12 year old girl stops Saudi soccer match

Arab News:

She wasn’t a hooligan, but she might as well have been for all the match-interrupting trouble she caused by daring to attend a free sporting event. According to yesterday’s Al-Watan newspaper, a free football match at a public stadium here was stopped in the 36th minute in order for stadium officials to order a 12-year-old girl out, because apparently the presence of a girl at a sporting event is offensive to people who don’t have better things about which to complain and get self-righteous. Before the game started, one particularly offended referee refused to start the game with the indecency of a female child attending the match. Another more rational referee dismissed his colleague’s concern and managed to get the game started. Later, however, stadium management decided to stop the game and asked the girl’s relatives to escort her out. The sporting event had been billed as a free community event, but apparently “free” and “community” only refers to half of the population — the ones who were born male.

It appears that someone at the Arab News had the same reaction to this insanity that I did. Maybe there is some reason for optimism about the Saudis after all. Not in the reaction of the idiots in the stands, but in the reaction to the news by the paper, which is a semi official media organ.