Saudi Arabia's Beheading Culture

This piece which appeared tonight on the CBSNews site reflects the point I was making the other day that within the Arab culture and specifically Saudi Arabia, beheadings are - while not commonplace - not exactly uncommon. The government of Saudi Arabia uses this as state-sanctioned punishment for even non-violent offenses:

The Saudi government beheaded 52 men and one woman last year for crimes including murder, homosexuality, armed robbery and drug trafficking. But Saudis say that while Islam condones the punishment in one context, it condemns militants who decapitated hostages here and in Iraq.

In some respects, this reflects great hypocrisy because while we yell about Saddam's great offenses, against Syria (even though we take some uncharged detainees there to interrogate specifcially because Syria allows extreme measures of interrogation and torture), and against "any country that doesn't observe good human rights principles, our "great friend" Saudi Arabia beheads gays just for being gay.

Likewise, American prisons are considered among the most violent, the most dehumanizing, and some of the worst for actual reform of an individual so they can return to society. We have 5% of the world's population yet more than 25% of the world's prison population.

Sure, someone's going to make the argument that we have so many prisoners because we're too "bleeding heart compassionate" and don't kill the dirty dogs we should. And then I'll probably to tell you to stop listening to Rush Limbaugh for news. What's that saying about not pissing down my leg and telling me it's raining?

We're a violent society with gravely unjust practices that can become more unjust if you don't have enough money, enough powerful connections, enough of the "right look". We, just like the Saudis and just like many of the Israeli practices under men like Sharon, have no right lecturing anyone on human rights until we become less a role model for what not to do to people.

But another similarity between Saudi Arabia and much of the Muslim world and this country is that the extremes of religion (extreme Muslim sects along with extreme right Christian groups) are playing a disproportionately high profile in the policies of the country and the administration of "justice" considering the far more moderate nature of the majority in both major cultures. Church and state don't play well together. One usually tries to dominate the other... and to some degree, it is probably better for society as a whole, when State wins the fight. Today, however, especially under the Bush Administration (II) but certainly not just there, the State doesn't just lose to Church (and again, only specific pools of denominations such as the more extremist Christian right), it leans over, pulls down its pants, and yells, "Sodomize me!"

Our religions.. indeed, even our very individual practices of faith (or choice not to practice)... often differ wildly. [Example: The God I believe in doesn't believe in state-sanctioned death while the God of someone like Ann Coulter believes being left of Rush Limbaugh is cause for the electric chair.] The state.. and society... can't use religion as the common denominator some would like it to be or we see cases where only creationism can be taught in schools, the pledge of Allegiance MUST contain "God", and the life of a woman who is a full, live, contributing human being is far less important than a multi-celled embryo she may carry.