Saudi Blogger to be Publicly Flogged for Insulting Islam

[jsteele]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/08/saudi-arabia-blogger-raif-badawi-public-flogging

"A Saudi blogger who was sentenced last May to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes will be publicly flogged for the first time after Friday prayers outside a mosque in the Red Sea coastal city of Jeddah, according to a person close to his case."

"Raif Badawi was sentenced on charges related to accusations that he insulted Islam on a liberal online forum he had created. He was also ordered by the Jeddah criminal court to pay a fine of 1m Saudi riyals, or about $266,000."

Everyone who has been polishing off their free speech credentials should get behind this guy. Of course because Saudi Arabia is a trusted US ally and responsible for the low gas prices we are currently enjoying, he is unlikely to find much support.

[Anonymous]

I think 1,000 lashes is a death sentence. We really need to stop cozying up to the Saudis. They have a product that they really want to sell to us. We don't need to be beholden to them.

[Anonymous]

That ain't nothing.

http://www.newsweek.com/2014/10/24/when-it-comes-beheadings-isis-has-nothing-over-saudi-arabia-277385.html

Behold, Islam. And don't give me any guff about how it's not "real" Islam -- this is what an Islamic state looks like.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think 1,000 lashes is a death sentence. We really need to stop cozying up to the Saudis. They have a product that they really want to sell to us. We don't need to be beholden to them.

They also educated the vast majority of the animals who carried out the 9/11 attacks.

[Anonymous]

And they created ISIS in an attempt to massacre all Shias...

http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/07/15/saudi-complicity-in-the-rise-of-isis/

[Anonymous]

100% percent behind the journalist. Disgusting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That ain't nothing.

http://www.newsweek.com/2014/10/24/when-it-comes-beheadings-isis-has-nothing-over-saudi-arabia-277385.html

Behold, Islam. And don't give me any guff about how it's not "real" Islam -- this is what an Islamic state looks like.

That would be Indonesia. Saudi Arabia is only a tenth the size.

[Anonymous]

I think this is so bizarre and have a hard time with an adult actually would be willing to do this. To me it's so Monty Python - the idea of "flogging". It just makes the Saudis seem so goofy and silly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think this is so bizarre and have a hard time with an adult actually would be willing to do this. To me it's so Monty Python - the idea of "flogging". It just makes the Saudis seem so goofy and silly.

+1

Unless you are the one being flogged of course. Maybe the answer is to mercilessly make fun of them? OH! That's what Charlie Hedbo was trying to do.

[Anonymous]

Yup, behind this guy. If there's a petition I'll sign it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think this is so bizarre and have a hard time with an adult actually would be willing to do this. To me it's so Monty Python - the idea of "flogging". It just makes the Saudis seem so goofy and silly.

Goofy? Silly?? I really think you are seriously unaware of what flogging is. There is nothing funny about it.

[Anonymous]

While I am 100 percent against the decision of the Saudi courts, flogging in Saudi Arabia is not nearly as bad as you might think for a couple of reasons.

1) You are flogged with all your clothes on. You could put any number of layers of foam under your shirt.

2) The flogger must hold a Quran under the arm he is flogging with. This means the flogging is done using the arm from just the elbow down. it is almost impossible to get leverage to deliver a whipping of any strength.

Flogging in Saudi Arabia really amounts to an exercise in public humiliation.

An American embassy counsel in Saudi Arabia I once knew told me that frequently those who are convicted of crimes in Saudi Arabia are given a choice between prison time or flogging, and he always recommended flogging to his American charges. Saudi prisons are pretty bad.

[Anonymous]

I think there are many papalells to 18th Century Mass ( as in Salem). You know, the inhumanity and hypocricy of whipping someone right after you have just finished supposedly spritually renewing yourself ( the Saudi whipping will be right after Fri prayers and done as a public spectacle).

What motivated the Puritans:

fear, ignorance, superstition, did I say fear, astounding levels of ignorance.

I think in Salem, Mass. they put anyone who threatened the powers that be with stockages, accused them of witch craft.

Anyone who threatened them being the operative factor, of course.

The means were primitive ( stoning, burning at stake, tar and feathering, hanging)

but the means matched the tools of the day, and mindset of the day

So, what does it reveal about Saudi society that IN THE 21st Century, its public will turn out to froth at the mouth for a human being being whipped to death in public. This, low level of base human behavior in an age ( 400 years on, mind you) where we have travelled to the moon, know full well that there are no "witches" and that the only evil is in the human heart.

Can we please turn our attention once and for all to solar and green energy and leave Saudi Arabi to evolve ( alone) . Maybe tehy will be ready to join the civilized world in 400 more years, give or take.

How sickening , and how unacceptable that we prop up their government

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:While I am 100 percent against the decision of the Saudi courts, flogging in Saudi Arabia is not nearly as bad as you might think for a couple of reasons.

1) You are flogged with all your clothes on. You could put any number of layers of foam under your shirt.

2) The flogger must hold a Quran under the arm he is flogging with. This means the flogging is done using the arm from just the elbow down. it is almost impossible to get leverage to deliver a whipping of any strength.

Flogging in Saudi Arabia really amounts to an exercise in public humiliation.

An American embassy counsel in Saudi Arabia I once knew told me that frequently those who are convicted of crimes in Saudi Arabia are given a choice between prison time or flogging, and he always recommended flogging to his American charges. Saudi prisons are pretty bad.

You can't get any weirder than " the American Embassy Counsel" …whoever they were . It sounds like S&M to me. Again, it has NOTHING to do with faith, love or God. It is all about demonstrating " we are have power, you have none, now we will kill you for challenging us" It is the essence of barbarism.

An evolved society should be able to withstand some criticism without reflevively needing to humiliate those who question.

As lomg as this goes on , they will remain a backward country. bacward in civil law, backward in economic nd policticla freedom, backward in scientific innovation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:While I am 100 percent against the decision of the Saudi courts, flogging in Saudi Arabia is not nearly as bad as you might think for a couple of reasons.

1) You are flogged with all your clothes on. You could put any number of layers of foam under your shirt.

2) The flogger must hold a Quran under the arm he is flogging with. This means the flogging is done using the arm from just the elbow down. it is almost impossible to get leverage to deliver a whipping of any strength.

Flogging in Saudi Arabia really amounts to an exercise in public humiliation.

An American embassy counsel in Saudi Arabia I once knew told me that frequently those who are convicted of crimes in Saudi Arabia are given a choice between prison time or flogging, and he always recommended flogging to his American charges. Saudi prisons are pretty bad.

From the accounts I've read, flogging is much worse than you are portraying it to be. Victims are checked to be sure they have no more than one layer of clothes on. And multiple lashes, even with a Quran under the arm, really tears up the back.

I cannot imagine living for six months knowing that you are going to go through this torture weekly. This is horrific.