Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-v5vhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-01T19:32:06.117Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

THE SAUDI PUBLIC SPEAKS: RELIGION, GENDER, AND POLITICS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 March 2006

Mansoor Moaddel
Affiliation:
Professor of sociology at Eastern Michigan University, Ypsilanti, Mich. 48197, USA, and Research Affiliate at the Population Studies Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich. 48108, USA; e-mail: mmoaddel@umich.edu

Extract

The fact that fifteen of the nineteen terrorists who attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 11 September 2001 were Saudi citizens inevitably raised serious questions about the social conditions that have produced such violent personalities capable of the mass taking of innocent lives and devastating an entire city, if not a nation. Answers were quick to come by, as the U.S. media pointed to the Saudi culture. Charges were made that the youth were brainwashed by the most extremist school in Islam, namely, Wahhabism. The Saudi educational institutions were also blamed for promoting anti-Semitism, anti-Western attitudes, and intolerance of other religions. Saudi society was also condemned for having a corrupt and backward political system. Naturally, in this land of intolerance and authoritarianism, resorting to violence by its inhabitants became a foregone conclusion.

Type
ARTICLES
Copyright
© 2006 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)