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mishmumkin · Joined: 01 Sep 2007 Posts: 929

An African-American friend of mine and her family have lived in Saudi before. They left for a contract in Egypt, but they are now considering returning to the Gulf. They had been told that the UAE was more racist than other nations in the region. What's the consensus on this? Which of the Gulf nations, if any, would be considered more tolerant?

007 · Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2008 8:16 pm Post subject: Re: Racism in the Gulf

mishmumkin · Joined: 01 Sep 2007 Posts: 929

veiledsentiments · Joined: 20 Feb 2003 Posts: 17644 Location: USA

As usual, 007 is picking things out of his... imagination.

I can't see any reason why the Wahhabi of Qatar would be more tolerant than those of Saudi.

I'd guess that Oman should be less racist because of the strong links to Africa from their colonies. Many Omanis look very much like African Americans.

VS

Neil McBeath · Joined: 01 Dec 2005 Posts: 277 Location: Saudi Arabia

The American Embassy used to b elieve that, too, VS.

In the 1980's they had a cohort of African-American Marine Corps guards at the Embassy. Six feet tall, bulging with muscles, shimmering with gold chains, they hoped to pass unnoticed along Ruwi High Street.

veiledsentiments · Joined: 20 Feb 2003 Posts: 17644 Location: USA

Thanks for the good laugh Neil. I can very well imagine the depth of their misconceptions. Some things never change. Laughing

Those dudes stand out like sore thumbs in Harlem...

VS

007 · Posted: Wed Feb 27, 2008 12:13 pm Post subject:

(MOD edit for unnecessary political hijack)

helenl · Joined: 04 Jan 2006 Posts: 1202

I agree VS, Omanis are probably the most tolerant to any other ethnicity/nationality of all GCC countries. Not being an African - anything and having only a few colleagues who were all African-African I can speculate that African Americans would experience some discrimination which would mostly disappear (usually) once it was understood they were American rather than African - hopefully there's someone with first hand knowledge who can provide better information

mishmumkin · Joined: 01 Sep 2007 Posts: 929

They are considering moving back to Saudi over the UAE because an African-American friend working in the UAE said he felt the people in the UAE were more racist. I would imagine that one would have much less "exposure" to Emiratis than Saudis, thoughs perhaps his complaint is registered w/ the UAE population overall (not just Emiratis).

007 · Posted: Wed Feb 27, 2008 5:12 pm Post subject: