Moral Victory of Iranian Women 30 Years After

The sign for Ebadi’s law office that reads, “Shirin Ebadi, Legal Advisor and Lawyer,” was torn from its place recently by vandals who wrote threats on the outside façade of Ebadi’s home and office building. After Ebadi called for assistance, police did nothing as they watched the mob spray paint epithets. Photo image: Change4Equality

On the 30th anniversary of the Iranian revolution, a new and innovative opportunity to address the status of democracy in Iran may be secretly on the mind of many Iranian citizens. Many who participated in Iran’s revolution 30 yrs ago had high hopes for freedom and independence, dignity and rights. But the hopes and aspirations of Iranian women were shadowed by despair in the early months of the new Islamic Republic.

As new government policies in the post revolution “Spring of Freedom” responded to widespread opposition to the idea of mandatory Islamic dress for women, including requirements to wear the Hijab, relaxation of the codes were not encouraged as Iran’s government took a step back only a few months later.

“As long as I am alive, I will do my duty and activities,” said Ebadi to the press recently.

Exposing Ebadi to higher risks and dangers, her advocacy work on issues related to human rights violations in Iran and her defense in the human rights of Iran’s Baha’i community, has placed her in an undeserved dangerous and very precarious position.

When she received the Nobel Peace prize in 2003, she used the 1.4 million prize money to found and finance the opening of a center for legal rights counsel in Tehran called the DHRC – Defender of Human Rights Center.

Recently, in Feb 2008, Ebadi and her family suffered under the weight of her human rights convictions as the government sponsored, IRNA – Islamic Republic News Agency, published a series of articles falsely claiming that she and her daughter, a student at Canada’s McGill University, had converted from Islam to a religion currently considered by the Iranian government to be part of a heretical and unrecognized minority – the Baha’i religion.

Leaving the Iranian Islamic State religion is a serious crime in Iran called “apostasy” and being accused of this “crime” cannot be taken lightly. “The penalty for apostasy Kofr (infidelity, blasphemy) under the Iranian criminal code is death,” states Section 5, Article 225-1 of the pending Iran State Penal Code.

The drive to formally include apostasy laws and to enact “justice” under the penal code has caused “deep concern” at the United Nations. On the Oct 30, 2008 UN General Assembly session, the Assembly expressed concern about Iran’s “increasing discrimination and other human rights violations against persons belonging to religious, ethnic, linguistic or other minorities.” Groups recognized as suffering under the report include Arabs, Azeris, Baluchis, Kurds, Christians, Jews, Sufis and Sunni Muslims, as well as Baha’is and their defenders.

“Particular attacks on Baha’is and their faith in State-sponsored media, increasing evidence of efforts by the State to identify and monitor Baha’is, preventing members of the Baha’i faith from attending university and from sustaining themselves economically,” along with Baha’i arrests, were also highlighted in the General Assembly report.

Under government scrutiny and the implication in pending Iranian law on the charges of “apostasy,” Shirin Ebadi and her daughter are clearly facing personal danger with a looming and dangerously real sentence of death.

She and her daughter promptly denounced the false accusation in public when Ebadi said, “Threats against my life and security and those of my family, which began some time ago, have intensified.”  An anonymous, handwritten threat that Ebadi has received during this time says, “Shirin Ebadi, your death is near.”

Oct 2008 threats and harassment against Ms. Ebadi also escalated while she was in Germany receiving the “Tolerance Prize” from the Protestant Academy of Tutzing. While receiving the prize, the IRNA – Islamic Republic News Agency warned Ebadi that she was not in favour with Iran’s government officials. They went on to explain, that Ebadi was exploiting Iran’s government authority’s “patience and tolerance.”

“This (Tolerance Prize) award was ?bestowed on her because of her remarks that are contrary to the interests of the Iranian ?nation,” stated the IRNA.

Since the revolution, 30 yrs ago, the population of Iran has doubled. 70 percent of all Iranians are the same age, or younger than, those who took part in the revolution. Today, these youth are eager to just “live their lives” and be part of the global community. Out of two million students attending higher education, more than 60% today are women. 30 years ago, of the 100,000 students attending institutions of higher education in Iran, only 17.5% were females.

