WOMEN

Both men and women in Iran have been involved in the struggle for freedom. This movement has encompassed the Constitutional Revolution of 1906 and underwent a new phase with the Islamic Revolution in 1979. This struggle for freedom has been strong and continuous, and in the past 28 years, women have taken on new roles, adapting to the changing political context. Women’s social and cultural significance has made it impossible for fundamentalists to ban them from universities.

When the religious fundamentalists came to power, they encountered women who were educated in universities prior to the Revolution, and who occupied important social and political positions in society. These women were not willing to forfeit these positions without a fight. They were not prepared to accept the order to wear hejab or chador as is called in Persian, lose educational and professional positions, nor accept a fundamentalist ideology that regulated women to the home.

There were other women who welcomed the Islamic Revolution and the hejab or chador as a potential for new freedoms and a means to escape the control of their religious families. For this reason, these women were active in the Revolution. Some women, who were raised in very traditional and religious families, hoped for more opportunities to participate in social and leisure activities and that the Revolution would increase their status and respect in their families.

Women who were raised in less traditional and more modern families wanted to abolish the legal inequalities women faced and also expected to achieve these goals and secure a better social and political situation for women through the Revolution. Although both groups of women were hurt by the decisions made by the fundamentalist groups in the Revolution, they nevertheless continued to challenge and transform these obstacles to women’s human rights in their respective ways.

Currently, over 65% of students entering university in Iran are women and slowly, these women will become a strong force that will make their dissatisfaction with the inequalities in law, society and the family known. Iranian women have not achieved this success easily and this representation is not secure. The current government has planned to reduce the number of women entering universities and has set up obstacles making it more difficult for women to achieve this goal.

After the revolution, women who played an important role in the Revolution with the aim of reversing discriminatory laws against women were shocked to find that these laws not only remained intact, but that the human rights that women had achieved before the revolution were also eroded. After the Revolution, Islamic scholars decided that women could no longer be judges and ordered that the hejab be mandatory. Additionally, laws pertaining to the family that were beneficial to women were abolished and career women that did not adhere to the strict hejab regulations, lost their jobs.

[The police] began enforcing the new hejab regulations and women who were not wearing it properly were punished. This is a policy that still exists today. In the past two years, women’s groups who have mobilized against unjust laws were also faced with repression from the fundamentalist groups. Since the Revolution, women have been alongside men in struggles, negotiations, and war but have been excluded from the official histories of these struggles.

In Iran, history and travelogues have historically been written by men. Since the revolution, women’s struggle has not just been about the hijab, but also about maintaining their careers and positions and at times, [at times going so far as to cost them their lives/even lost their lives in these struggles]. Women never felt the need to write history from their own perspective, and as a result, men gave an official version of history that regulated women to the margins of politics and important events.

It can be said that this is a consequence of women’s shortcomings in several areas and that their impact in the writing of history was not as significant as it could have been. Women’s perspective did not have as much of an impact as men’s, and in order to reverse or moderate the official story given by religious fanatics, they will need more [study]. It seems that this is starting to take shape and a new future for women’s history in this area is developing. To make this a reality, women will need to study writing, speaking/communicating and will have to provide input in social, economic, and political issues.

It appears as though there is still a lack of effective input from women in important areas such as education. In this too, it seems that the ice is melting and the voices of women are uniting and being heard. This new reality is creating a new horizon[new possibilities?], as the incredible presence of young Iranian women’s weblogs demonstrates. The short stories written by women under censorship also highlight this coming future.

Stories [memoirs] about being imprisoned, articles written by women outside of Iran, films and theatre productions that struggle to make it to the stage in Iran, indicate the hard work done by women directors, artists and actors behind the scenes and under censorship to tell their own stories from their own perspectives. This is the voice and new birth of Iranian women. In this context, their persistence is astonishing. This phenomenon women’s presence in the recent history of Iran is like a magnificant plant that is growing worldwide. For instance, a beautiful Iranian girl from Canada has risked her life for that of another Iranian woman in prison [in Iran] who was sentenced to death. Her commitment of time and energy led to the freeing of this Iranian woman. Iranian women, through the use of all the available networks of today, have come together.

The unique history of each of these women, their personal struggles, household issues, the conflicts they face within their societies, demonstrates the history of Iranian women. It is not enough for intellectual and famous women to write their life stories and biographies, it is necessary for average, everyday women to also get involved in communicating the challenges they face in their[the?] families and in a patriarchal society. The perspectives of women who are farmers, housewives, or real estate agents is just as valuable in impacting the history of Iranian women as those of famous women.

This involvement is necessary for the broader women’s movement. In the social and political context of Iran, women’s voices and aspirations have yet to be realized. Women in general have been able to “cross the red lines,” but in some areas, these red lines are not only related to political issues, but also have social and cultural roots.

Crossing these red lines is perhaps the most challenging. Even though Iran underwent two revolutions in the name of freedom, in 1979, the social and cultural red lines dating to 400 years ago from the Arab world were made into law by the Islamic government in Iran. People challenging such discriminatory laws are therefore seen as opposing Islam. This is a dangerous situation for people working towards women’s rights, because they are seen as challenging Islam and as a result, are punished. Even in light of this situation, however, there have been women who have still struggled for women’s rights and in doing so, crossed these red lines.

