To be disgusted with Qatars assault on these women?

[ChristmasStocckings]

I'm honestly shocked at how these poor women have been treated and my heart breaks for them. How on earth did anyone think that this was ok? No one should be forced to have an examination that they did not consent too. There is no excuse for this behaviour.

www.news.com.au/travel/travel-updates/incidents/doha-dfat-registers-serious-concerns-after-women-pulled-off-plane-strip-searched/news-story/f4eb941d267c2211605238a574935995

@MangoFeverDream Perhaps you misread or misunderstood: women used to be prosecuted for extramarital sex if they were raped. This is no longer the case, as the specific clause around this is no longer applied. It has been decriminalised in Abu Dhabi. Your article is not relevant to the issue at hand.

I have acknowledged that the region has a long way to go, while you continue to try and ignore the significant progress made in just a few years. It’s a shame that you want so badly to distract from the poor women who were assaulted in Qatar. How disappointing.

@mumwon

with respect lack of information here we have no idea from scant info as to whether the woman gave birth in the toilet cubicle or transported baby & abandoned it there (carried in bag its been done & nb! could be done by male in this case - maybe extreme family poverty & the mistaken hope of rich western taking baby?) Its all speculation

Either way, anyone criticising the woman for passing on her trauma to the baby needs to tell us exactly what option she had that might've avoided this.

I have acknowledged that the region has a long way to go, while you continue to try and ignore the significant progress made in just a few years

There’s been little progress. Plus, that article wasn’t addressed to you, someone else mentioned it in a previous comment and I linked to it (they thought it took place in Qatar but was actually the UAE).

It’s a shame that you want so badly to distract from the poor women who were assaulted in Qatar. How disappointing

I have not and do not. I pointed out that all these regimes are horrible when it comes to
women’s rights. To me, this is just the latest iteration to come from the GCC. Maybe Saudi is the absolute worst, but the UAE does not set the bar much higher either.

You seem curiously intent on saying it’s only Qatar that’s like this, when clearly they ALL have huge problems.

I mean, you clearly seem to live in the UAE, you absolutely know this. But I guess you just have the right passport, don’t you?

Australia is a pretty "right passport"

@MangoFeverDream Whataboutism within a region still distracts from those women’s experience. Please stop minimising their experience for the sake of point scoring in a context you aren’t fully informed about.

I have been very clear this is a systemic issue in the GCC. You brag about achievements of the UAE and Saudi Arabia (as IF they are any different) in this thread, which not only detracts from this individual case, it is a hard slap in the face to any woman surviving (not thriving like you) in these countries.

Fact is, this woman would have been jailed along with her baby in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, Kuwait ... the list goes on.

It’s a shame that you want so badly to distract from the poor women who were assaulted in Qatar. How disappointing

Context is entirely relevant.

You're being disingenuous (or deliberately obtuse).

with respect lack of information here we have no idea from scant info as to whether the woman gave birth in the toilet cubicle or transported baby & abandoned it there (carried in bag its been done & nb! could be done by male in this case

It is not impossible.

Though keeping a new born quiet and getting then through security in a bag, especially the latter, is doubtful.

I'm presuming these were departure terminal toilets (?) So they had to have gone through security. (And obviously also had a flight booked). They could have carried the baby under clothes in a wrap I suppose. But security would still be a big risk.

Even if it were done by a male (unlikely), it still shows a couple in this position because of Qatari law regarding sex and births outside marriage.

And the subsequent violation of female passengers human rights, privacy, dignity etc. remains the same.

As another poster said, if a another country's airport authority had done this to women from an Islamic state, their embassies would be burned to the ground by now.

Anyway - to the apologists and minimisers; don't worry, I'm sure there are hundreds of people scrutinising every second of CCTV in that airport to identify who went into the toilet the baby was found in and their subsequent movements and maybe they'll be extradited to "pay" properly for their crimes or having sex or being raped outside marriage and abandoning a baby in utter desperation to avoid arrest etc.

As another poster said, if a another country's airport authority had done this to women from an Islamic state, their embassies would be burned to the ground by now.

What about the link I posted upthread about Muslim woman who was forced to pull her pants down in Boston when she she was on her period and not allowed a lawyer? Why were no embassies burnt then?

@friendsoftheearth, all I can say is that mine and my daughters experience of Qatar in no way resembles yours and your daughters - I could post photos of my grandaughter playing in shorts and t-shirts, and she is not much younger than yours, but that would be inappropriate. Covering arms to elbows and legs to knees is not what I would term forced to cover up - a sensible precaution with regard to the sun I would have thought. They have to wear headscarves for work but not when out shopping

I have asked them again just now whether they feel safe in Qatar, whether they drive alone at nighttime and the answer is yes they do feel safe and yes they do drive alone at night. Mind you it gets dark at about 6 so they don't have a lot of choice most of the time.

But maybe they have lived in very shitty inner UK cities if they consider Qatar safe!

However this is derailing the thread somewhat so I'll back away.

And again I do not condone the abuse of any women/girl in whatever country they live in

Those posters who seem to think this treatment is fine how would you feel if it was your mum, sister, nan or daughter? They were returning home and through no fault of their own (except for their sex and biology) they were forced to be internally examined.

