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The Jewel of Medina is a first person narrative from the perspective of Aisha, one of Muhammad's wives. It steers clear of graphic details about the sexual relations of Aisha and Muhammad, but does touch on their love life. 'This was the beginning of something new, something terrible. Soon I would be lying on my bed beneath him, squashed like a scarab beetle, flailing and sobbing while he slammed himself against me.
He would not want to hurt me, but how could he help it? It's always painful the first time.' TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — A bill that would allow men in Iran to take additional wives without the consent of their first wife has generated so much controversy that parliament had to postpone a vote for more debate. Polygamy is not practiced in mainstream Iranian society, but the government of hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has pursued amendments to a landmark women's rights bill to allow multiple marriages, as it seeks to enshrine elements of Islamic law into the country's legal system. The Family Protection Bill was drawn up by the judiciary with the intention of allowing women to serve as judges for the first time since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
As initially drawn up, it would also impose prison sentences for men who marry girls before they have reached legal age. But the government's push to add articles allowing multiple marriages raised so much ire from women's rights groups and the judiciary that a vote in parliament had to be postponed Tuesday.
Another government amendment that drew objections from the judiciary is an article that would introduce a tax on the money grooms pay to wives upon marriage under Islamic law. Opponents say the government should not be allowed to get its hands on that money.
Under Iran's Islamic law, a man can have up to four wives with the consent of his first wife or wives. But the practice is frowned upon by most Iranians. Rights groups say the postponement of the vote is a significant victory for women, but hard-liners, including some conservative female lawmakers, say they will fight to include it in the parliament's agenda again for a vote soon. Earlier this week, dozens of women's rights activists, including Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi, went to parliament to protest the bill. Judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi also blasted the government's amendments, saying they were harmful to women. Shahroudi said the amendments have overshadowed the pro-family articles in the bill drawn up by the judiciary. 'The dowry tax was unnecessary.
It is harmful to women. (the other part) should be amended and debated away from controversy,' he told judges Monday. 'That the parliament postponed the vote is a significant victory for women in Iran,' said women's rights activist Farzaneh Ebrahimzadeh. 'But we have to fight on. The bill may return to the parliament for a vote but we have to make sure that articles reducing the rights of women are deleted.' Hard-line lawmaker Fatemeh Alia said in remarks published Thursday that she and other conservative lawmakers won't give in and will fight for a vote in the parliament soon.
'Lawmakers will never give up drawing up Islamic laws. And won't give in to mudslinging by a group of secularists gathered around those obtaining gifts from aliens,' Alia was quoted as saying by the daily Etemad-e-Melli.
She was referring to Ebadi, who received the Noble Peace Prize in 2003. Hard-liners have condemned Ebadi, accusing her of working for the interests of Iran's enemies. Iran has refused to ratify the U.N. Convention on women's rights, and the country's senior clerics in Qom, Iran's main center of Islamic learning, have rejected the convention as un-Islamic. Under the strict form of Islamic law practiced in Iran, a woman needs her husband's permission to work or travel abroad. And a man's court testimony is considered twice as important as a woman's. In September 2006, Iranian activists launched a campaign to try to change laws that deny women equal rights in matters such as divorce and court testimonies.
But despite being shut out of the nation's highest political posts, Iran's 35 million women have greater freedoms and political rights than women in most neighboring Arab states, including the right to vote and hold public office. Those freedoms got a boost with the 1997 election of former President Mohammad Khatami, a reformist who appointed a female vice president. Since then, other women have held positions within the government but have not been Cabinet ministers. And while women in Iran can run for parliament, they're prohibited from running for president.
