Gulf states develop amazing new biomedical technology


First off, I must mention that these states are awful, evil, terrible places under the thumb of an obsolete religious morality.

Those under the age of 21 living in Kuwait found to be taking part in homosexual acts currently face prison sentences of up to ten years. Homosexual acts are banned in all GCC member countries, which include Saudi Arabia, Oman and the United Arab Emirates.

Earlier this week Oman suspended their newspaper The Week, alleging it had printed an article that was considered sympathetic towards homosexuals.

Homosexuality is illegal in 78 countries across the world and is still punishable by death in five countries, which include Iran and Yemen and Saudi Arabia.

But despite their repressive social policies, they must have made an astonishing scientific breakthrough.

Yousouf Mindkar said routine clinical screenings of expatriates entering Gulf Cooperation Countries (GCC) such as Kuwait would be introduced under new proposals. Persons who are identified as LGBT through the tests would then be refused entry into the country.

Whoa. They have clinical screenings for the Gay? I would like to know about those, but they aren’t giving out the details. I hope it’s not that fuzzy digit length stuff, or lie detector tests, because they don’t work. But something that can unambiguously detect what sex a person finds attractive would be really interesting.

They couldn’t possibly be lying about this, could they? Those government officials from the GCC all sound so rational.

MP Mohammad Al Jabri called on the Kuwati authorities to clamp down on Amnesty itself, ‘I condemn the brazen requests by an organization that introduces itself as a protector of freedoms and human rights,’ Al Jabri said.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs should respond urgently to the so-called Amnesty International to highlight the noble Islamic principles, values and teachings in which the people of Kuwait believe and which reject the propagation of vice and debauchery in the community.”

Retired MP Mohammad Al Hayef accused Amnesty International of “interlacing honey with poison” and suggest that gay people “destroy humanity”.

He told Al Rai “It should have reinforced the slogan of human rights and the defense of the oppressed, not confuse issue[s] and interlace honey with poison so that one of its officials dares to encourage behavior that is against the human nature and clashes with the teachings of all apostles. Deviant behavior and attitudes undermine and destroy humanity.”

Don’t they sound nice? They’d be right at home in Texas or Washington DC. I guess we can expect our Republicans to follow suit on this important issue any day now.

The Kuwait Times reported earlier on Wednesday that coffee shops which allow men and women to drink together “corrupt morals” according to Kuwaiti MPs.

I wonder if there is a clinical test in the wings to determine whether someone has shared coffee with a person of a different sex, and I wonder if it will be sensitive enough to detect whether you’ve had coffee with a gay person.

Comments

  1. Thomathy, Gay Where it Counts says

    From an unfortunate time in the history of Canada, let me suggest that the GCC is planning to usefruit machines.

    I’m surprised that the GCC is 50 years late to that particular party. With a fruit machine you can abuse, humiliate and discover homosexuals all at once.

  2. Thomathy, Gay Where it Counts says

    From an unfortunate time in the history of Canada, let me suggest that the GCC is planning to use fruit machines.

    I’m surprised that the GCC is 50 years late to that particular party. With a fruit machine you can abuse, humiliate and discover homosexuals all at once.

  3. frog says

    Well of course it can detect if you’ve had coffee with a gay person! What a silly question!

    I understand they’re developing new techniques to test if your house was ever owned by a gay person, but currently they’re getting a lot of false positives if the house ever was serviced by a gay plumber or housepainter. This is leading to a lot of burned-down houses. They better get to testing the firefighters.

  4. Dunc says

    I wouldn’t be at all surprised if they’ve spent several million dollars on updated versions of the notorious ADE 651 “bomb detectors”, which turned out to be dowsing rods…

  5. says

    See, LGBT people give off particles known as anti-heterons. These anti-heterons are able to be picked up on certain devices, I suppose “gaydar” is a good way to put it (although as stated, LBT individuals also give off anti-heterons.)

    It’s been a known technology for years, I’m surprised you haven’t heard of this.

  6. george gonzalez says

    Well, it’s obvious. They have a room with a big banner “WAITING ROOM BEFORE ENTERING THE TEST ROOM. PLEASE PICK UP TWO NUMBER 2 PENCILS AND SIT DOWN TO WAIT”

    The pencils come in army-camo color and in a tasteful chartreuse.

    The waiting room has piles of magazines, just “Maxim”, “Popular Mechanics”, “Marie Claire”, “Architectural Digest” and “GQ”.

