Samar Al-Mugrin
Al-Jazirah
DESPITE our many confrontations, the human rights organizations — may God guide them — do not want to understand the private nature of our society and how different we are from the rest of the world and other inhabitants of Planet Earth. Even with our closest neighbor in the Gulf, we have so many differences the way Earth is different from Mars. Yet, certain individuals in our society don’t want to understand or realize that there are human rights organizations in countries around the world that influence international decisions that might harm local interests.
Some Saudis don’t want individuals or bodies to improve their image in the eyes of the world. In fact, they insist on distorting this image even further and do everything possible to agitate the world against us intentionally. This is due to the lack of social responsibility and feelings of empathy toward others. These distorters are the reason why we have never had proper infrastructure or institutions that can compete with others on the global stage.
The inability to respect others and the lack of a sense of responsibility, supervision and accountability has put the country and patriotism at the bottom of the priority list of some citizens. A lack of patriotism has led to reckless actions that defame and distort the reputation of Saudis abroad.
Having certain bodies such as the police or the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (Haia) arrest violators in ways that go against human rights is a factor that further erodes the reputation of our country. We have had enough defamation and distortion. For those who care about our image as Saudis and the image of our country internationally we must impose strict penalties on anyone who humiliates a citizen or an expatriate resident while arresting him, irrespective of whether he is guilty or not, because at the end of the day he or she is a human being with dignity and rights.
I recently saw a video clip of a Haia member who was removing a celebrity from a mall in a very humiliating manner. He grabbed the man by the neck and pushed him away in a hateful manner, perhaps out of spite for all the admiring young women who came to pose with the man. I don’t care what the young man did or what the girls did. What I care about is the negative image reflected about my country. Such incidents overshadow the positive aspects of the country. We have to change our ways; it is unacceptable to allow anyone with authority to humiliate people by grabbing them by the neck and kicking them out of public venues simply because they are celebrities and have fans.
The image and reputation of our country is a trust so let us fulfill our duty toward our country and leave people’s necks to their Creator.
