On the Campaign
for Abolition of All Gender Based Misogynist Legislation and Islamic punitive
Laws in Iran
Raha Jazayeri
8mars no.14
The following is a partial text of
the speech which was delivered in number of places in Europe by a supporter of
the March 8th Organization (Iran-Afghanistan) in order to promote
the Frankfort – Deng Hague march (March 4 to March 8, 2006) of the Campaign for Abolition of All Gender Based Misogynist
Legislation and Islamic punitive Laws in Iran.
Greetings to all
Thank you for giving your time tonight to hear
my talk on the Campaign for Abolition of All Gender Based Misogynist
Legislation and Islamic punitive Laws in
One of the high points of this Campaign is a very
exciting march which will last 5 days from March 4 till March 8; it will start
from the city of
This was a short introduction to the content of
my speech tonight. I want to cover several themes: One, the “
I will aim to explain the importance of the
upcoming march in relation to this whole thing. I will aim to convince you that
why it is important to give us a hand in order to make this march a resounding
victory for women of
All of you are familiar with the current news
about
But this is not the only hypocrisy about
For the Western media the women of
So we say: Yes the IRI is a criminal regime but
not because of phoney reasons of the Western powers. Not because it is clashing
with the Western powers for its own reactionary interest to stay in power. This
regime is criminal because it has made the women slaves of men and it has made
peoples of
Yes this regime must be overthrown. But not by the Western powers but by its victims. Who are
its victims? They are the women of
The reactionary regimes must be overthrown by
the people of those countries. If those people don’t change these regimes for
the better, no one else can. That is not difficult to understand. The
imperialist powers can never change things for the better. That also has been
proven in
State of Women in Iran: A shocking View
So let us talk about women of
27 years ago the IRI took over power form the
Shah’s regime in
This was breath-taking and shocking. And it did
shake women in
In the face of this outpouring of protest and anger,
Khomeini took back his decree and waited a little longer and then step by step
advanced. Women were organising and fighting back but that was not enough to
prevent the Islamic regime from advancing and consolidating. At the same time
the Islamic regime started to open other fronts of attack against the people. Against the Kurds, the workers and against the student movement.
It was like Hitler regime who started with the communists and social democrats
and eventually came for every body else. A theocratic fascist regime was
consolidated in
The body of Laws in any society is an expression
of power relations or social and economic relations in that society. Laws talk
about rights and lack of rights and punishments.
Fundamental Law; Civil Law; Penal
Law in Islamic
We all know that women are oppressed and
considered second class citizens even in
This situation existed in traditional relations
in the society and in the backward thinking of the people. But since 27 years
ago the IRI codified this situation in its laws. These laws are inspired by Sharia of Islam: which means literal reading of Koran, Hadith or sayings of Mohammed and other prophets of Islam
and traditions of early days of Islamic rule. These Islamic laws, in fact, have
their roots in the laws of Roman Slave Empire within which head of family owned
its children and wives and slaves.
Fundamental laws
Body of law in
The most important section in the Constitution
which is the mother and source of other anti women laws is that it says no law
in land can contradict Islam and that Islam is the source of laws in
Men have domination over women and the right to
police them—this is because God has assigned supremacy of some over others and
because men should use their property to maintain (i.e., feed and
cloth….-translator’s note) women. Therefore, proper and obedient women are
those women who in the absence of their husbands guard the rights of their
husbands and keep those things that God has ordered to- and those women whom
you fear their disobedience and opposition, first preach to them, if they
continued their disobedience avoid sleeping with them, and if they still
continued their disobedience, beat them. If they obeyed you, then you don’t
have any right to oppress them because god is great and merciful.” (My
translation from Farsi version of Mehdi Elahi Ghomsheii)
If you look at the Bible you can see similar order. According to bible
children disobeying their parents, women who commit adultery, and victims of
rape who don’t resist sufficiently against the rape, all deserve to be
executed. All three religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam are similar in
this respect. They have copied each other.
In the introductory section of the IRI Constitution woman is defined as
mother who should bring up Islamic children. (what happens to non Moslem
mothers!? And women who are not mothers?!) In Islamic constitution woman only
exists in relation to their fathers, husbands and children. She is not a
citizen among citizen. She is an especial category. A house slave and a
property!
