http://abcnews.go.com/International/dutch-woman-allegedly-raped-qatar-sentenced-adultery-allowed/story?id=39816386

Religion of peace FTW! I still don't get why anyone from the western world would ever travel to the Middle East as a civilian. It will be interesting to see how full the stadiums will be at the 2022 World Cup.

6/13/2016 7:31:48 PM

wrong thread. this should be in the reasonable rape thread.

6/13/2016 7:41:46 PM

^This article is more about Sharia Law and the wackos in the middle east.

6/13/2016 8:01:45 PM

That's fucked up. I have already bitched about it in strong terms on some Gulf newspapers' comments sections.

That made me think:

If a woman in the US says she was raped but there is zero evidence of any type, and the man says it was consensual, what would be done? I guess he would be let go, right?

(Not saying that applies here, because I haven't read anything about on what basis the judge decided that it was consensual. Was a rape kit used, or any other DNA evidence collected? Was her blood tested for drugs? No details, unfortunately.)

6/13/2016 8:02:11 PM

if there's zero evidence i would hope a person would be acquitted of a charge... for any crime.
rapists rank right up there with the worst human beings on the planet in my book, but conviction of a crime needs more than a single person's words

[Edited on June 13, 2016 at 9:36 PM. Reason : typing ]

6/13/2016 9:36:09 PM

Right, but even lacking evidence they can be convicted, just takes a very convincing victim. Lacking that, it sometimes requires a pattern of behavior, such as he has been charged with rape several times before.

As for this thread, I guess Quatar's law has no exception for rape when it comes to the adultery statutes? Or did they just not believe her? Maybe they're afraid all women would just cry rape whenever their adultery was relieved if there was an exception.

6/13/2016 10:01:20 PM

Quote :

"If a woman in the US says she was raped but there is zero evidence of any type, and the man says it was consensual, what would be done? I guess he would be let go, right?"

Well she wouldn't be stoned to death like in one country. We know that much.

6/13/2016 10:11:00 PM

^Exactly! I still don't get why people from the west would travel to those places though. By now everyone should know they have some crazy laws and terrorist groups in the general area.

6/14/2016 12:52:08 PM

Yeah, Qatar is known for its rampant terrorism.

There is more domestic terrorism in America than fucking Qatar.

Do you enjoy being this ignorant?

(And has abhorrent as this case is you probably have a higher chance of being choked out by an overzealous police officer in NYC than have this happen to you)

[Edited on June 14, 2016 at 12:55 PM. Reason : X]

6/14/2016 12:54:24 PM

^I'll take my chances here in the west.

6/14/2016 12:59:30 PM

Qatar is well known for its rampant funding of terrorism. They were one OBL's main funders. They funded and protected al-Zarqawi and AQI. They give hundreds of millions to Hamas.

I mean I guess they don't have a lot of bombings within the borders, so that's cool. but Qatar and radical jihad go together like lamb and tuna fish.

[Edited on June 14, 2016 at 1:06 PM. Reason : .]

6/14/2016 1:04:32 PM

No major terrorist attacks since 2005. It's a pretty safe place all things considered.

6/14/2016 1:15:14 PM

I went to Qatar for a few months. I had a good time. Intel briefings showed that there was less crime in Doha than on base, haha.

It's a weird and interesting place.

I'd go back to anywhere in the Middle East tomorrow and enjoy myself just for the hell of it, as long as it was somewhere fairly safe and secure. It's a fascinating place.

[Edited on June 14, 2016 at 8:14 PM. Reason : ^^ there have been a lot of Qatari dinars finding their way to terrorist coffers]. The society is relatively moderate, though.

[Edited on June 14, 2016 at 8:16 PM. Reason : ^^^ why? Go broaden your fucking horizons if you want to have an opinion on everydamnthing]

6/14/2016 8:13:13 PM

Qatar is so oil rich that its citizens don't have to work. Any actual labor is performed by poor people from other countries who are practically slaves.

It's not surprising that most tourists think it's a neat, safe place.

But, if anything, the fact that this happened in such a wealthy, educated place should be a sign that maybe--just maybe--there might be something a little off with Islam.

And I think it's possible that there's something about Islam that doesn't jibe with our Western ideals. I would never vote for a politician who wanted to ban Muslims, and I'm certainly not scared of anything. I value religious freedom in a major way because I was raised explicitly agnostic. If we didn't have religious freedom, I woulda voted to burn all people of faith at the stake just for being annoying. So I understand in a very personal way how easy it is to despise someone for what they believe, and I see very clearly how religious hatred is bad, bad, bad.

But it does frustrate me that our religious freedom and tolerance is precisely why we need to accept some people who so proudly do not value religious freedom or tolerance.

And I dunno...I can't do the mental gymnastics on this stuff that y'all can. My aunt was in the hospital dying, and her final wishes were essentially: "Don't let him take her back to Iran. She will be his slave." Of course, he tried. My progressive, educated, "Westernized" uncle tried to take her back to Iran to be his servant. My people had to embark on a campaign of shame and threaten his reputation until he finally gave up custody.

He did go back, by the way, and he took his son with him. My cousin is a decidedly disaffected young man, and we thought he intended to stay in Tehran and start a new life. But he returned to the states shortly. And you can relax, Big4Country. He's not a potential terrorist. He just really loves drugs.

6/15/2016 11:37:37 AM

I can't comment on Qatar on whether it's a shitty country or not, but we just let a guy who committed multiple felonies of sexual assault/rape off with a 6 months sentence that will end up being 3 months in jail. There was a case recently where a cop raping citizens was given no jail time. We had an issue at BYU where female students reporting rape were then punished academically. Spousal rape is still not completely illegal in some areas in the US.

