I lived and worked openly gay in Saudi Arabia and the UAE for 25 years.

[MADem]

191. So, those people at Amnesty International are a buncha liars? Those people pleading for asylum

here, in Europe, in Canada and elsewhere, who know that if they go home, they die, are just being "hysterical?" ( and quotes are there for a reason).

I think you are mistaking "culture" for something else. The sexes are segregated, there is no "macho man" attitude in that milieu, affection is not something to be feared or rejected; but if you think--for a second--that talking about "being gay" is "OK" in KSA you are horribly mistaken. Again, the individual in charge is NOT gay--the submissive partner, though, might well be (their POV, not mine) . It's a power game as a consequence of sexual urge and non-availability of females owing to sex segregation. Try suggesting that a person engaging in sexual relations in this manner is gay at your own risk.

A lot of people are "gay" in prisons, too. Ask them if they are, though, and they'll tell you otherwise. Just because people engage in homosexual behaviors does not make them gay. Sexuality is not binary, it's sometimes a function of culture, circumstance and opportunity. In sum, one takes what one can get--not necessarily what one might like.

Did you ever stop to think that the people in your small, censored world knew enough to watch their six, not take risks, and keep their mouths shut?

Look, here's my POV--if one single person is "punished" in any way for being the way they are born, then that's just wrong. It can't be excused, it can't be mitigated, it can't be brushed aside as an "Oh well" kind of thing. It is something that is WRONG with that society--and it's not just about gay men, it's about gender segregation, lack of opportunity for women, treatment of women as property, that fosters this society you think is full of happy gay guys (who are simply frustrated heterosexuals, many of them, with no options). You can't kick that under the carpet and then finger wag about how people "don't understand" the conservative/fundamentalist sector of the Arab/Muslim world. They DO understand it, and they understand what the problem is--take half the society and stuff them behind a veil, behind walls, don't educate them to their potential, limit their world view, discourage their self-actualization, limit their movement so that they are unable to interact in larger society, and what you saw (and thought, because of your own perspective, was just dandy) is what you get.

I doubt you'd want to put your money where your mouth was and go back there and make a public announcement to your peers and acquaintances in any compound that you were gay. You wouldn't want to point to this acquaintance or that, and tell them "Say it loud, now brother, you're gay and you're proud!" That'd go over like a lead balloon. You know in your heart that you'd risk your job if not your life if you did anything like that. And I think, if you spend some time ruminating about it, that if Saudi society became more open so that single women and men could interact and make decisions about partnerships, marriage, and social interactions without a lot of censorship, limits, and interference, that all this "happy gay activity" you thought you saw would probably retract to levels that are equivalent to any civilized society where gays are not persecuted.