"Saudi Arabia Moves Backward" Huh? You mean more backward, don't you?

Stephen Suleyman Schwartz is an American journalist, columnist, and author. In 1997 he became a Muslim and then suddenly became a vocal critic of Islamic Fundamentalism, especially in the form of the Wahhabi sect of Sunni Islam. He is seen by many as "a Trojan horse for Islam", so keep that in mind when reading his article.

Suleyman july22
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Finally and most importantly, Abdullah had taken steps to curb the notorious mutawiyin, usually mislabeled a “religious police” by foreign observers, and to make them accountable for their frequent abuse of ordinary people.

In reality, the mutawiyin are not a police agency, but a paramilitary body similar to the Iranian Basij who spy on citizens in totalitarian countries like Cuba and China. The mutawiyin patrol the Saudi streets to enforce the rigid pseudo-moralistic habits prescribed by Wahhabism, the Saudi state religion. They accost couples they suspect of being unmarried; they arrest women who drive vehicles, and beat, with leather-covered sticks, women who allow a thin margin of the abaya, a garment covering the whole body, to slip, exposing an ankle; they harass vendors of allegedly heretical or subversive books; they raid homes where they suspect liquor is consumed; they walk the streets of the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, preventing Shia and Sufi pilgrims from engaging in prayers of which the Wahhabis disapprove… and they kill people.
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Quote 2
Saudi prince Al-Waleed Bin Talal, a nephew of Abdullah, has not been popular in America since New York mayor Rudy Giuliani correctly returned his attempted gift of $10 million after 9/11. In 2007, Al-Waleed donated $1.48 million to the Islamic Society of North America, the representative institution for “official Islam,” oriented toward Wahhabism, in the U.S. But during Abdullah’s reign, Al-Waleed also positioned himself as a critic of the establishment, especially its policies toward women.
His media company, Rotana, produced a comedy film titled Manahi, which was shown to excited crowds in Jeddah. But in accord with Wahhabi writ, movies are banned in Saudi Arabia; the mutawiyin condemned the film, with Nayef’s backing, and on Saturday, July 17, the Jeddah Film Festival, sponsored by Rotana, was cancelled. Such incidents may appear trivial to the outsider, but inside Saudi Arabia, minor frictions may produce great flames of protest.
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