New Dubai and - deeply uncomfortable

Who cares? I wouldn’t go to that shithole of a misogynistic, homophobic, artificial country if you paid me. People who think Dubai is a lovely holiday destination are morons. Seriously, of all the wonderful countries in the world, why would you go to that dump?

I've only been there once and my impression was that the local men were really lecherous. I was walking with ex in jeans/jacket no handholding and got heckled in quite a vicious way. Ex was really alarmed.

Are you sure it was the locals? I've lived in Qatar and spent a lot of time in Dubai and never had anything like that.
It was possibly men from the Asian sub-continent?

I've only been there once and my impression was that the local men were really lecherous. I was walking with ex in jeans/jacket no handholding and got heckled in quite a vicious way. Ex was really alarmed.

That's a brief cameo though. It wouldn't entice me to go back.

While we were there a group of local boys ran around the hotel grounds kicking sand into the faces of guests.

The Indian hotel staff came out. They were too scared to chase the boys but did try and the manager told us he was too frightened to ring the police as he may lose his job and get deported.

That was just one unpleasant incident there were several during our stay, Dubai is awful. The way the locals treat service workers is utterly disgusting and it is not a safe place at all.

I've been all over the world and it is the first place I would never return to.

https://www.detainedindubai.org/resources

This is the reality of Dubai

The comments about the ad seem to me to to relate to relate to their culture, or rules.

But that's not what this thread is about it is about the misleading advert. What are the rules as it is not clear at all!

It's their country, their rules.Though when I did business there I was appalled at the way Indians did all the work whilst locals loafed.

You described the demographic not me, I am probably describing the demographic you work with, 'poverty' isn't just about money, it is poverty of a culturally and educationally enriched life. People absolutely are bothered even if they aren't in your circles.

In Dubai this public show of affection isn't allowed

Yes it is. No-one will stop you holding hands with a partner.

I'm puzzled why people don't understand the OP. They are promoting a couple walking hand in hand while not wearing wedding rings. In Dubai this public show of affection isn't allowed

I work with young people with the exact demographic you are describing and I can tell you that there isnt an appetite to consider the harm that comes to other kids either here or in other countries as long as they're getting their weed or ket

Generally speaking when the issue of drugs are raised, people are very nonchalant about weed in particular but also other class b street drugs even when it is explained that there are children being groomed, abused and exploited for them, they deny this and they always seem to get it from Dave down the road who grows his own. Its amazing how many people just buy it from Dave, no kids or exploitation involved dont you know

The comparative examples would be too endless to list. You are living in cloud cuckoo land of exceptionalism if you think we don’t have a history where people were exploited and within that women where treated as chattels. Hence the reason brides are given away and men ask fathers for permission to marry their daughters. Hence why rape within marriage was still legal until the 80’s or 90’s.

The UK and Europe were colonial powers you created a commercial global slave trade, enacted ethnic cleansing and genocide whilst stripping countries of their assets. And we took everything back home in the form of Fascism, the Nazis and communism. Who if my memory serves me right weren’t big on human and civil rights for anyone but did again put women in their place for special treatment.

One thing that stood out for me is how superficial it is. For CVs, you have to include a photo of yourself and the airline I used to work for would regularly weigh us and do image and uniform inspections before flights. They would put crew on weight management programmes and ground them until they lost the weight. If they didn’t they would be sacked.

I worked for a UK airline in the 90's / 2000s and it was exactly the same here - after returning from maternity leave having gone up a dress size I was told to lose weight and uniforms were not stocked above size 16. Uniform standards were checked every flight and I was once pulled up on not reapplying lipstick enough during a flight - so an industry thing at the time not an emirate's thing.

@Coolasfeck Dubai is rich because it does not pay foreign workers properly.

"Dubai is rich, it can afford to pay and treat foreign workers properly."

@Barbadossunset these people already live in abysmal conditions in their homelands with no chance of making any money at all. They hope to work for a few years for their family's benefit.

The people who are building it are lied to, they've been told there's a job abroad for them but when they het there they're housed in overcrowded sheds, they get their passports taken off them so they can't leave when they realise how hard the job is, working at the height of the day.

I have often read about these appalling conditions for workers in Dubai and they are shocking. However, does word not spread to the workers’ home countries about how terrible conditions are in UAE and put off people from taking jobs there?

Are they, how do you know this? I think you'll find there is a certain demographic of young people that have been forgotten, that are living in poverty, that has been made profoundly worse by 14 years of austerity by the Conservative party, that has been made worse by huge wealth inequality that started under Thatcher and has got worse ever since. I think you'll find many Brits care about wealth inequality as pretty much all societal problems lead back to poverty. Many Brits wouldn't be happy to have strict, draconian rules to control these problems, that has not been the case for a long time, there is a preference for tackling the root of the issues- poverty.

Oh yes, absolutely, I wasn't trying to be flippant about my hand holding comment, actually having looked at the Foreign Office advice it states that kissing in public is frowned upon. I suppose it is odds with the glitzy advert. I have absolutely no interest in going there.

And for those interested just yesterday news run articles on it and how number of Brits in it is rising too

Given we have a thriving modern slavery industry in the UK with regards to drugs running I doubt people are that bothered about whats going on in places like Dubai.

You see it on multiple threads here and in real life whenever the subject of drugs comes up, people shrugging their shoulders and 'its not as bad as alcohol'

Young people in their droves use illegal street drugs, which have all incurred abuse, exploitation, grooming of other children, both here and in other countries.

They're not bothered.

I think this is a simplistic take. I don’t think it’s about Islam at all. If it was you’d see threads about a multitude of Muslim countries, however, you don’t, it’s always Dubai.

I think the reason is because it markets itself as a glitzy Mediterranean type destination when it’s not. People get confused and get into trouble. It’s false advertising.

Slavery, genuine two tier policing in favour of locals, sexism, racism. How can any tourist or ‘ex-pat’ with a conscience pretend they don’t know? I think many people who go to Dubai, want others to shut up so they can pretend they don’t know about this stuff.

What happened with that teen last year hopefully put a ton of young people off ever going. I would not want my kids going there at all. How can you eat your luxury meal in a 6 star hotel fully aware of the slavery? Dubai is rich, it can afford to pay and treat foreign workers properly.

Dubai is a city built on slavery. That new hotel being built? The people who are building it are lied to, they've been told there's a job abroad for them but when they het there they're housed in overcrowded sheds, they get their passports taken off them so they can't leave when they realise how hard the job is, working at the height of the day.

I cannot believe people don't think about that when they go to places like this. It's not just oh we can hold hands no so it must be an OK place to holiday.

LemonTT

At what point in the history of Western Europe were women treated the same way as in those other countries in the region you mention? You say it was before the progress made in 100 years. Do you know anything about the UK and Europe?
The scale and nature of abuse towards women and their lack of human rights isn't comparable to anything we've ever had in Europe.

in what way is Islam matriarchal? You didn’t answer earlier.