Double Standard: Foreign Women in Saudi Can Dance in Crop Tops But Local Women Can't?

Despite an exceptional year for Saudi Arabia's social and religious reforms, featuring music festivals throughout the year and granting women more rights than ever, Saudi women have resorted to Twitter to point out that new gender reforms have not included them, especially when it comes to the dress code.

Many Saudi women took to Twitter using the hashtag #استغلال_الذوق_العام_ضد_النسا (using public decency against women) to protest what they is a double standard of new freedoms granted to non-Saudi women in the country.

They reported being fined for not wearing head covers, wearing colored abayas, and for showing their faces, even though Western women in the country have been able to enjoy a much more relaxed dress code, not having to abide by wearing hijabs, abayas, or the face cover. 

Translation: "- Excuse me, you have been fined for violating public decency.

- excuse me, wha...

- Oh she's a foreigner, let her go"

Some Saudi women also posted videos of non-Saudi women dancing at an open-air party in the desert, wondering if this would ever be an option for Saudi women the way it is allowed for foreigners and Saudi men. 

Translation: "Does the Saudi law allow women to dance in KSA, the way it allows non-Saudis and Saudi men? Or is that considered to be against public decency?"

Translation: "How come they only fine Saudi women, while the Lebanese and the non-Saudis dance with men while wearing crop tops and never face consequences? Didn't the crown prince say that nobody is above the law?" 

A few months prior, the Saudi Interior Ministry issued a 'public decency list' that grants policemen the authority to detect violations and levy fines, but Saudi women described it as vague.

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Translation: "Where is the list we are supposed to follow in order for us not to offend the public decency? Or is public decency a subjective matter? Is it only applied to Saudi women? Someone show me the list because public decency differs by region."