If you're talking about the Qataris, Kuwaitis and Bahrainis, they generally don't consider themselves[1] repressed, even though it looks that way from say an American perspective. (Women's rights are definitely a huge issue still) Those countries are very quickly becoming enormously Westernized, though. Just don't ask how many women politicians there are.

[1] only speaking of the natives, immigrants of all flavors have a very different situation

If you ask iranians, it also strongly depends who you ask, whether they confirm or debate the claim that they are repressed.