Iran also has lots of oil, and our relationship with them is largely poor because we toppled their government to allow a friendly despot to retake power (and start selling us oil on the cheap again.) Our relationship with Saudi Arabia is basically only what it is because the Sauds are (mostly) more interested in money than ideology.
And so are we, demonstrably ;).
It’s different for girls.
They aren’t allowed out without a male relative as escort. 
I sure am.
In this case that not really relevant, as this sounds suspiciously like a story an expat heard and simply repeated. A death penalty in Saudi has to be confirmed by Court of Appeal (they call it that, but it’s procedure is more like that of cassation courts rather than Appeals heard in Common law countries).
Saudi court system are fascinating to a student of legal systems. The trial courts for law (they have a division between administrative law courts and general law courts) are presided by judges and unless there is a specific statute in the field, they are free to make any decision that they think is just and appropriate in the circumstances as long as it does not violate the Quran and the Hadith.
Sounds like they can execute a fellow for double parking. :dubious:
I’m just not sure what any of the western-educated Saudis would gain from a revolt.
They have the best of both worlds. If they want to get drunk and party, they pop over to Bahrain (the nightclubs in Manama are full of drunk Saudis on the weekend). They want western TV, they download or stream it.
I don’t think freedom of speech or expression is such a strong driver and I’m not sure if support of equal rights would be sufficient impetus for a revolution if you haven’t been brought up thinking that equality is important.
“Flogging” snerk
[QUOTE=smith537]
Cutting people’s heads off is backward. Many would even argue that any form on government mandated death penalty is backward. But beheading particularly so due to it’s brutal and horrific nature.
[/QUOTE]
So a quick death by beheading is worse than having drugs injected into your arm, when you say “I feel my whole body burning,” and then take 10 minutes to die?
The death penalty is the barbarism. How it is administered is merely secondary.
According to the Guardian, Saudia Arabia slipped a bit, and only killed 79 people in 2013, bringing them in 4th on the list of death penalty states. Number 5 on the list was North Korea, with 70 dead, followed by number 6 on the list, the United States, with 39 killed.
The “burning” guy had the advantage of a few years of appeal, as opposed to being arrested on Monday, tried on Tuesday, executed on Wednesday.
Thing is if it was not for the oil Saudi Arabia or Iran most western counties would never have traded with them thus the counties economy would be dirt poor forcing them to adopt to 21 century.
But the problem is far leftists in Europe are opposed to the embargo. Than you got Asian countries that would never put a embargo on them because they use them as proxy.
Look at North Korea extreme poverty,starvation, shortage of goods and service:mad::mad::mad: if China or Russia stop supporting them they would have been shut down long ago.
If the US ever found fusion power Saudi Arabia and Iran would be dirt poor.
People are scared to protest on street for right for freedom of speech,democracy and equal rights and stuff because of the totalitarian government.
Just like in Egypt.
Yet the US and western counties trade with them like they are friends.
Yah, about that. I seem to remember the religious police forcing little girls back into a burning building because they didn’t have their head coverings on.
What’s that got to do with it?
I would imagine that it indicates that a state run by a repressive religion is a Bad Thing.
As I reflect upon it, he was not screaming in pain, he was complaining and remarking that he loved Jesus, his Wife, and child, despite his raping and murdering his girl friend’s baby.
And they should care exactly why ?
You are entitled to your own opinions, no matter how odd, but they, nor anyone else, are not obligated to share those opinions nor conform to anything anyone in the world thinks, unless that other can exert sufficient force to impel obedience.
Just like daily governance in the west, sans veils.
For the record I detest Saudi as a regime.
If only because they are an elective monarchy rather than through primogeniture.
It sounds like things have become more liberal.
In the late 1960s, a Western European salesman for my fathers’s firm struck a Saudi woman with his car (she may have died, I don’t recall).
He was sentenced to public amputation of his left arm. The only concession to his government was to allow an embassy visit and they drugged him just before the sentence was carried out.