8/20/2008 11:28 AM ET (RTT News) One of Iran's most popular actresses Golshifteh Farahani was banned by the authorities from leaving that Islamic country apparently angered by her appearance in the Hollywood movie, Body of Lies. The 25-year-old Farahani appears in Ridley Scott's latest movie, which tells the story of a CIA agent sent to Jordan to trace an al-Qaeda leader, with Russell Crowe and Leonardo DiCaprio.Authorities asked Farahani not to leave the country when she arrived at Tehran airport Tuesday on her way to Hollywood where she was about to consider a new offer, Iran's state news agency IRNA said. The award-winning young actress is reported to have not conformed to the law that requires Iranian actors and actresses to obtain a permit from the ministry of culture and Islamic guidance to act in foreign movies. Her role in the film Santouri was criticized by the conservative media for 'portraying a negative image of Iranian society and its drug problem.' Farahani is said to be the first actress living in Iran while appearing in a Hollywood production.
(: گلشیفته فراهانی, born, in ) is an acclaimed actress. She is the daughter of actor/theater director and sister of actress. Iranian students from Sharif and other top schools, such as the University of Tehran and the Isfahan University of Technology, have also become major players in the international Science Olympics, taking home trophies in physics, mathematics, chemistry and robotics. As a testament to this newfound success, the Iranian city of Isfahan recently hosted the International Physics Olympiad—an honor no other Middle Eastern country has enjoyed. That's because none of Iran's neighbors can match the quality of its scholars. The country suffers from many serious ills, such as chronic inflation, stagnant wages and an anemic private sector, thanks to poor economic management and a weak regulatory environment.
University professors barely make ends meet—the pay is so bad some must even take second jobs as taxi drivers or petty traders. International sanctions also make life difficult, delaying the importation of scientific equipment, for example, and increasing isolation. Until recently, Iranians were banned from publishing in the journals of the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the industry's key international professional association. They also face the indignity of often having their visa applications refused when they try to attend conferences in the West. Yet Sharif and its ilk continue to thrive. Part of the explanation, says Mohammad Mansouri, a Sharif grad ('97) who's now a professor in New York, lies in the tendency of Iranian parents to push their kids into medicine or engineering as opposed to other fields, like law.
Sharif also has an extremely rigorous selection process. Every year some 1.5 million Iranian high-school students take college-entrance exams. Of those, only about 10 percent make it to the prestigious state schools, with the top 1 percent generally choosing science and finding their way to top spots such as Sharif. 'The selection process gives universities like Sharif the smartest, most motivated and hardworking students' in the country, Mansouri says. Sharif also boasts an excellent faculty.
The university was founded in 1965 by the shah, who wanted to build a topnotch science and technology institute. The school was set up under the guidance of MIT advisers, and many of the current faculty studied in the United States (during the shah's era, Iranians made up the largest group of foreign students at U.S. Schools, according to the Institute of International Education). Another secret of Sharif's success is Iran's high-school system, which places a premium on science and exposes students to subjects Americans don't encounter until college.
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This tradition of advanced studies extends into undergraduate programs, with Mansouri and others saying they were taught subjects in college that U.S. Schools provide only to grad students.
Iran's success, in other words, is also the country's tragedy: students want nothing more than to get away the moment they graduate. That's a boon for foreign universities and tech firms but a serious source of brain drain for the Islamic republic. There simply are not enough quality jobs for graduates in Iran, says Ramin Farjad Rad, another Sharif grad ('97) who's now an executive at Aquantia in Silicon Valley.
What's worse, star students who stay in Iran and try to launch businesses complain that predatory government officials demand a cut of their profits or impose unnecessary obstacles. Thus many Iranians who can't make it to the West head to Dubai instead. As one Sharif grad in the Persian Gulf port city puts it, 'Here, our education is properly valued.
We are given freedom to succeed. In Iran, we are blocked.' Such frustrations augur ill for Iran's future.
True, it's produced a startling number of top students in recent years. And the country's history is rich with achievement, featuring Avicenna (also known as Ibn Sina), the medieval world's greatest scientist; Muhammad al-Khwarizmi, the ninth-century inventor of the mathematical algorithm (the basis of computer science), and Omar Khayyam, the famed mathematician and astronomer. That's a fine legacy.
But unless the Islamic republic changes directions soon, all of that history and potential could be squandered. URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/151684. Foreword by and Akbar Ganji, called by some 'Iran's most famous dissident,' was a commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. But, troubled by the regime's repressive nature, he became an investigative journalist in the 1990s, writing for Iran's pro-democracy newspapers. Most notably, he traced the murders of dissident intellectuals to Iran's secret service.