If you judged us by single legal incidents, we're a shitty, violent, rapey culture and society too. But it doesnt make sense to judge us this way, and I don't see how it makes sense to judge another country that way.

6/15/2016 12:18:45 PM

Only doing 3 months in jail for raping someone is bad

Doing 3 months in jail for BEING RAPED is much worse

6/15/2016 2:13:23 PM

^This!

IIRC, Qatar is ranked pretty low on the human rights list. I would rather go some place where there is a little more respect for human rights.

6/15/2016 8:02:07 PM

Well ok, I get that argument. I would have some qualms about spending my vacation dollars to fuel the economy of a place that is dirty in a lot of ways from a humanity perspective...but they're not Iran...or Saudi Arabia...and we all still drive cars.

If you want to talk about their imported labor, then it's also true that it's an ugly system...but it's also an opportunity for people in destitute places, mostly around the Indian subcontinent.

There are a lot of things there, and throughout the gulf states, that aren't good, but they also aren't totally simple.

Quote :

"Qatar is so oil rich that its citizens don't have to work. Any actual labor is performed by poor people from other countries who are practically slaves."

More natural gas, although some oil...but yes, richest per capita in the world, for their actual citizens, last time I checked. Average of about $750k/year. When I was there, they got a stipend from the gov't of about $10k/month just to breathe...and the whole society is a fucking racket in their favor.

This could be its own thread. Like I said, it's an interesting place.

6/16/2016 12:42:00 AM

LOL, you're being so uppity.

6/16/2016 10:15:58 AM

"Look how cool I am I've been to Qatar and know all these obscure facts"

6/16/2016 10:27:43 AM

And most of the facts are not even obscure!

Thanks to FIFA and the World Cup, there's been at least two straight years of continuous reporting on Qatar's economy and its treatment of migrant workers.

And he literally just repeated my remarks back to me, which makes me so . Then, topped it all off with a "Like I said..." Uppity mother fucker.

6/16/2016 10:51:15 AM

Per capita GDPs in today's world don't go higher than ~$130k for any country. $750k would cause a black hole to appear where the country is. If talking about per capita income, again, $750k is an unimaginable amount. And from what I remember, Qatar is in top 3-5 in nominal per capita GDP, and top in PPP per capita GDP.

As for this case, the woman was found guilty of illegal consensual sex and given a suspended 1 year sentence, and will be deported soon. The man was found guilty of the same and of being drunk in public, and sentenced to 140 lashes.

I am still failing to find any reports which explain on what basis the judge deemed it consensual and not forced. If someone does, please post. There was a case last year in Dubai involving a young Norwegian woman, with the exact same verdict, even though she said she was raped by a business colleague while she was inebriated.

6/16/2016 11:51:36 PM

Quote :

"the woman was found guilty of illegal consensual sex"

6/17/2016 12:08:47 AM

Your point?

6/17/2016 12:25:35 AM

That Qatar is fucked up if consensual sex among willing adults is illegal?

6/17/2016 12:29:15 AM

Sure. And so are the dozens of other countries with the same law.

6/17/2016 12:32:30 AM

Dozens implies 24 or more. Are there really 24 countries that jail women for consensual sex? What a backwards region of the world as far as civil rights, obviously.

6/17/2016 12:43:15 AM

Quote :

"Only doing 3 months in jail for raping someone is bad Doing 3 months in jail for BEING RAPED is much worse"

If any woman is raped and then punished for it, I can't think of a worse miscarriage of justice, and indeed, a worse form of oppression, than that. However, she was not imprisoned, thankfully. It is still inexcusable, as she was found guilty of adultery and for some unknown reason her story was not believed, but his was.

This is just as bad, though, and dare I say, worse:

https://www.change.org/p/dear-ncaa-create-a-policy-that-bans-violent-athletes

Quote :

"What I do know is that my mom was drugged and gang-raped by four football players in 1998. I know that Oregon State University gave two of them 25 hours community service and Coach Mike Riley gave them a one-game suspension. I know that the police threw away her rape kit and the DA lied to her about her case. I know that Oregon State cared more about football and money than my mom. I know that my mom wanted to kill herself, and I know that she almost did. And all because other people decided that football, money and reputation was more important than me and my brother having a mother."

http://www.oregonlive.com/sports/oregonian/john_canzano/index.ssf/2014/12/canzano_oregonian_investigatio_1.html

And don't tell me that's not "business as usual". We all know this keeps happening in the US again and again, every single year. And that's just the cases we hear about. The fact that it goes against the law is exactly zero consolation to the victims, and in fact, an insult to their injury.

[Edited on June 20, 2016 at 11:12 AM. Reason : ]

6/20/2016 11:12:27 AM

^There is a difference between following/not following your legal system laws when investigating/hearing a case and actually having laws that let men get away with rape.

6/20/2016 7:39:50 PM

^^ There are procedures in place for such miscarriages. Call the feds and have them prosecute the corrupt locals for civil rights violations. But, sometimes criminals get away with violating just laws. The solution is not to twist just laws until they become unjust. But in the case mentioned in the original thread there was no miscarriage, the unjust law was implemented as written.

[Edited on June 21, 2016 at 11:16 AM. Reason : .,.]

6/21/2016 11:15:42 AM

Quote :

"I can't think of a worse miscarriage of justice, and indeed, a worse form of oppression, than that. "

This is why you don't go to countries like this. Always kills me when I read about some dumb ass visiting a country like North Korea then pleading for help when they arrest and imprison him.

If you don't want to deal with shit like this then don't go to these awful places. It's absolutely awful that laws like this exist but you aren't going to change it so just don't go.

6/29/2016 10:57:32 PM