Strategic Media Usage: Saudi Women 1, Jordan Times 0

Some women in Saudi Arabia made a video of themselves driving on a main highway in the Kingdom. They then posted it on Youtube- 13 hours ago. CNN and BBC are mad Youtube savvy!



Across the desert (uh, literally, unless you rented a boat at the red sea and drifted north), a French national has been sentenced to three months in jail in Jordan for verbally insulting King Abdullah. I read about it here in the BBC.

In search of a more in depth story, I went to the Jordan Times homepage. Nothing! I even searched for French both today and last week. Not one word. Not a peep.

The Saudi women have done something pretty cool as far as using media strategically as a tool for social change. The Jordan Times, well, you can read more about my frustration with the Jordan Times here.

I mentioned also in my previous posts slamming the Jordan Times that I expect better from them than to ignore abuses of fundamental human rights. The reason is this: the Jordan Times has actually done plenty in the past to bring about social change in Jordan precisely through its reporting. The Jordan Times was the first newspaper in Jordan to begin covering the trials of honor crimes perpetrators. Rana Husseini attended trial after trial to simply report in the newspaper about how crimes against women (mostly, sometimes men) go unpunished and are thus allowed to continue. Due almost entirely to her reporting, Jordanian society became appalled with the way the legal system was dealing with honor crimes (because really it isn't something that normal people can accept, no matter what you've heard about scary Arab men- honor killings also happen in Brazil, Italy, and in diverse societies all over the world), and things are actually changing. I have utmost respect for Rana Husseini and the Jordan Times for printing her work.

So, this is why the lack of reporting on abuses of Filipina workers in Jordan, and on this poor bastard who's gonna sit in jail for the next three months because of some words he spoke, frustrates me to no end.