Civil Law
This is supposed to explain the rights. But in fact for women it is a body
of codes of conduct and lack of rights. If the civil law is not observed then
the Islamic Punitive Laws take care of those who violate it. Let us take a
look!
Slavery of woman begins from childhood. According to law number 1041,
the female gender child can be married off as young as 9 years old by her
father or the father of her father. Because according to number 1180 the
children belong to father and paternal grand father. According to number 1043,
“if a virgin wants to marry even if at the age of adulthood has to obtain the
permission of father or paternal grand father.”
These laws perpetuate child slavery and sexual abuse of female gender
children. Because the owner father and grand father can sell their baby girls as
they wish. Because men with money can buy these baby girls as their wives since
according to Civil Law men can obtain as many as 4 wives. During the latter
years of the Shah’s regime the age of
marriage was raised to 16 and then to 18 but still the practice went on because
of influence of age old traditions. The Islamic Republic re-introduced 9 years
old which is outright child slavery but no international agency (more so the
United Nations) never objected this legal crime. Have you ever heard Germany threatening
Iran for such child brutality with trade sanctions? Never!
According to number 1105, man is the head of the family. Number 1005 and
1114 says the man has the right to choose the living place of the family and
wife should follow his decisions. Number 1117 says wife can work with the
permission of husband. According to law number 498, abortion is illegal and a
crime.
But look at this one: law number 1108
states that the wife must obey sexual needs of the husband or else the man can
cut off her food and clothing allowances—i.e., he is allowed to starve her. So
you can see that according to law the husband has bought a sexual slave and has
the right to deal with the wife as such. Man can beat, rape the wife and claim
the right to do so because according to law the wife has the duty to fulfill
his sexual desires. According to law this is one the main roles and tasks of
any wife. A friend who was working in a hospital explained that one day a 20
years old woman was brought to their hospital. Both legs crippled. Why? The 60
years old husband was raping her all the time from the back and she could not
complain because he was using his lawful rights. As a result of fissures in her
back she had contracted infection. The infection had damaged her bone marrow
and made her crippled.
As you see in Iranian law women almost don’t have any rights. They only
have tasks. Does that sound familiar to those who know history of slave
society?
Look at one of the rights they have. Women have the right to inherit
from husband something (as much as one eight share of his non estate wealth)
BUT the law number 945 says if “he dies before entering into her she can not
inherit anything.”
Woman’s rights and tasks are defined according to sexual services to man
and motherhood. A mother, if divorced, does not have any right over her
children including the right to bring them up. She has to leave without
children because according to 1180 father and paternal grand father are the
custodians of the children. Therefore even if there is no divorce but the
husband dies, the children are taken away by the grand father. This is one of
the most heart wrenching stories happening daily in Iran.
For the wife to travel she has to obtain written permission of the
husband. She has to beg and bribe him to make him to do it. This is another
yoke that the law has given to man to enable him to police woman as a household
slave.
This is a private property relation as it exists in aslave-feudal
societies.
What happens if women do not observe this civil code? There is the
horrifying Islamic Punitive Laws. It has sprung out right out of the dark ages.
Islamic Punitive laws
According to number 630 of the IPLs, “if a man finds his wife in sexual
act with another man he can kill both there.” No bureaucracy required! During
the Shah’s regime this law was under General punishment laws of civil law
number 179.
Since according to Civil Law and Shariia, wife is the property of
husband, if she sleeps with other men, in fact unlawfully she has transferred
the property of her husband to another man. Therefore she must be punished
severely and the husband can act as judge and executioner at the same
time.
Another thing that the IPLs do is to put value on lives of men and women
and body parts. According to its price list, the life of a woman costs half of
that of a man. This pricing has become necessary because the Islamic Republic
regime recognises and practices a special kind of Islamic punishment based on
Vengeance (Ghesas). According to number 300 of the penal law if a man kills
another man, the family of the victim can call for vengeance. In this case the
state executes the murderer. But instead of vengeance they can settle for a
payment equivalent of 1000 sheep. But if the victim of murder is a woman, what
would happen if her family wants to call for vengeance? They should pay the
murderer equivalent of 500 sheep to be able to have him executed because the
life of a woman costs half of that of the man.
In the same manner the law have put a price tag on every body part. When
we compare the price tags we find out that the whole life of woman is less
worthy than the “left testicle” of a man! (Islamic Punitive Law number
435)
What do you call a society with this kind of relations among the human
beings? With these kinds of laws in the land what kind of relations do you
think exist in the families?
