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Saudi Students In US Seek Segregation By Gender On Facebook
Beetle B. writes "A 22,000-member group for Saudis studying in the US on the social networking website Facebook has been split into two groups, one for women and one for men. The split follows a request from the group's female members who wanted extra privacy. The separate page for Saudi women is a valid decision. We took it to fulfill the wishes of the Saudi women in the US. We have been contacted by a lot of women asking for their private group,' Majed Aleid, media chair of the 'Saudis in the US' group, told Arab News in a letter."
Here's your burkha.
am i missing something - how is this news?
And Facebook is so the right place for that.
They want to avoid getting harrassed by male Saudis for not wearing the damn burkha, dumbass.
At first it appears so, but in Facebook's eyes, they haven't got any more privacy than before. In fact, they have less... Facebook employees can still read the group (at least some of them, I'm sure) and now the group has clearly marked its advertising demographic. This is a major win for Facebook in every regard. Especially if people keep saying Facebook helped these people have more privacy.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
Having a women's group and men's group is fine, but they are deluding themselves thinking that they can do without a mixed group... Girls wanting a place for girl talk happens a lot in all sorts of environments. Many social forums have female only and male only sub-forums. But splitting the bazaar down in the middle with a wall... Nobody is going to be content with that. In fact the whole idea is rather backwards and primitive. And checking ones gender on the internet is a bit tricky, so expect covert mixing. No wall is as attractive to climb over as the one with the opposite gender on the other side...
let me tell you what the big deal is, as someone who is living in a muslim majority country - after a certain point, they will start to make demands that others 'respect' their religion properly. which will entail you, as an outsider, sticking with their idea of respect as it is present in their language. you wont criticize anything regarding their religion, wont talk negatively about their prophet, their ways and so on. after a certain point, they will want that their ways be the dominant rule, law. and those not compliant with their ways, should be treated as outsiders, minority, and have 'minority rights' in limited conditions. after a certain point, everyone is demanded to stick by their rules. because, they are divine.
Read radical news here
As a german happily living in a democratic and free Germany, I have to disagree. Most more recent "freeing" attempts may have been utter failures, but (proof by example) it is obviously possible to succeed.
Yes
Climate Progress - Hell and High Water
You can unlock someone's cage, but if you force them out then you have taken their freedom.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Yup. How many people in the US would be comfortable on a nude beach? Or even a topless beach? The fact that our broadcast TV standards can produce a half-million-dollar fine for a nipple while allowing gratuitous carnage to be shown is considered very strange to a lot of the rest of the West - much of it enthusiastically supported by our fairly conservative religious culture.
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
Oh, come on. Next you'll be saying that Christian fundamentalists will want to impose their will on women's reproductive rights, even if they're not Christian, and to start using that as an unofficial litmus test for who could be elected President!
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
I think the point is that there's a difference between making sure someone has their own choices and forcing the choices you think they should make upon them.
In canada a few years back it was ruled that women could go topless (equality thing because it was legal for men to walk round topless.). Women gained the freedom to go topless if they wanted.
If on the other hand the court had ruled that women *had* to go topless whether they wanted to or not then would they be more free?
of course not.
Similarly there's a difference between making sure women have the choice not to wear a burka and *forcing* them not to wear it.
Particularly for older women it can be essentially forcing them to expose parts of their body they consider private.
It's completely reasonable that women might want to self-segregate under some circumstances. I can totally see why they might want to form a second, subgroup for the main Saudi's in America page to discuss how the issues are relevant to them specifically. On the other hand, segregating the main page is clearly a religiously influenced decision (whether it was driven by the women themselves or not). OP was trolling, but it's true that the type of Islam practiced in Saudi Arabia is *extremely* conservative and anti-female, and it's not parroting Fox News to say so. Like Christians, Muslim have a range of practice that are considered "Orthodox"; and just as some versions of Christianity are very sexist, so to are some versions of Islam. Tunisia, for instance, is completely different and very liberal in regard to relations between the sexes.
In short, choice to form a self-segregated group to discuss women's issues is a perfectly reasonable idea. A forced split of all men and women on the main page into separate groups is a symptom of what's wrong with Saudi Arabia from a human rights perspective. Even if the drive to segregate was from the women, you can see how this is a problem based on the reason.
There are a significant number of girls who do not yet feel confident enough to share their points of view and opinions in the same domain as men. In my opinion they need some time to adjust
In other words, these women have been beat down enough that they literally can't respond to a man in a disagreeable manner. So they want to segregate, as "training wheels". However since th whole site is segregated, I fail to see what they can do after they've "adjusted" to practice their new found confidence.
I don't need a million points of light, just two points of multi-mode fiber and a 10 Gig-E router.
Yet even most aboriginal societies have some form of bodily covering - even if it's just loincloths.
What?!
Hong Kong is not a democracy by any western standards. Half of the legislature is what we call the "functional constituency", which has a voter base of about 3% of the whole population. A few of those seats are exclusively selected by "corporate votes", no real people voting. For example, the legislator in the "finance" constituency only has to secure votes from a few dozen BANKS to get a seat. (You thought just lobbying by corporations was bad enough?)
The government directly reports to the Central Government of the People's Republic of China, and the head of government in Hong Kong is elected by a small group of about 800 people. Note, you're talking about a city of 7+ million people.
Not that the state of affairs was any better under British rule -- for a long time, the legislature was appointed until it switched to a system similar to that of today, and the Governor of Hong Kong was appointed by the British government.
In short, Hong Kong is not, and was never a democracy.
---
As for Taiwan, I am less familiar with its political history. But I am not aware that there was significant "outside" help. The people in Taiwan wanted democracy, and the then president Lee Teng-Hui gave what they wanted, and now they are pretty proud to be the only place in "China" where democracy is practiced.
Don't quote me on this.
Can anyone think of reasons why they should remain segregated in the modern world?
urinals.
MEN ! DO NOT BE TAKEN IN BY THIS!
We all know how long and slow lines at the womens' room is for busy events. Do YOU want to suffer the same inconvenience ?!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
You're right. People in the West really have deluded themselves into thinking that they don't have an arbitrary culture, it's everyone else that does. Of course you cover your penis, testicles, vagina and anus: that's just natural! Of course only women cover their breasts, unless on a beach in France or on spring break in Mexico - that's reasonable and natural! But that women should have their hair covered - well, that's repression! Oh, and men will need to shave for at least the first 10 to 15 years of their careers if they want to be taken seriously in the corporate world - that's just normal... etc.
In fact, many of the things we take as conventional have "repressive" origins, but we've integrated them into everyday life as simple conventions and habits of basic modesty. That so many people don't understand how this could possibly be the case for Muslims is discouraging.
There are many spheres of life, too, where women do better when they segregate themselves from men. Because of the tendency of boys to monopolize attention and resources in K-8 math and sciences education, girls do much better in those subjects when taught in all-girl environments. Unsurprisingly, then, a disproportionate number of women scientists and engineers went to all-girl schools: the shocker is that there are more women (by percentage) studying engineering in the Arab world than in the US! (Recognizing the reality of discrimination in the job markets in those countries, however: most come to Europe or the US to work.)