Wojdan Shahrkhani is a young teenager who overcame a lot of abuses and attacks on social media platforms: Attacks that were full of vulgar, racist remarks, asking her to “go back home, back to your roots”. In all honesty, it seemed that Wojdan’s battle would not be against her opponent on the Judo mat in the tournament she was scheduled to compete in, but against the ignorant and the prejudiced back home. And there are plenty of those.

This was a historical moment for Saudi sports buffs; it could be equated with the “Jackie Robinson moment”, which refers to the first African-American player to compete in major league baseball. It was eerily familiar, how hate groups started attacking her with venom, criticizing her “bad behavior” and asking how dare she insult the country! Mind you, she was always dressed in her hijab and accompanied by her legal guardian: her father. Yet there was the urge and the need to attack her to completely discredit her.