Dubai is a lot safer than most US cities, even for women. The rapists of this Aussie girl were not locals, they don't work in hotels. Seeing the uproar in India lately about rapes, it would not surprise me if the rapist were from there. And that you see in the local news here in the UAE occasionally.
A very active sex trade (government tolerated) centered around hotel bars and a few nightclubs doesn't make a rape story sound very believable, especially when it happened at a hotel bar.
Her story is most likely true, yet how often do we hear about rape stories that later on turn out to be fake and used as blackmail against a guy?
In Dubai I see women walk all by themselves all over the place at any time of the day / night. Like many other countries in Asia, or Europe. Do you see that in the US? No. Like one of the commenters: we always are in a big group, always someone doesn't drink and someone always watches our drinks and we go together to the bathroom.
Dubai is full of single young women there for work (without expats the place would not exist), who move around freely, 24 hrs a day. With 1.2 million people on a few square miles there are always going to be some problems, and the justice system might not be always in your favor. That goes for everywhere, even the US. How many rape cases are turned away by the police every year?
Going for a drink? No problem. Don't create a scene for which the cops need to be called, and don't drive (maybe this policy should apply to the US....).
There should be no reason why a women should have to wear a black tent (so men don't get exited). Yet they wear perfume and make-up (to make themselves more attractive to men). Maybe it is time for these women to stand up for themselves. If their husbands can walk around in t-shirts from Ferrari or some British football club, Armani shorts and Gucci shoes, I think so should she be able to. I hope some of the local young women in the UAE see how foreigners dress, and change their own patterns. There are quite a few muslim countries where women don't cover themselves (in black), yet somehow we don't perceive them as being muslim.
RJCAP: I think that article hits the nail pretty well on the head. Going around the world and visiting / living in places off the beaten tourist path gives you a different view on things, unless you are the hotel hermit like I know some.
