The Vanishing Woman: Saudi Arabian Ad Substitutes Image Of Inflatable Ball For Mother In Pool Picture

We have previously discussed how woman magically disappear in Saudi Arabia, including  ads for companies like IKEA. (We have seen the same vanishing in Orthodox Jewish publication).  Now Saudi Arabia is accused of replacing a picture of a mother with a beach ball in this advertisement to protect Muslim sensibilities.  At least these kids can say “Mom was a real ball on vacation.”

The picture is for a pool sold by the company SACO which originally featured a family lounging in a swimming pool. However, for Saudi shoppers the mother of the family is magically converted into an inflatable ball.

It is a fitting substitution since an inflatable ball has about as many rights as a woman under the Saudi Sharia law system.