In 2000 Ganji was arrested, sentenced to six years in prison, and banned from working as a journalist. His eighty-day hunger strike during his last year in prison mobilized the international human rights community.The Road to Democracy in Iran, Ganji's first book in English, demonstrates his lifelong commitment to human rights and democracy. A passionate call for universal human rights and the right to democracy from a Muslim perspective, it lays out the goals and means of Iran's democracy movement, why women's rights trump some interpretations of Islamic law, and how the West can help promote democracy in Iran (he strongly opposes U.S. Intervention) and other Islamic countries.Throughout the book Ganji argues consistently for universal rights based on our common humanity (and he believes the world's religions support that idea). But his arguments never veer into abstraction; they are rooted deeply in the realities of life in Islamic countries, and offer a clear picture of the possibilities for and obstacles to improving human rights and promoting democracy in the Muslim world.
Endorsements 'Americans first heard about Akbar Ganji during his decade as a political prisoner. It was thrilling to hear him say, 'My broken face is the true face of the Islamic Republic of Iran.' His face is healed today, and his book, The Road to Democracy in Iran, reveals a powerful and original mind. Not only is he devoted to his country, Iran; he conceives Iran as a prism for seeing the whole modern world. He advances powerful arguments for reform in Islam, but he sees that the struggle for reform is just as urgent in Christianity, in Judaism, and in every other world religion. He understands this struggle as a permanent condition of modern life. But he argues persuasively that modern men and women have the inner strength to wage this struggle.
Akbar Ganji is an exemplary 'public intellectual'. He gives new life to the promise of Martin Luther King, 'We Shall Overcome'.' -Marshall Berman, Distinguished Professor of Political Science, The City College of New York. 'Akbar Ganji writes with the focus of a philosopher, the punch of a journalist, and the credibility of someone who has fought and suffered for the good. His words, which have cost him dearly, are luminous and moving.'
-Philip Pettit, Princeton University 'Akbar Ganji's small and readable book is the most intelligent and accessible program for the non-violent creation of democracy and human rights in Iran. Ganji has mastered both Western thought and Iranian cultural possibilities, and is one of the first male Iranians to see the centrality of achieving equal status and treatment for Iranian women, and to appreciate women's struggles and activities. He also shows the self-defeating nature of aggressive threats to Iran by the U.S. And calls for a new U.S. Policy toward Iran that might encourage democracy and peace.' 'In this brief, lucid book Akbar Ganji advocates a gradual, persistent, non-violent effort of reform in Iran leading to a just, egalitarian democracy. What he so clearly describes as a program for Iran is in reality a program for all of us, for no society today lives up to the standards of global human rights that alone will bring peace to the world.
This is a book we need to keep by our bedside and read once a month until we get closer to being the kind of society he describes.' Bellah Professor of Sociology, Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley. The majority of its inhabitants were lower-income workers, but Islamic fundamentalists were not the only group in the neighborhood. Marxists often chose to locate their cells in working-class areas. These neighborhoods also produced young Muslim activists who later joined various Iranian political movements.
To assume that such disadvantaged neighborhoods only produced Islamic fundamentalists is an ideological interpretation. The activist youth from my neighborhood mostly subscribe today to Islamic modernist thinking. As a supporter of the 1979 revolution, what did you expect from it?
Did it turn out differently than you thought it would? The 1979 revolution did not bring about liberty, democracy, or human rights; it did not even fulfill its promise of social justice. The class gap is about the same today, if not worse.
The political repression is greater than it was before the revolution. This is because the Pahlavi regime only repressed political opposition, but the Islamic Republic continues to repress the entire spectrum of cultural, social, and political activity. In my view, the most important achievement of the revolution is that it turned the masses into agents of historical change and highly politicized them. The 1979 revolution demanded political independence and the end of external interference in Iran's domestic affairs.
