Iran: Tyrannical Justice

When law, religion and society become oppressive to the point people lose their freedoms, their voice, their ability to express themselves, that is tyranny. Where punishment is meted without ability to question its fairness, sound logic and reasoning, that is tyranny.

Atta Kenare / AFP / Getty Images

 
Religious persecution, prisoners of conscience, a harsh judiciary cracking down on social media permissiveness and arresting online models who do not wear mandatory head scarves. Now, Iran's Judiciary and authorities have punished even students. Thirty college students were recently arrested, interrogated, and within 24 hours, were given 99 lashes for attending a graduation party that included men and women. Iranian Students Lashed 99 Times Over Coed Party.  

Prosecutor Esmail Sadeghi Niaraki stated, “We hope this will be a lesson for those who break Islamic norms in private places." Note the key words the Prosecutor used: "in private places." Not even in their own private dwellings are Iran's people free from restriction and invasion by the so-called "law." 

These young students were punished severely with 99 scarring lashes for merely celebrating their graduation and not wearing "scarves and long coats, and“dancing and jubilating."  99 lashes. Barbaric? Extreme? Unjust? In Iran, "Judges in Iran have broad freedoms to interpret Islamic law, and according to the Constitution, the government and other institutions have no right to interfere with their decisions." In other words, Iran's Constitution would allow the Judiciary to get away with unjust and extreme forms of punishment.

Ironically, the justice system can be bribed: in Iran, the wealthy can pay a fine rather than be whipped. If you cannot pay the fine, however, you will receive the lashings. Is this justice? The question of justice in Iran is laughable. The judiciary of Iran recently announced the arrest of "Instagram models." A blogger was arrested and prominent actors and actresses, all of whom have large followings on social media, were warned to adhere to Islamic dress codes and “Islamic behavior.”

A former model, Elham Arab, 26, the New York Times reported, "had been something of an Instagram star, posting pictures of herself in bridal gowns with eye-catching, dyed-blond hair. But in an interview on Sunday, May 15, 2016, months after her Instagram account had been shut down, she wore a pious black scarf and matching gloves as she was questioned by two prosecutors during a live television program." In this interview,  as Times reporter Thomas Erdbrink  writes, "in sharp contrast to the happy and glamorous images of herself posted online, Ms. Arab spoke of her 'bitter experiences' in Iran’s technically illegal modeling industry and warned young women to think twice before posting pictures of themselves online. 'You can be certain that no man would want to marry a model whose fame has come by losing her honor,' she said."

When law, religion and society become oppressive to the point people lose their freedoms, their voice, their ability to express themselves, that is tyranny. Where punishment is meted without ability to question its fairness, sound logic and reasoning, that is tyranny.

The "head scarf issue", Thomas Erdbrink reports, is the main issue "between powerful hard-liners and Iran’s increasingly urbanized and worldly society. Iran’s laws require that all women, even visiting foreigners, cover their hair out of a traditional respect for culture and morality. Many hard-liners view the obligatory veil as a last-ditch defense against what they say is an onslaught of Western cultural decadence."

During Ms. Arab's questioning by 2 prosecutors in the live TV program, "Tehran’s public prosecutor, Abbas Jafar-Dolatabadi, concluded on the television program the 'offender' was 'the enemy' - Iran's household label for the West and its unwanted influences." The television program "was part of a broader crackdown on self-expression and freedoms both online and in the real world that was rekindled after the victory of reformists and moderates in Iran’s parliamentary elections in February."

"The crackdown, led by the hard-line-dominated judiciary and security forces," Mr. Erdbrink wrote, " runs counter to the policies of [former] President Hassan Rouhani, [whose] platform [had been of] greater personal freedoms and called  for a loosening of Iran’s social strictures. While Iran is undergoing broad changes under the influence of satellite television, the Internet and cheap foreign travel, few laws have been updated since the Islamic Revolution of 1979."

Iranian state news media reported on May 24, 2016, that the Iranian council, Assembly of Experts, which has authority to select a new supreme leader, elected the 89-year-old hard-liner Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, as its new chairman. Under hard-line rule, the freedoms and justice entitled to by all, would be severely curtailed if not outright eliminated.

Take for example the religious persecution of the Bahai religious minority who have been deemed pagans and impure by the country’s dominant clerics. Faezeh Hashemi, 54, the daughter of the former president, Ayatollah Rafsanjani, recently sat down for tea with Fariba Kamalabadi, 52, a Bahai leader. Ms. Kamalabadi was on temporary leave from a 20-year prison sentence imposed on her and six other Bahai leaders for allegedly "spying for Israel." The United States State Department has condemned their imprisonment and called for their release along with other “prisoners of conscience.”

An official with Iran’s conservative judiciary, Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei, called the meeting “obscene and despicable,” and told reporters on Wednesday that he was planning to take Ayatollah Rafsanjani's daughter Ms. Hashemi to court.

Ms. Hashemi is one of Iran’s most prominent activists and once an outspoken lawmaker who  started Iran’s first newspaper for women in 2000. Outraged Clerics said meeting with Ms. Kamalabadi, a psychologist, was “criminal.” The head of Iran’s judiciary, Ayatollah Sadegh Larijani, said that Ms. Hashemi faced prosecution on national security grounds. But Ms. Hashemi told Euronews that she was “not sorry at all.” Discrimination in name of religion and the oppression of the Bahais are wrong, she said. “We are oppressive in Iran not only toward these but toward many,” she said to the agency. “We should correct our behavior.”

We are living in the year 2016.  Humanity as a whole has achieved freedom of religion, freedom of thought, freedom to be who we are safe from persecution, terror, control and restriction. Iran's hard-line Judiciary is emblematic of the deepest problems with humanity - the desire to control others, for dominance. Power and authority become corrupt and tyrannical in the hands of those who seek to exert their beliefs on others who disagree with them and do not consent. Such tyranny should never be allowed to spread and the world, as a whole, must come out against it.  

- Founder, Nishi Rajan

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