

It was unclear precisely why the religious police objected to the exhibit, which apparently had been innocently featured at shopping centres across the Gulf for decades. Malls are one of the few public spaces where Saudis mix socially, and so often draw the Hayaa’s attentions. Gone, however, are the days when its agents can go about their business unchallenged.


Not a few tweets cast the incident in political terms. "Why close the show?" asked one. "It's not as if we don’t see dinosaurs in newspapers and on TV and in the government every day." "They should go after the dinosaurs who sit on chairs," suggested another, seconded by a tweep who advised that dinosaurs in gilt-trimmed cloaks, the garment of choice for senior sheikhs, would make a better target.

Several contributors injected bawdy innuendo into their comments. Noting that one of the displays showed a dinosaur riding on the back of another, one message declared that this was obviously sexually suggestive and possibly could be categorised as a Westernising influence. "I confess," declared one penitent, "I saw a naked dinosaur thigh and felt aroused." Another tweet provided this helpful tip to the suspicious CPVPV: "No, no, that long thing is a tail!"

But most of the messages singled out the religious police for ridicule. "They worried that people would find the dinosaurs more highly evolved than themselves," explained one. "It’s the Hayaa that should be stuffed and mounted so future generations can learn about extinct animals," quipped another. This message adopted a more pedantic tone: "Dinosaurs are a paleontological life form from an ancient geological era, and our clerics are a paleontological life form from an ancient social era." "Hello? Stone Age? We have some of your people; can you please come and collect them?" pleaded one tweep. Another wrote: "If the dinosaurs were still alive they’d be saying, thank God for extinction."