WWE will host event in Saudi Arabia with no women, sparks outrage

World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) is set to host The Greatest Royal Rumble, an upcoming professional wrestling event which will be held in Saudi Arabia on April 27 ... but it's not all positive news.

The entertainment brand has sparked outrage among Twitter users this week for its exclusion of female wrestlers from the 50-person lineup in the forthcoming event. 

WWE was also questioned about its decision to hold the event in Saudi Arabia, a country that has been heavily criticized for its treatment of women as second-class citizens.

Online users are calling out WWE for conforming to Saudi Arabia's customs and traditions, which contradicts its "Women's Evolution" program that encourages women to partake in wrestling matches. 

On Friday, women will only be allowed to watch the show, held at the King Abdullah International Stadium in Jeddah, if they are accompanied, according to The Independent.

Many women in Saudi Arabia are not allowed to try on clothes in most retail stores, an essential right to all shoppers in the world. 

Female fitting rooms are non-existent in the majority of shopping outlets across the kingdom and this is mainly due to the fact that most sales staff are male.

Even though things seem to be slowly changing, with several huge outlets in the kingdom opening female changing rooms in recent months, many women in the country are understandably still frustrated over the issue. 

"It's truly one of the most frustrating things I've ever encountered. Imagine going into a store, having to actually buy clothes without even trying them on. In what world does this make sense?" one woman explained to StepFeed earlier this year.

"It's not enough to just have fitting rooms in stores run by women, they should be in every outlet regardless of who works there. A changing room is a private, closed space, so what does it matter anyway?" she added.

Following the online outrage, Paul Levesque - aka Triple H - defended the entertainment brand's decision to host the event without two of its well-known women wrestlers, Charlotte Flair and Ronda Rousey.

"You can't dictate to a country or a religion about how they handle things but, having said that, WWE is at the forefront of a women's evolution in the world and what you can't do is affect change anywhere by staying away from it," he told The Independent. 

"While, right now, women are not competing in the event, we have had discussions about that and we believe, and hope, that in the next few years they will be. That is a significant cultural shift in Saudi Arabia," he added.

The kingdom's male guardianship system - which subjects women to full dependence on their fathers, brothers, husbands, or sometimes even sons, in nearly all aspects of public life - has repeatedly received criticism as it is a hindrance to women's progress.

However, the kingdom has amended a number of laws in recent years in an effort to empower women, including opening municipal elections to female candidates and making women's verbal consent to marriage mandatory. 

In September 2017, Saudi Arabia lifted its ban on women driving, ending the long-standing policy that has been heavily criticized since 1990. 

A month later, the kingdom announced women will be able to attend sporting events in stadiums starting 2018. 

Sporting events for Saudi women have been moving forward in recent months, with the kingdom holding its first-ever women's basketball tournament at the end of 2017.

In 2017, the General Sports Authority announced its plans to start granting licenses to women's gyms and open female-only fitness centers in every district in the kingdom.