diamond, but, he also wrote something else along with this statement, something along these lines:

      A beautiful women who is without discretion, is like a beautiful diamond thrown in an un-flushed toilet.

      Hollywood bimbos are the worst and when they and others like debbie wasserman shutltz open their mouths they prove beyond any doubt their stupidity, sharia law is an extremist point of view, but also, so many women these days have absolutely no discretion, they dress and act provacative, like being treated as whores, and prefer multiple partners and on and on and on, they have lost their way in what GOD expects of them, (discretion) and Motherhood and being a “loyal” Wife.

      Report Post »  
    • Jim in Houston
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 11:33am

      v15 I was at a resort off the Malaysian peninsula and landed on a plane with a Saudi women dressed head to toe in the black bee keeper suit with only her fancy shoes showing. A few minutes after arriving at the hotel, I saw that same pair of fancy shoes, but this time it was on a woman wearing the skimpiest bikini I had ever seen. They truly are hypocrites.

      Report Post »  
    • TIME_2_END_THE_GOP_IN_12
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 12:38pm

      Bet this Women wouldn’t let the TSA molest her. Nice to see someone standing up for their rights. As the sheep of our country stand by while their heroes strip them of their Freedom. Here are a few of the many you can thank.

      Allen West
      Bachmann
      Marco Rubio
      Mike Rogers,
      Eric Cantor
      Paul Ryan

      Yes all of these voted and support the following

      Indefinite Military Detention Provisions
      National Defense Authorization Act
      Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act
      Federal Aviation Administration Act
      Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act
      Patriot Act
      TSA

      Way to go GOP!!!

      TIME_2_END_THE_GOP_IN_12  
    • Zer0
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 1:26pm

      I love this story! I pray this woman is okay and safe from harm. I thank God I live in a country that is secular, yet protects religious freedoms, so that I can be as immoral or moral as I choose to be.

      Report Post »  
    • midwesthippie
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 2:18pm

      …cute little doop’s…don’t any of you understand that the “left” looks at uncle glenn and the “religious right” as the “mutaween”? …they see this woman as part of the “left” fighting for freedom from uncle glenn and the religious right.

      Report Post » midwesthippie  
    • ghostsouls
      Posted on May 27, 2012 at 5:00am

      Gloria “Already Been Paid” won’t come out of the dog house unless obama and his team put her onto someone to protect him.

      Report Post » ghostsouls  
    • pavepaws
      Posted on May 29, 2012 at 12:42am

      This is nothing for her to lose her head over, oh wait, she probably did.

      Report Post »  
  • HelloWorld
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:59pm

    I mean now that is a muslim for America.

    Report Post »  
  • lcltcc
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:58pm

    It’s hard to believe that any woman, would want to live under this kind of oppression. And people are making fun of Sam Brownback for the law passed banning sharia law in Kansas. Shame on any American who would not support Brownback. If there were not already so many cases in American courts that have used sharia law in the determination of the cases involved, then we would not need bans on sharia.

    Report Post »  
  • SgtB
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:56pm

    I’m still reminded of the recent school fire that happened in Saudi Arabia. During that tragic event, children, little girls, were turned back into the fire by the so called religious police because they were not “appropriately covered”. Apparently it is better in their eyes for a child to suffer being burnt alive than to possibly go a few minutes without their hair covered in public. The nation of Saudi Arabia is sick and brutal. I hope that the individuals who live there continue to strive for Liberty as we continue to seek it here as well.

    Report Post » SgtB  
    • nzkiwi
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 7:23am

      And to add; an “ally”.

      Principles matter. I have a wealth of arab people standing up to this tyranny (I won’t bore you with re-posts) and who is it standing up to these people that can easily “disappear” or execute them?

      Repoprters? Poets? Politicians possessed with princilple?

      No.

      Almost exclusively, one type of person.

      Ordinary women.

      Report Post »  
    • nzkiwi
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 8:04am

      And who stands by, careless of the outcome?

      Where the very politicians and camp followers who loudly profess their support?

      African- Americans vote overwhelmingly for the democratic party. The very party that refused to admit Condelzza Rice’s father to its ranks because he was black. The party then overly represented in the KKK. He joined the republicans, not because he agreed with them, but because they allowed him to speak.

      African-Americans convert to Islam, and yet the arabic word for a black person translates into “slave”. Arabs, MUSLIMS, traded black people to the slave traders, who trans-shipped them into a life of bondage. And muslims hold slaves to this very day. Africans or black people, whatever is PC, SLAVES. To this very day!

      And who defends them? Conservatives. Search Dred Scott, the spark that lit the fire to your civil war (yes, I know that it was a bit more complicated than that, but that was the spark).

      What a disgrace it is that the defence of liberty is left to the smaller, weaker sex.

      How filled with shame we adult males should be.

      How our politicians quibble about the “art of the possible”, when they should be standing four-square against tyranny no matter how softly and guilelessy it presents itself.

      Where are the ghosts of the simple, clear-thinking people that came before us?

      Is there nothing left but the impotent railings of us opinionators on this website?

      Report Post »  
  • HelloWorld
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:48pm

    No that’s a Muslim women I would like to see living in America. Welcome to America you are truly one of us.

    Report Post »  
  • truemedia
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:48pm

    We think we just witnessed SHARIA LAW…in your face!

    Report Post »  
  • Lion420
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:47pm

    They’re awfully scared of women in islam.

    Report Post » Lion420  
  • tharpdevenport
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:43pm

    Not she needs to start a support group and train more women to be like her.