I wrote a book entitled “Crossing the Red Line” in order to shed light on the work of such writers, journalists, lawyers and activists. Two reasons contributed to my decision to choose this title: first, right after the revolution, debates about revolutionary and Islamic values were heated, and the government placed a limit of the boundaries of this debate. In 1997, the reformist media named the limits on freedom of speech imposed in the name of Islam “the red line”. Some fundamentalist factions that were opposed to these reformists, would regularly ensure that writers and journalists not cross this red line. Little by little, the red line became an established reality in the political culture of Iran.

The debates around women’s rights have been and continue to be the strongest red line. Currently, there are two women’s rights campaigns in Iran. One of these campaigns in the “One Million Signatures Demanding Changes to Discriminatory Laws.” Another campaign is trying to abolish the stoning of women. Even though the people involved in these two campaigns are under constant fear of being arrested, they continue their peaceful struggles without a direct confrontation with the government. This example is sufficient to show that even though women in Iran live under the laws of fundamentalists and face constitutional inequalities, compared to neighboring countries, they have still managed to achieve many victories.

In the past three decades, even when faced with harsh inequalities, women’s motivation, courage and strength have not died. In this sense, Iran is unique among Middle Eastern countries. Even in comparison to Israeli women, Iranian women have been more successful. Women’s struggles in these areas have been continuing since 1906. Iranian women, with their determination and involvement in the historical struggle for freedom, were able to become highly educated. Women’s education is not limited to theoretical sciences, but also includes their outstanding achievements in physics, mechanics, electrical engineering, and other technical fields.

Unlike many other Muslim countries, women in Iran received the right to drive at the same time as men. Even though the law and fundamentalists restrict women’s entry into key government positions, women have held and still do hold these positions. Women have broke gender limitations in the fields of medicine, law, engineering, and academia. This presence is vital to the functioning of Iranian society. In Iran, men and women workers are both involved in the struggle for worker rights. They are involved in peaceful protests alongside nurses and teachers.

After the revolution, due to inflation and the high cost of living, women, even with their hijabs, took on a larger role in the work force. Even in the absence of equality in law, women have had no unique obstacles in the area of investment based on their gender, rather, they face the same obstacles as men that result from an instability with regards to investments. If this changes, women will be a great source of investment. Currently, twelve hundred women in Iran operate their own businesses and have business licenses. As a result of Iranian business women’s demands, the [Otagheh Bazarganie va Sanaye va Ma-aden] has established a special committee for women business owners and investors.

In the face of censorship and political obstacles, Iranian women created advancements in the fields of art and literature. The number of women writers grew and in their stories and work, they described the realities of discrimination against women. After the revolution, the percentage of women writers of literature has outnumbered men. Women also compromise the majority of readers. This will undoubtedly have an impact on social change in the future and will have a huge effect on how Iranian men think about the capabilities of women in this area.

In the face of censorship and political obstacles, Iranian women created important award-winning works in the fields of film and theatre. Women playwrights, directors and actors have taken this industry by storm. These women are highly educated in the field of theatre.

Iranian government regulations have strict rules about actors in plays and theatres: women actors are wearing hijab and romantic relations between men and women can only be portrayed without physical contact on the stage or in film. Even under these conditions, women theatre and film directors have demonstrated their amazing ability to tell love stories in indirect and creative ways, while maintaining the power of the emotions being displayed.

We can therefore conclude that women are crossing the red line and obstacles in this area. Some women authors have produced powerful literature that deals with the subject of women’s issues and lives. The ministry of [Ershade Eslami], especially under the government of President Ahmadinejad, has reduced these publications. My name is among the list of women authors who are banned from publication, even though I was consistently active in writing in newspapers in both the pre-revolution and post-revolution periods in Iran. Furthermore, I have written about the unjust social and legal position of women in Iran. I am familiar with the censorship of both the pre-revolutionary and post-revolutionary eras, and even with my own self-censorship, I have still been refused publication. As a result, I have given up and now publish outside of Iran [with Roshangaran publishers]. In this respect, I am regretful that I am unable to publish in my own country, which is, in my opinion, a misfortune.

In conclusion, in my book, “Crossing the Red Line,” I discussed how women are not allowed to be judges in the fundamentalist government and I also discuss techniques to help women challenge the limitations they face.

Before the revolution, women [judges/lawyers] were very highly regarded. During my internship as a young lawyer in Iran, I felt proud in my field. With the revolution, women were forced to adopt clever and cautious techniques in order to cross the red lines they faced while still keeping their positions.

Women’s prohibition from the field of law created many disruptions. The issues facing women in Iran are universal. They are not simply related to Islamic societies. Recent events in the United States helps demonstrate this point. Even in the United States, a country where women have achieved a level of equality with men, it was still newsworthy when Nancy Pelosi became the first female speaker of the House in the history of the U.S. congress, or when Dr Drew Faust became the 28th President of Harvard University. In Western countries, there is a discrepancy in women and men’s wages and representation in high positions as well as other forms of gender discrimination.

Iranian women have a long road ahead of them, but they have also achieved many victories. My book deals with only a small part of a much larger problem. The achievements of that I wrote about were attained in the harshest conditions and it was precisely at that time that women struggled the hardest. Some of these women were lost, while others found a light to continue in their struggles. The challenges they face are heavy, and in crossing the red lines, women were also forced to accept certain compromises.

Mehrangiz Kar is a leading women's rights activist and human rights lawyer. This essay was read at Santa Monica College in southern California earlier this year. Her latest book is "Crossing the Red Line
The Struggle for Human Rights in Iran" from Mazda Publishers.