    Guys seen picking up camo pencils and Maxim or PM and gals choosing “Marie Claire” and chartreuse pencils get waved through into the country.

    Everybody else gets tortured until they confess.

    Do I have to do all the thinking for you people?

  7. carlie says

    So you can’t spend any time with people of opposite gender, because it’s immoral.
    You also can’t spend time with people of the same gender, because that’s gay.

    Um…

  8. says

    Homosexuality is illegal in 78 countries across the world and is still punishable by death in five countries, which include Iran and Yemen and Saudi Arabia.

    In defence of Islam (including the most fanatical – at least historically), I would like to point out that, aside from Saudi Arabia, killing fellow muslims – gay or not – has been a big no-no for several centuries. It is only recently that Islam’s criminal penalties have been enforced. It started in the 1920’s in Saudi Arabia and 50 years later in Libya, Pakistan and Iran. Historically, for all their fiery condemnations, Islam has been very much free of state sponsored murder. That is very much a recent invention.

    (To give one an idea of how restrained Islam has been:until the recent upstarts (murdering for purely political gain), there was only one recorded death penalty for religious reasons in the whole time of the whole of the Ottoman Empire (stoning) and only one in Syria (stoning). The stoning in Syria occurred 300 years before Mohammad, by the Romans, in order to rid themselves of a pesky christian. It is only in recent times that Islamic culture has been infested with the gory innovation of murdering others for godly point-scoring. The islamists of today are entirely and utterly different to those of the last century and before.)

  9. Erp says

    Though figuring out the LGB would be a problem since I doubt people would admit it, I worry whether any male detected as HIV+ would be treated as gay (though HIV+ might already be excluded). Will they use other pseudo science detection methods? Unfortunately transgender people could often be detected if they’ve undergone surgery (a man who is XX or a woman who is XY). If they are doing genetic testing they may also find people who don’t realize that their genetic sex is not they same as their physical appearance (and if those people are already resident in those countries I hope they get out safely).

  10. sqlrob says

    Dunc @4:

    That was my first thought when I saw the recent articles.

    Am I a bad person for hoping, that if this gets implemented, some of the upper level muckety-mucks are tagged by the “technology”?

  11. drken says

    For some reason I keep thinking screening will go like this:

    “If your hand is bigger than your face, you’re gay”
    *THWACK!*
    “Ha, ha, just kidding, move along”
    “If your hand is bigger than your face, you’re gay”
    *THWACK!*
    “Ha, ha, just kidding, move along”
    etc….

  12. tomtethys says

    ‘Deviant behavior and attitudes undermine and destroy humanity’
    Something has certainly undermined Mr Al Hayefs humanity.
    What a disgusting, deranged human, no matter what his cause or religion.

  13. coffeehound says

    @ # 5,

    It’s been a known technology for years, I’m surprised you haven’t heard of this.

    Well, yeah,everyone knows that but i thought that the antiheterometer was not yet ready for prime time.
    At least until they had a choice of 15 fabulous colors and a sequins option.

  14. bushrat says

    I’m sorry, since it’s scientific and all, shouldn’t we be addressing it as “Teh Ghey!”.

  15. futurechemist says

    @16

    Show tune medleys playing in the waiting room. If you hum along they shoot you.

    Careful with that idea. If we go purely based on stereotypes, that would catch both the LGBT and Jewish communities, which would be a bonus for these countries.

  16. skaduskitai says

    The test isn’t exactly a biological one. It’s more a breakthrough in behavioral psychology. I’ve heard that any male entering the country simply has to go through a test of interior design. If the room looks faboulus after the test then obviously the guy is gay and must be punished. The tests are done on real locations so that the states can provide some public service for their obviously uniformly heterosexual population at the same time as figuring out who is gay.

  17. Azuma Hazuki says

    @5/Kevin

    Actually, the problem here is that there are particles for three sexual orientations. Let us call them yaoion, yurion, and heteron. These people think 1) heterons annihilate when they come in contact with the other force-mediators, and 2) any person is a source ONLY of a given type. (As is typical for this kind of person, they also think 3) there’s no such thing as a yurion…lesbian invisibility strikes again!).

    In places with, shall we say, less creaky and unstable reaction vessels, it is common to find a uniform and stable plasma composed of some 90-95% heterons with a spread of yuri- and yaoions making up the balance. THOSE two can theoretically annihilate on contact, though usually they just pass right through with no real interaction.