    But I got bad news for her: doesn’t matter what they said about no more harrassement, what little law may have been made in regardsto that, it’s still an Islamic country, with little international follow up to this, headed by men far worse than the creepy moral police following her, where women still get murdered, raped, amd disappear. Where she’s still considered inferior to men both by Sharia Law and the Koran.

    Report Post » tharpdevenport  
  • cosmic dogma
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:33pm

    You go girl!

    Report Post »  
  • HiredMind Blog
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:23pm

    If I may make a suggestion to all oppressed women of the Muslim world: If the law is that women must not show their hair in public, why not shave your heads as a form of protest? Then you can walk outside and feel the sunshine on your skin any time you like.

    If the religious police harass you, you can simply ask them, how am I in violation of the law against showing my hair? I HAVE no hair!

    Report Post »  
    • Shadowangel
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 2:17am

      Unfortunately they thought about that too, women are not allowed to shave their head under islamic law. Even cutting it is “touchy” it can’t be too short, and it has to please their husband.

      Report Post »  
  • Kafir-Islamsux
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:15pm

    islam…spawned from satan’s rectum….

    Report Post » Kafir-Islamsux  
  • TJexcite
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 10:10pm

    Such a odd place Saudi Arabia. Shoe and nail polish for sale at the mall but just can not were them outside in public. They so much want to be like the west on the outside but still not on the inside.

    Report Post » TJexcite  
  • Meyvn
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 9:33pm

    You go lady! Good lucks with the hypocrites.

    Report Post » Meyvn  
  • leftcoastslut
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 9:28pm

    God help us, everyone.

    Report Post »  
  • LeadNotFollow
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 9:11pm

    …
    If those men, the so called Religious Police, want to be taken seriously, they need to move into the twenty first century, and quit wearing dresses. It’s hard to respect a man in a dress.

    Report Post »  
  • wdittgasn
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:57pm

    How dare she show her hair, Off with her head!!

    Report Post » wdittgasn  
  • From Virginia
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:57pm

    Recently one of these rubes accosted a woman on the street. She beat the cr@p out of him. I would have LOVED to see that on UTube!

    Report Post »  
  • Ron_WA
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:54pm

    Good for her. This is actually big time progress for the kingdom. Back in the early ’90s a woman & most men wouldn’t stand up to these thugs.

    Report Post » Ron_WA  
  • NeoMouser
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:53pm

    at the begining look how afraid the other women were of what was going on
    they hunched down and sped past the incedent

    Report Post »  
  • jhaydeng
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:49pm

    It’s a shame that she will probably be raped and stoned to death over this! I wish her luck!

    Report Post »  
    • dmforman
      Posted on May 25, 2012 at 9:20pm

      We shouldn’t be wishing her luck, but praying for and praising her for speaking out against what she believes are unjust laws. She deserves our prayers, not luck!

      Report Post »  
  • applehill
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:47pm

    I know some will say Christians also practiced unequal rights for women…. But I still say Islam is a evil religion that promotes hate and isolationism.

    Report Post » applehill  
  • randy
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:47pm

    Gee we have Muslim cops in Washington wearing turbans and beards now, but in Saudi Arabia they don’t? LOL

    This woman has guts.
    But I fear she is in for a short life.

    Report Post » randy  
    • CatB
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 12:33pm

      I would like the State Department to get her on a plane (along with any children) to the safety of the U.S. … I know that won’t happen .. women like Hillary think it is perfectly okay to abuse women .. look who she is married to and how long she has taken it …

      Report Post »  
  • copatriots
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:46pm

    Good for her but I hope this woman survives the ordeal.

    Report Post »  
  • ChiefGeorge
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:45pm

    Great! My wife saw this and now she’s acting up!

    Report Post » ChiefGeorge  
    • Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra
      Posted on May 25, 2012 at 9:05pm

      Well Chief, you could always pull rank on her, just make sure the doghouse is liveable. :-)

      Report Post » Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra  
    • wzanesdad
      Posted on May 25, 2012 at 9:11pm

      hahahahahahahahahhha

      Report Post » wzanesdad  
    • bigdaddyt46
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 4:45am

      I don’t take no crap from anybody else, but you.
      I wear the pants around here!…when I’m finished with your laundry.
      ‘Cause I’m a guy you don’t want to fight! … when I say “jump” you say “yeah, right”.
      I’m the man of this house! … until you get home.

      What I say goes around here! … right out the window.
      And I don’t want to hear a lot of whining! … so I’ll shut up.
      The sooner you learn who’s boss around here! … the sooner you can give me my orders, dear.
      ‘Cause I am the head honcho! … but it’s all in my head.

      And I can have sex anytime! … that you want.
      ‘Cause I’m a man who has needs! … but they’re not that important.
      And don’t expect any flowers from me! … because if I’m not mistaken you prefer jewelry.
      I’m the king of my castle! … when you’re not around.

      And I’ll drink and watch sports whenever I want! … to get into trouble.
      And I‘ll come home when I’m good and ready! … to sleep on the couch.
      Because a man‘s got to do what a man’s got to do! … and I’m going to do what you tell me to.
      Because I’m top dog around here! … but I’ve been neutered!

      Report Post » bigdaddyt46  
    • nzkiwi
      Posted on May 26, 2012 at 8:44am

      I enjoyed that, Bigdaddy.

      Report Post »  
  • blackyb
    Posted on May 25, 2012 at 8:42pm

    They want to come over here and try that with our Southern women? They will be lucky to leave with their ****** in tact.

    Report Post » blackyb  
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