This is just my opinion, but I think I have earned my right to offer it with a good measure of confidence given that I lived in Saudi Arabia since I was a newborn until I was 19, with only few-months breaks in between every year to visit my country of origin.
First off, I'm going to be brutally honest: most Saudi people I have ever met, heard (in person), or read comments from are extremely sexist. Some are outright misogynistic instead of just being sexist with good intentions. Many, I would say most, are also very socially conservative. The media is not that far off when they represent Saudi people as people who support things like stoning, cutting off thieves' hands, and the death penalty for homosexuality and apostasy (more so the former than the latter for some people). In the capital, Riyadh, there is a large mosque called al-Masjid al-Kabeer (literally The Large Mosque), and after every Friday prayer, punishments are carried out according to Shari'a—as interpreted by Saudi authorities and judges. My father told me that he knew people who went and prayed there to watch thieves' hands getting cut off after the prayer (out of curiosity or out of a sense of satisfaction that they derive from watching those, I will never know), for example. I could have gone there to watch if I had wanted, but I never did, thankfully.
I could go on for days about the sexism. Many Saudis marry multiple women and treat all of them badly and as subservient to men. Also, I never saw a Saudi woman without niqab even once. Some take it off in certain places like malls, but that's a relatively rare occurrence. When all women in a country or city dress the same way, it is a safe bet to say that at least some of them are coerced into dressing that way. Saudi women also can't travel without their husbands' or closest male relatives' permission. I'm not sure if that's part of Saudi law, but regardless of that question, it is a de facto social law, and a strict one at that. There is so much sexism in Saudi culture that there are gender-segregated malls. Going by some people's logic, one would think that so much restriction would curb sexual harassment, but no. I saw some of the nastiest forms of sexual harassment there, including, for just one instance, a guy who yelled and called a woman "dirty" because she refused to respond positively to his verbal harassment (unwanted flirting). It is extraordinarily hard for a woman to pursue her dreams in Saudi Arabia if she wants to be independent and have a successful career outside of very few jobs, such as teaching.
And then there is the marked xenophobia and ultra-nationalism. I lived in Najd, and I saw some of the ugliest facets of xenophobia and racism there against foreigners who weren't from Europe or the Americas. There is so much racism that a lot of Najdi people are actually racist against their fellow Saudis who are from "lesser" tribes (there is a tribal system in Saudi Arabia to this day, at least in some parts thereof). That's not to speak of the demeaning, inhumane treatment of the foreign working class, primarily Pakistani and Indian people as well as non-Khaliji Arabs. One of my relatives worked there under a wealthy Saudi man, and my relative saw the Saudi man literally slap one of his workers on the face. Another wealthy Saudi guy that my father worked under had a company that provided so little safety measures to workers that scaffolds collapsed in an area of work and resulted in the death of one of them and severe injuries to others. That's not atypical of working conditions for the working class in Saudi Arabia, who are usually paid very little in return for their work.
Also, in recent years, there have also been discriminatory laws against non-Saudis, and my own family have experienced difficulties created by those laws. Just renewing their residence permit costs a lot relative to their income and is a painful chore. There is also a nasty habit of a lot of Saudi employers to postpone salaries and pay their employees late. I know some people who are in debt as a result of that, including very close relatives. A lot of Saudi employers live comfortably and pay a lot for unnecessary things (like an expensive sports car that my father's former employee destroyed in an accident) while their employees suffer through debt, subpar health care, and inability to provide much money for their family beyond covering their basic needs, if even those.
That said, there are many kind, generous, and well-meaning Saudi people. This manifested, among other ways, in a lot of relatively small but noticeable everyday happenings where Saudi people showed cooperation and compassion toward my family. I admire anyone who can be kind, open-minded, and/or compassionate in such a culture. There are good employers as opposed to the bad ones, there are generous people as opposed to the greedy ones, and there are tolerant and open-minded people as opposed to the xenophobic and racist ones.
I can see some positives to Saudi culture—and I know this thread is about Saudi people; when I speak of Saudi culture, I primarily mean the people. But to be perfectly honest, my net experience there was negative, especially in the last two years or so when I started doubting religion before completely leaving it. I felt unsafe, unwanted, and estranged... not just because of state law but also because I knew the prejudices that many Saudis have. I'm glad I don't live there anymore despite the fact that I live in a third-world country where my freedoms are still restricted. That says something, I think.