    The current hypothesis to explain this is that both the quality of the containment vessel and the average IQ of each *on sink have something to do with the stability of the plasma. Filth, anger, and ignorance seem to destabilize the underlying field and cause explosions.

  18. says

    Those under the age of 21 living in Kuwait found to be taking part in homosexual acts currently face prison sentences of up to ten years.

    -I wonder what the penalty is for those over the age of 21.

  19. Christopher says

    -I wonder what the penalty is for those over the age of 21.

    Six years.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_in_Kuwait#Laws_on_homosexuality

    Article 193 of the Penal Code punishes homosexuality between men, over the age of 21, with up to six years imprisonment.[2] If the conduct involves persons under the age of 21, then imprisonment can be for a maximum of ten years.[3]

    But that is only for penis-on-penis action, lesbian sex is fully legal.

  20. anuran says

    25 – But according to Hadith if a man catches his wives jollying each other he can move them out of the house or divorce them.

  21. vaiyt says

    I’ve heard that any male entering the country simply has to go through a test of interior design. If the room looks faboulus after the test then obviously the guy is gay and must be punished.

    That’s only going to make them run out of talented interior designers.

  22. robro says

    Theophontes #11 — “I would like to point out that, aside from Saudi Arabia, killing fellow muslims – gay or not – has been a big no-no for several centuries…there was only one recorded death penalty for religious reasons in the whole time of the whole of the Ottoman Empire (stoning)”

    That’s a extraordinary claim. Not that killing other Muslims is a no-no…that’s essentially the same for most cultures. However, the assertion that there was only “one recorded death penalty for religious reasons” under the Ottomans makes me wonder what’s not being counted. I suppose it depends on what’s included under “religious reasons.” Also, some may have been killed for religious reasons that didn’t get recorded as such, and others may not have been recorded at all. Furthermore, there were Muslim regions that were not under Ottoman control.

    I would agree that the return of the Saudis to power in the region in the early 20th century, thanks in part to the British, was pivotal to the rise of the current brand of Islamic fundamentalism. From what I’ve read, they have a history of exploiting religious zealotry for political gain and their particular flavor of Islam is puritanical and conservative.

  23. anuran says

    #28robro: If memory serves it was for a Muslim woman who had an affair with a Jewish man. When such things happened the man would generally undergo a sudden sincere adoption of the True Faithmarry the woman often after a whipping or a large fine. In this case the woman was ordered stoned to death despite the man’s willingness to convert and some public outcry. Things like that, as Molly Ivins would say, were “Bad for Bidness”.

  24. felidae says

    Could we try it out on Sen. Lindsey Graham ?–I just want to see if my gaydar is correctly calibrated

  25. vole says

    Treatment of gays in that part of the world is going to be a big global issue in 2022, when Qatar hosts the World Cup (football i.e. soccer). USA are likely to be among the teams competing; maybe England too. It’s going to be very uncomfortable there for gay football supporters. (Actually it’s going to be pretty uncomfortable for everybody, with temperatures of 50 degrees or more. The general opinion is that the award of the World Cup to Qatar cannot be explained by incompetence alone. But that’s another story.)

  26. sonofrojblake says

    Post 7:

    See, LGBT people give off particles known as anti-heterons.

    No, no, no! The fundamental particle that mediates the force of sexual attraction is OBVIOUSLY…. the turnon.

    Them nice heteros emit charm turnons, and obviously teh Gayz emit strange turnons. Or is it bottom turnons? I really need to grow up.

  27. Nick Gotts says

    Hmm… the obvious approach is to fit intending entrants up with the appropriate devices for measuring penile erection or vaginal lubrication*, then show them gay/lesbian porn as appropriate. But then, who fits the devices? Obviously it can’t be someone of the opposite sex – that would be immoral – but it certainly can’t be someone of the same sex, or both entrant and fitter would make themselves liable for six (or ten) years in jail.

    Ah! I have it! Robots! But you’d still have the problem of intending entrants who insist on unfocusing their eyes and thinking about the washing up, and surely buying or making gay/lesbian porn is a serious offense in itself…

    I dunno – maybe they should just grow up.

    *Yes, I know there’s serious doubt whether this actually measures sexual interest in the images shown.

  28. Nick Gotts says

    Or is it bottom turnons? – sonofrojblake

    No, no – top and bottom turnons are emitted by BDSM doms and subs respectively.

  29. rnilsson says

    @ 36 etc: I thought this dispute had already been settled by CERN with the Large Hardon Collider?