Saudi Girls Must Stay Chaste

So says Saudi Arabia's Grand Mufti. [The newspaper hasn't been delivered yet - and I'll be curious to see where this article is. If it is on the front page, in big print, I'll post a photo. See below.] Nary a mention of Saudi boys. Imagine if someone in the States said this. Women's groups would go ballistic. Heads would explode. "Saudi girls [should] remain chaste in the face of liberal forces which want to deviate women from the right Islamic path so as to satisfy their ulterior motives which have nothing to do with Islam." What are the "liberal forces?" Driving? Going to movies? No. Apparently traveling is a liberal force. As is being unveiled. And getting involved in relationships with whoever they want. Mobile phones. They're a big problem. "Legal marriage is the right way of protecting the youth from committing sins." Well. Okay, then.

The article is NOT in the print edition of the paper. Why is that? I have searched all 16 pages of today's paper and the article is NOT there. I've captured it though, in a couple of different screen shots, just in case it mysteriously disappears. Other articles have...

The front page of the on-line edition of today's Saudi Gazette:

The actual article:

Some people just can't mind their own dayum business. A man on a plane "demanded that the air steward oblige a fellow passenger to cover her hair and bring a 'mehram'" [male guardian - see above] after refusing to put on his seat-belt. [File under: Only in Saudi.] The pilot "was forced to turn his aircraft around and abandon take-off." Passengers should have pummeled the guy to an unrecognizable mass of bloody pulp. What a jerk. He - the man who is not identified by either name or nationality - is reported to have declared that "cleansing the plane of Shariah violations is more important than wearing seat belts... in any case, safety is in the hands of God." Put this asshole on a permanent no-fly list and tell him to get on a camel the next time he wants to travel. "Security officers requested that the passenger disembark from the aircraft, considering him a risk to the flight." Gee. 'Ya think?

In other news today... "The Commission for Investigation and Prosecution has begun interrogating the father of three boys and a girl... who were reportedly beaten and abused. The children's stepbrothers and stepmother are also implicated." If any of this is true I hope every single one of them - the stepbrothers, the stepmother and most of all, the father go to jail for a very, very long time. The children's mother, "an Arab of non-Saudi nationality" [does it matter what nationality she is? it must - it is reported] discovered the abuse when she "came to the Kingdom to visit them." She says, "I found that they had been tortured day and night. They had been sleeping on bare floor tiles and shattered glass." Shattered glass? "The four children, of whom the boys are aged between 11 and 14, say that they suffered regular beatings, and that they were burnt and maltreated in other ways by their father, stepmother and stepbrothers. One of the children said that his stepmother would force him to clean the bathroom, and lock him in after filling the room with insecticide spray." Who cleans a bathroom with insecticide spray? And, where is the maid? Are you the ONLY family in Saudi without one? "The girl said that her stepmother took her to a deserted valley area, beat her repeatedly and burned her on the private parts of her body. She said her step-mother would only give them the leftovers of meals... and would sometimes put insecticide in it." What is it with the insecticide? Sounds to me like the wicked stepmother was trying to kill them - the children of her husband's first marriage. The mother - the real mother - "is seeking a a trial by Shariah Court for the abusers of her children." Would this be the same court that awarded custody of the children to the father in the first place? Let us know how that works out.