Where did we start losing kindness, respect and humanity?

You can see posts like never whom state their dd and gds are there and it is all fine, you have to wonder if she has actually been there herself and seen the prison like settlements her dd will be living in, the fact she has to be chauffeured everywhere sounds glamorous doesn't it, but in reality there is no freedom or safety for women there

I feel I should say something here. Firstly I am extremely disappointed and disgusted at what happened, there is no excuse and I' m not going to attempt to make one, they need to sort their shit out.

But the above is not true. There certainly are cases where things can go badly wrong for wome there but in general it's a very safe environment (if you ignore the batshit driving). Many people live on compounds with walls and security but it's more of a privacy/exclusivity thing, the actual crime rate is incredibly low.

Of course women drive by themselves! I didn't imagine my friends an neigbours doing the school run daily, for one thing. Or women driving themselves to work.

I went out and about myself, it was absolutely fine. There's not much scope for walking around apart from very specific areas just because it's very much a big roads and big cars culture and the driving is fucking awful, but there's a metro now so that's probably improved a bit.

Those posters saying it is safe for women to travel around on their own. Even our foreign office advises women to take care out there.

I can’t imagine a daughter living in Quater really telling their mum the truth that actually they can’t go out on their own in the dark. Whatever we think about the Uk women can still go out and in 99.9% of the time are safe.

I can’t imagine a daughter living in Quater really telling their mum the truth that actually they can’t go out on their own in the dark

I wouldn't go out on my own in the dark in Scotland either though? I mean I'd go out to meet friends by myself at night in a taxi or whatever, and that's the same as what I did in Doha.

@Orcus I am concerned about
the baby
the mother
the women who were assaulted as I stated in pp
I put in links with guardian articles about what had happened to the women, mentions about the issue of not knowing who else had been affected the reason why this older woman was the only one to have given interview to the papers (imagine giving an interview after this if you had been through this) by the by she witnessed the girls (her term!) going into the ambulance & also she along with them were interviewed after this. Apparently the women were together on the bus when they arrived in Sydney (on route to their isolation hotel) & it was than reported to the authorities. The police have been informed &they are investigating & the embassy has been complained to by Australian Government officially. Within one of these articles it mentions other women of other nationalities were affected &, I repeat, we have no idea of the ethnic or religious background of the Australian women/girls - its a multicultural country
www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/25/australia-demands-answers-after-women-taken-from-qatar-airways-flight-and-strip-searched
www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/26/i-was-absolutely-terrified-australian-witness-recounts-qatar-strip-search-ordeal

What about the link I posted upthread about Muslim woman who was forced to pull her pants down in Boston when she she was on her period and not allowed a lawyer? Why were no embassies burnt then?

Most likely because she's an American citizen.

Are fundamental Muslims going to attack American Embassies over an American woman (who incidentally as a highly educated professor at an American Uni is not exactly confirming to fundamentalist views regarding female roles)?

In any case, her search was because the official felt padding at her crotch and wanted to confirm definitively it was not something illicit/potentially dangerous. She explained she had her period and it was sanpro but they wanted to confirm that, which is not totally beyond the realm of reasonable behaviour in a country that has suffered terrorist attacks on planes. Obviously she is being profiled because she is Muslim and she is also an extremely unlikely candidate to be a terrorist, but the first question if another attack/incident happened in a plane or at an airport would be why the person was not thoroughly searched.

I don't know if it's normal for her to be denied having a legal representative present at a search in the US.

She is legally pursuing a case for a pattern ongoing harassment when leaving & entering her home country (US).

The circumstances are very different from this mass examination of women to try to catch a new mother and arrest her. But as other posters have said you're just tripping over yourself with your whataboutery.

*Mass vulva/vaginal examination of women

You wouldn't go out after dark in Scotland?

Wow. That's a bit odd.

It's a whole country!

And it gets dark pretty early in the winter so you wouldn't be able to do most jobs... That's very odd.

Reminds me of s woman who claimed she'd never been out after dark in the UK by herself in her entire life!

She certainly had a case about her harassment as an American Muslim at American airports, but more that she has considerable scope for pursuing that legally in the US ...

What rights do these women have against Qatar - their governments making shocked and disapproving noises while nothing is actually ever done because Qatar controls so much of the world's fossil fuel energy.

*note that she has considerable scope

(This is in reference to the Muslim woman whose underwear/sanpro was examined at Boston airport).

You wouldn't go out after dark in Scotland?

I think you're taking what I said a bit literally. Of course I'd commute etc, yes it certainly does get dark very early here in winter. I mean I wouldn't walk around by myself at night unless it was an obviously safe, busy area. I wouldn't walk home alone from a pub or club.

In other words, exactly how I approached things in Doha.

As I said, I'm in no way defending the incident in question, it was a fucking disgrace. But day to day living there was not scary or difficult.

@GilbertMarkham

She certainly had a case about her harassment as an American Muslim at American airports, but more that she has considerable scope for pursuing that legally in the US ...

What rights do these women have against Qatar - their governments making shocked and disapproving noises while nothing is actually ever done because Qatar controls so much of the world's fossil fuel energy.

You think the US would do anything about a Muslim woman being debased by airport security? I’m afraid you have no concept what’s happening there if you think that.