In this sense Iran has become independent, but globalization processes have made possible many new forms of foreign interference that affect Iran. For example, periodically the Iranian government is forced to open its most sensitive nuclear installations, which are hidden from its own people, to inspections by Western governments. National independence in the old sense of the term does not and cannot exist anymore. Values of freedom, democracy, and human rights demand that we struggle against dictators and expose their crimes. The Islamic Republic has assassinated many dissident intellectuals both inside Iran and abroad.
Exposing its acts of terror was our moral responsibility. What is the status today of the reform movement in Iran? Are you optimistic about its prospects? The confrontation between Iran and the Unites States over nuclear power, terrorism, politics in the Middle East, and Iran's increasing influence in the region, has greatly overshadowed internal opposition activity. The specter of war, together with the regime's repressiveness, has pushed aside the struggle for democracy and human rights. Moreover, the regime in Iran uses the pretext of an 'impending war' to crack down more severely on its opponents.
Resistance under such circumstances is very difficult. Given such circumstances, many of the reformist groups have placed their hopes on formal periodic elections in the Islamic Republic of Iran. What these reformists do not realize is that democracy and human rights will never emerge from the ballot box of the Islamic Republic. Other political activists have shifted their focus to civil society. This is the only way forward for us.
Discontent is widespread, but people are not organized, and an effective leadership supported by a broad consensus does not exist at the moment. On May 19, 2005, you started a hunger strike in Evan Prison, where you were serving a sentence for having attended a conference in Berlin described by the government as 'anti-Islamic.' Why did you decide to go on a hunger strike? Do you think it was an effective tactic? Ivory tower intellectuals occupy their time with abstract issues and are not engaged with the pain and suffering of people.
What is important is reducing pain and human suffering. Public intellectuals are theoretically concerned with the question of truth, and practically they are concerned with reducing pain and human suffering.
Is it possible to ignore the widespread poverty, destitution, and social injustice, and merely focus on questions of 'truth' in the abstract? What would you say to those who insist that true Islam is incompatible with Western-style democracy? Scriptures, just like any other text, are subject to human interpretation. There is no 'un-interpreted' religion. From this perspective, there are three types of religious interpretations: fundamentalism, traditionalism, and modernism. Islamic fundamentalism and Islamic traditionalism, just like Jewish and Christian fundamentalism and traditionalism, conflict with democracy and human rights. But modernists have developed interpretations of Islam that are compatible with democracy, human rights, pluralism, secularization, and freedom.
We need reconstructions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam that promote peace; religion should not be turned into a weapon of war and violence. If we suggest that Islam is inherently undemocratic, this is not going to benefit the promotion of peace and democracy around the world. Islam, to the same extent as Christianity and Judaism, opposes modernity and its logical implications and to the same degree can be reconciled with modernity. One chapter in your book addresses the gender apartheid in Iran. Is sexism an issue that many male activists are concerned with? Are many women involved in the reform movement? The principle of equality is at the core of democracy.
Iranian male intellectuals are very concerned with the question of freedom for women. Women have been very active in the reform movement but they have realized that they need their own independent women's movement. Democracy is the product of a balance of power between civil society and the state. A strong civil society is one that is socially organized. The various interest and identity groups should be organized and mobilized so that society as a whole will be strong. Iranian women are taking steps in this direction and they are currently trying to organize themselves. In your book you discuss the importance of gradually fomenting changes in attitudes and culture rather than imposing revolutionary change from above.
How do you think this gradual cultural change can be accomplished? In a society such as ours, where the state rules in the name of religion, a critique of religion is tantamount to a critique of the state. During the last three decades we have witnessed important cultural and intellectual transformations, and the ideas of democracy and human rights have greatly expanded. The global spread of the idea of democracy has forced the autocratic government in Iran to call itself a religious democracy. Our culture, traditions, religion, and moral positions should be seriously critiqued and reconstructed anew. I understand you've been in the United States and Canada for several months.
What are your impressions of North America? Whatever humans have built so far is a combination of good and bad things, correct and incorrect, efficient and inefficient institutions. The United States is a very creative society, which has produced and trained great thinkers and it has also attracted great minds to its universities. At the same time, the class differences in the United States are unbelievable.
