Azizah Al-Maneh Okaz Nothing gets on my nerves like hearing someone making fun of another's appearance. I do not understand how those people have the audacity to laugh at how someone looks or appears. By doing so, they are objecting to the way God has created this person. It is regrettable that this practice is very common in Arab societies. Everywhere you go in the Arab world, you will find people who make fun of how others look, how tall or old they are, and of anything related to general appearance. This practice also occurs in non-Arab societies but at lower levels. Mocking others because of their looks is against the common ethics of human beings. In the West, it is punishable by law and can be considered to be racial discrimination. Perhaps this is why this negative practice has been dramatically curbed in Western countries. In Arab countries, we seem to enjoy ridiculing others and making jokes about their appearance and laughing at them. I have seen religious people and persons who claim that they uphold Western values mocking their fellow citizens and using racist remarks knowing that they are able to get away with it. In fact, Arabic literature is full of examples of poets lampooning other poets or members of society. For example, one poet made fun of a man's nose and described it as long, and another mocked the face of a man and said that it looked like that of a dog.
