Look at the list of prominent SV VCs and execs who were recently 'named to a Saudi advisory board': Sam Altman, Marc Andreessen, Travis Kalanick etc.

https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-execs-named-saudi-board...

Surprised Sam Altman would sign on. Doesn't Saudi Arabia execute non-heterosexual people?

Surprised that a rich person contradicted his stated "beliefs" when time came to make himself a stack? Don't be.

Sam makes himself available to discuss issues publicly, and seems to have a functioning sense of morality.

Do you have any knowledge to contradict this picture? Surely billionaires are as individual as anyone else.

I agree this sounds like a contradiction, and I'm curious to hear Sam's reply. Let's not pre-judge him.

You mean like the knowledge that he works with Saudis?

I will await for that explanation. I believe however you are very naive.

I agree. I'm inclined to think there's very little excuse to 'get in bed' with the Saudis in the first place, but at the very least we should wait for a statement.

LGBT rights in Saudi Arabia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_in_Saudi_Arabia

KSA is not exactly under the rule of law.

I believe it technically is, in a sense that Sharia (which is the supreme law) is supposed to be applicable even to the royal family. But I doubt that's how it works in practice.

That is almost exactly what it means to not be under the rule of law, when laws can be applied selectively you technically aren't under the rule of it, if there is a group above it they also can get away of going against it.

What I mean is that formally, those laws (Sharia) are not applied selectively. The practice is different, but that's not quite the same thing. Historically, when the concept of rule of law was first introduced, it was to counter the then-prevailing idea that laws officially don't apply to kings, who are above the law. In places like Russia, this was even manifested as part of the title - "autokrator" grew to specifically mean that the ruler is not subject to anyone else's will (including any laws).

How does that differ from this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_immunity_in_the_Unit... ?

You can still sue any specific person, just not the office they represent. E.g. if the Senate passes a law, all senators are still subject to that law as individuals.

The other side to rule of law is that the government can't punish you arbitrarily - they need to have an applicable law, and they can only apply it to you as written (including penalties etc). In a system without rule of law, a subject can be charged with wrongdoing on the whim of the ruler. That part is also missing in KSA.

Not surprising, just another rich asshole.

Isn't being jewish (like most of YC) an even bigger issue to the saudis?

No. Neither is being Israeli. The two find lots of mutual ground in their opposition to Iranian and Muslim Brotherhood (Turkey, Qatar) strength/control.

Maybe 30+ years ago. Not these days.

According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel%E2%80%93Saudi_Arabia_re..., Saudia Arabia forbids aircraft traveling to Israel from overflying Saudi airspace. Doesn't seem very friendly to me.

> Saudia Arabia forbids aircraft traveling to Israel from overflying Saudi airspace

Anti-Israel, not (as) anti-Judaism. Saudi Arabia and Israel have a rough history. I know plenty of Jews who safely do business in the KSA. That said, they tend to stay within the larger cities of Riyadh and the more-liberal Jeddah.

That's interesting, thanks for sharing. I guess pragmatic commerce finds a way. I thought it was more black and white.

A friend from Bahrain put Middle East politics this way: 'Look at the Palestinians. Every country's government decries how poorly they've been treated, but none of them lift a finger to do anything about it.'

In other words, money and business >> beliefs.

> Anti-Israel, not (as) anti-Judaism

I think you are kidding yourself if you think religion doesn't play a major part in Israel's relations with the rest of the Mideast, on both sides.

And elsewhere it's a complicated issue: Anti-Semites use that claim (anti-Israel, not anti-Jewish) as cover for and a dog-whistle for acting and talking against Jewish people; on the other hand. people criticizing Israel's behavior have been unfairly accused of being anti-Semitic. It's often very hard to separate the two motives based on objective fact. (And to make it more complex, anti-Semitic race nationalists, including at least some Nazis, have supported Israel because it fits their concept of national racial purity - 'Israel for Jews, the country I live in for <their racial self-identification>'.)

A commercial El-Al flight landed in Saudi a few years ago for emergency repairs.

Israel and KSA both benefit from people thinking they hate one another. But they don't.

Exactly. It's pretty much an open secret Israel and SA even cooperate in an intelligence capacity. They do have a common enemy after all (Iran).

The world is just full of contradictions with regards to what is common public knowledge and actual reality.

Doesn't apply to military aircraft. Both countries have some sort of military co-operation related to Iranian threat. Enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Read the lede.

I would agree they're not "friendly", but I didn't use that word.

From my understanding, Jamal Khashoggi, a regime insider journalist was disappeared and allegedly dismembered by a hit squad of 15 assassins in the Saudi Ankara embassy, according to Ankara/Turkish police, because he violated an unwritten rule: once an insider, one must never be critical of or disobey the royals. His "self-imposed" exile didn't diminish his insider status in the minds of the regime. His gruesome murder (and possibly torture) was intended to send a message.