How can the biggest economy in the world produce so many homeless people, fail to provide health care to its citizens, and tolerate so much violence? The mass media provides very superficial analysis of existing problems and keeps people occupied with issues that do not have a connection with real problems, as if it all were some theatrical performance. In your book you say that Islam faces a choice between following the path of the West, or becoming increasingly weak and failing to address its people's needs. Does this mean that there's no path to successful governance other than the Western model? This is the issue: returning to the premodern era is impossible. Religion, and in this case Islam, if it wants to remain in this world, must be made relevant to the life of a modern person. Modern man will not accept the monopoly of one worldview.
Democracy is the most rational and just form of government created by humans so far. The development of human rights is an important modern human accomplishment. Accepting this fact does not mean we are becoming Westernized.
Universal values have no national home. If ideals and ideas are rationally and morally defensible then they should be welcomed. The origins of these ideas are not as important as their contents.
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'Akbar Ganji's small and readable book is the most intelligent and accessible program for the non-violent creation of democracy and human rights in Iran. Ganji has mastered both Western thought and Iranian cultural possibilities, and is one of the first male Iranians to see the centrality of achieving equal status and treatment for Iranian women, and to appreciate women's struggles and activities. He also shows the self-defeating nature of aggressive threats to Iran by the U.S. And calls for a new U.S. Policy toward Iran that might encourage democracy and peace.' Introduction The representation of black people in advertising and commercial products has changed over the past century.
London's Black Cultural Archives has documented how black people have been portrayed in every day objects and how that representation has changed with society. Soap and slavery In the early years of the 20th Century, the only images of black people in advertising were those related to slavery and service. Two controversial images that remain are the figures on Uncle Ben's Rice and Aunt Jemima's pancake mix (a US breakfast product). Both are well-known brands, but some race campaigners say the images are still associated with stereotypes of black servants. Whiter than white Black faces often appeared only to emphasise their difference from white people. This Pears Soap advertisement from 1903 suggests the product is powerful enough to 'clean' a black child. 'The suggestion was that being black was unclean,' says Sam Walker of the Black Cultural Archives.
'It reinforced the idea that being black was negative, not least to children who may have seen this.' Out of Africa Another image was that of the African native or savage.
This snakes and ladders game shows a man being chased in the African savannah. 'In later years this idea of black people running around Africa reappeared when sportsmen and women were posed next to lions or other animals,' says Sam Walker. Positive portrayal begins The first products to emerge with positive black representation were in the cosmetics industry.
Black people either set up their own companies or were targeted by cosmetics firms which were developing new products. In advertising terms, the idea that black is just as beautiful as white was a revolution in thinking. Appealing to the family Positive images increasingly appeared in glossy magazines and in products aimed at ordinary people.
This Kellogg's Corn Flakes box is an example of how black figures began to appear in the same family scenarios as white people. In 1976, Boeing used a black model in the Sunday Times Colour magazine in an advert aimed at business travellers.
Old habits die hard Stereotypes did persist. This Kentucky Fried Chicken box (date unknown) recalls slavery with a 19th century American folk song about growing corn: 'The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home, tis summer, the darkies are gay.' Robertson's Golliwog The Golliwog first appeared on jars of Robertson's Jam in 1910 and became one of the most recognisable brands in the UK. It spawned a range of toys and collectibles. In the 1980s, the name became Golly amid accusations that the character perpetuated stereotypes. It was finally dropped in 2001.
Subverting imagery Diesel Jeans has sought to build a name with campaigns presenting the fashion house as a subversive force. In 2001 the company ran a campaign turning history on its head, making Europe and the US the developing world and putting, in this case, black models in positions of power in a stately drawing room. The man from the Halifax Remember the Man from the Pru? Now there's Howard Brown of the Halifax Bank, Sheldon, Birmingham. Howard became the face of the bank after he won an in-house audition. 'It's perhaps the best example of positive black advertising we've seen,' says Sam Walker. 'He's there because he's a good salesman of financial products - no other reason.'
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