Saudi officials order arrest of rapper over 'Girl from Mecca' YouTube video
Saudi officials have ordered the arrest of rapper Ayasel Slay after she released a music video for her song "Bint Mecca" or "Girl from Mecca" on YouTube. Authorities issued a statement saying the song "offends the customs and traditions" of the city's inhabitants.
Islam's holiest city, Mecca, Saudi Arabia, is the birthplace of the Prophet Muhammad and each year millions of Muslims travel there on Hajj or pilgrimage.
The music video — which has since been removed from YouTube — features Slay rapping about her pride in coming from the holy city, and hailing women from Mecca as "powerful and beautiful."
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The @MakkahRegion's official Twitter account posted a tweet stating the governor had ordered the arrest of Slay and the video producers.
"Prince Khalid bin Faisal of Mecca has ordered the arrest of those responsible for the Bint Mecca rap song, which offends the customs and traditions of the people of Mecca and contradicts the identity and traditions of its esteemed population," the tweet added.
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"A Mecca girl is all you need/Don't upset her, she will hurt you," reads the lyrics to the song. "With her, you can complete the Sunna [get married]/Your life with her will become Paradise."
The music video features Slay rapping while children and teens dance along. No further details about the specific cause of offence has been detailed. It's not clear who took the video down from YouTube.
On social media, activists have flocked to defend Slay, citing racism and misogyny as the reason behind the backlash to the song. Part of that backlash included the emergence of a racist hashtag #You_Are_Not_Mecca's_Girls — a reference to the fact that Slay is a black Muslim woman.
"Had it been an affluent, well connected, light skinned Saudi influencer who created the video, it would have been used in MBS's [Mohammad Bin Salman, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia] propaganda as a sign of progress and reform," wrote @MsSaffaa on Twitter.
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"It's important to condemn the Saudi regime's hypocrisy as well as the anti-black racism and misogyny that the rapper Ayasel Slay has been subjected to by some of her fellow Saudis," wrote feminist author Mona Eltahawy on Twitter.
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"This is racist, sexist, & utter bullshit," wrote Amani Al-Ahmadi.
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This story is developing.
UPDATE: Feb. 24, 2020, 2:12 p.m. GMT YouTube responded to Mashable's request for further information, and the article has been updated to reflect this. It's not yet clear who took the video down from YouTube.
Topics Social Good Politics
Rachel Thompson is the Features Editor at Mashable. Rachel's second non-fiction book The Love Fix: Reclaiming Intimacy in a Disconnected World is out now, published by Penguin Random House in Jan. 2025. The Love Fix explores why dating feels so hard right now, why we experience difficult emotions in the realm of love, and how we can change our dating culture for the better.
A leading sex and dating writer in the UK, Rachel has written for GQ, The Guardian, The Sunday Times Style, The Telegraph, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Stylist, ELLE, The i Paper, Refinery29, and many more.
Rachel's first book Rough: How Violence Has Found Its Way Into the Bedroom And What We Can Do About It, a non-fiction investigation into sexual violence was published by Penguin Random House in 2021.