Seven months after the Iranian revolution ended, prominent Iranian poet, Ahmad Shamloo, summed up the feeling of the Iranian people when he wrote,

In This Dead-end

They smell your breath.
You better not have said, “I love you.”
They smell your heart.
These are strange times, darling…
And they flog love
at the roadblock.
We had better hide love in the closet…
In this crooked dead end and twisting chill,
they feed the fire
with the kindling of song and poetry.
Do not risk a thought.
These are strange times, darling…
He who knocks on the door at midnight
has come to kill the light.
We had better hide light in the closet…
Those there are butchers
stationed at the crossroads
with bloody clubs and cleavers.
These are strange times, darling…
And they excise smiles from lips
and songs from mouths.
We had better hide joy in the closet…
Canaries barbecued
on a fire of lilies and jasmine,
these are strange times, darling…
Satan drunk with victory
sits at our funeral feast.
We had better hide God in the closet.

The leadership, creativity and utilization of communication technology by the young women of Iran is setting a vibrant and energetic example for other global social movements.  Iran women are now heralding a new global 21^st century women’s emancipation.  While in western society, young women are often hesitant to claim the identity, or even use the word “feminism,” feminism in Iran has become commonplace in the discourse. Feminism is considered neither taboo nor dreadful.  The creation of online human rights journals, “The Feminist School” and “Campaign for Equality” are two examples of this expanding trend.

Even as a majority of women receive higher education in Iran today, 30 years after the revolution, women still constitute only 15% of the formal paid labor force.  According to the results of the 1385/2006 Iranian census, only 3.5 million Iranian women are salaried workers, compared with 23.5 million men.   Female share of the labor force is less than 20%, considerably below the world average of 45%.

Slightly over half of all teachers in Iran today are women, but the proportion of female university teaching staff is only 20%, less than that of Algeria (41%), Tunisia (40%), Turkey (38%), and Bahrain (36%). To top this off, less than 4% of employed women are found in senior, executive or managerial positions.

The Campaign Against Stoning and All Forms of Violence against Women, The White Scarves Campaign – fighting against gender segregation in Iran stadiums and Kanoon Zanan are all part of a 30 year transcript of a nation where women will no longer take the back seat and accept the inferior position in society.  Iranian women writers, novelists, journalists, publishers and movie directors are defining and redefining gender roles and gender relations on a daily basis.

In a 21st century re-interpretation of 14th century Sharia law the Iranian people, and Iranian women in particular, are claiming moral victory and the beginning of real legitimacy.

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[YouTube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljrFNiv1g5M]
Shirin Ebadi, the famous Iranian human rights activist, in a speech to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington D.C. on 2 February 2009 said: “We have a great many female university professors, physicians, engineers, executive managers. It is for that reason that the women of Iran are critical of the discriminatory laws, – which were all passed after the revolution because they do not correspond to our culture.” A Feb 2009, 6:08 min video production by IranVNC.com
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LINK TO REPORTS ON WOMEN’S RIGHTS – IRAN:

Amnesty International Report – Iran’s Women’s Rights Defenders Defy Repression, Feb 2009

United Nations General Assembly – 63rd Session – Agenda Item 64 (c) , Oct 2008

Bridgewater State College (Bridgewater, Massachusetts -US) – Iranian women and the Civil Rights Movement, Nov 2007

WFAFI – Women’s Forum Against Fundamentalism in Iran – Official laws against women in Iran, 2005

Open Society Institute – Muslims in EU – Cities Report, 2007
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Additional sources for this article include the FIDH – International Federation of Human Rights, Peacewomen – WILPF – Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Campaign4Equality, The Open Society Institute, US Dept of Justice Executive Office of Immigration Review, UN General Assembly reports, Amnesty International and The US Department of State.
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Special correspondent for Women News Network – WNN, Elahe Amani, is director of Technology for Student Affairs at California State University. She is also a 2007 Lillian Robles Award winner for her outstanding community service, social education efforts and feminist activism and is chair of Women Intercultural Network (WIN).

Humanitarian journalist, Lys Anzia, is Director/Editor-at-Large for Women News Network – WNN

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©Women News Network – WNN 2009

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