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| Women in Iran Take Up Equality's Cause |
| In the run-up to presidential elections, women have been standing up to legal, social discrimination |
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Hadi Ansari (g_n_a)  |
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Published 2005-06-17 09:34 (KST) |
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 | |  Shadi Sadr, a prominent feminist journalist and activist, wields a loudspeaker as she addresses demonstrators in front of Tehran University, June 12. | | | ©2005 Sadaf Farahani | | This past week has seen a lot of activity in the fight for women's rights in Iran. One prominent example was during the Iran-Bahrain football match in Tehran, June 8, when about 30 women activists assembled in front of Azadi Stadium gripping tickets to the game. By law, women in Iran must be accompanied by males at such events.
After five hours of protest outside the gates, they were suddenly allowed into the stadium escortless to enjoy the match along with 70,000 male fans. These activists were the first group of women to do this since the Iranian Revolution of 1979.
The second case occurred a few days later. The Iranian Women's Cultural Society invited about 100 NGOs and organizers from 200 Web sites and bloggers to meet to protest against sexism entrenched in Iran's constitution. They gathered in front of the prestigious Tehran University June 12.
 | | | Iranian women wave protest signs in front of Tehran University | | | ©2005 Sadaf Farahani | | This meeting was also a hailed as a definitive success, but an hour later discussions became decidedly political; it thereby fell under the definition of an illegal rally, drawing the attention of the police. Before the crowd was broken up, organizers managed to publicly highlight specific instances of a "lack of equality in rights between men and women."
 | | | A few minutes after the women gathered in front of the Tehran University, hundreds of people joined them to form an unauthorized demonstration. | | | ©2005 Sadaf Farahani | |  | | | | | | ©2005 Sadaf Farahani | | Their points of protest include forced marriages of teenage women in conservative families; the right of a man to have more than one wife; forced divorces by men; and honor killings between tribes, among other injustices that society imposes on Iranian women.
It is said that a woman in Iran is just known for being "a good mother." In the foreword of Iran's constitution, a similar sentiment is expressed. When it refers to women's rights, motherhood is the foundation of all rights extended to her, as it pertains to Islamic law.
 |  | | | A police officer orders demonstrating women to leave the area. | | | ©2005 Sadaf Farahani | But Islamic law is does not recognize the autonomy of women. For example, decisions about one's citizenship are up to males; thus if your husband is German, you must also take German citizenship. As a result, Iranian women encounter many difficulties in the case of inheritance, marriage, employment and the like; their choices are very limited.
Iranian society maintains that its constitution makes no distinction between women and men and that the law applies to "all citizens." But in fact this only is the case for men.
So there are individuals and groups that wish to reform the constitution to come more into line with the rights imparted by other progressive countries and international human rights declarations that decry discrimination against women. They are determined to continue protesting until they succeed.
It is important to keep in mind that Iran's constitution was written 26 years ago. At that time, these kinds of demands for equality were very rare. Today, however, women are becoming very active in society and business and can no longer endure such limitations.
But the question remains: are Iranian women going to succeed by changing the law or they should concentrate on changing society?
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| Photographs by OhmyNews citizen reporter Sadaf Farahani |
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©2005 OhmyNews
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