According to number 638 of IPL the women who come to public view without
having Islamic dress code, specifically head cover, they would be arrested and
jailed. In order to get out of prison the male relatives should go and get them
out. This law makes male relatives the policemen of women, as the Nessa verse
of the Koran has said so. But since we are in 21st century, the men
do not tend to act like what the Koran or the Islamic Republic law says. In
order to make them act like that, there has to be force of coercion. That is
how the Islamic Republic makes people act among themselves according to its
oppressive and brutal laws.
There is a vast police apparatus just for women. Police patrols all the
time to catch women violating Islamic code of behaviour. All this has been
engineered to make women like sheep. Make them coward and obedient. It is more
than a hell. All state plus men against you.
Punishment of women who are unfaithful to their husbands is especially
brutal: it is through stoning. Recently they stoned a young woman right in
front of her 4 years child. The child went nuts.
Islamic Punitive Laws especially takes to heart the sexual interests of
men. There are about 700 penal laws and 1000 civil laws which in one way or
another have to do with codifying and excreting certain sexual relations among
men and women. That is why a lot of women call the Islamic Republic of Iran a
“penis regime.”
Men have the right to take 4 wives and as many temporary wives at the
same time. But women should not violate the private property of husband and if
they do so they will be stoned to death. If a girl is raped by a man her male
family members can kill her in order to clean their “honour”. Usually the
rapist receives minor or no punishment.
These laws represent and codify a certain type of exploitative and
oppressive social relations who has existed before the Islamic Regime too but
the Islamic regime integrated religion and state more than before and enforced
this hell bound relations ten folds. Therefore, our struggle against these laws
is in fact a struggle to upturn these social relations and prevent any future
social relations resembling these. We understand that this is a difficult and
bloody battle because the guardians and beneficiaries of these relations will
not let go easily. But our lives as women are already a hell and our deep
interest lies in overthrowing this regime and the system that it is
perpetuating and enforcing.
We warn our sisters in the USA of a similar thing happening there. The
US government, which is now under dominance of the Christian fundamentalist
forces, have systematically stamped out the rights of women. The theocratic
attempts of the Bush regime to totally abolish the abortion right and other
misogynist measures smell the Ayatollahs in Iran. Just imaging if the Mosaic
laws such as Leviticus 20:13 become the law in the US, which says: «If a man lie with a man, as he would with a
woman, they both commit abomination: they shall be put to death.»
You might think this is not possible. But have you heard the US army
general William Boykin saying that: God has sent Bush! Have you heard right
wing pastors talking about «reclaiming America for Jesus Christ» or bringing
«the rule and reign of the cross to America,» (pastor D. James Kennedy, and
Bishop Harry Jackson) whose religious sermons are filled by the US senators and
congressmen and Bush administration members?
Some in the US may be thinking, ‘there’s no way these lunatics in the US
could gain enough influence or power to actually carry out a theocratic
regime’. I should remind that a lot of people within the revolutionary movement
in Iran thought the same in the wake of seizure of power by the Ayatollahs in
1979.
In any case the women of Iran have every reason to say: we neither want
Ayatollah Khamenii (the spiritual leader of the IRI) nor Ayatollah Bush!
Women of Iran have resisted and fought against these oppressive
conditions since day one of Islamic Republic regime. They have not been
obedient house slaves. Today majority of the student enrolment in the
university system are female. Young women have involved in love affairs. They
have resorted to illegal abortion as well as restoring their “virginity” by
surgical practices. They have stepped out of the red line of Islamic dress
codes. They have escaped home and the yoke of patriarchy. They have ventured
mountains and joined the rebel groups beyond the borders. No obedient and
proper girls. Women have rebelled in many forms. They have defied laws,
prisons, and executions. The tales of this resistance should inspire all women
of the world to stand up to powerful forces, not matter how brutal they
are.
CONCLUSION
I come to conclusion of my talk. I strongly
suggest to you to support our Campaign against the anti women laws and
concretely help make this great march from
The development of the general
situation in
On the other hand, an important section of progressive people in the West who are
against the US-led occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq are hesitant to actively
promote the struggle of the peoples of Iran and specifically women’s struggle
against the Islamic regime for fear of helping the US build a case for invading
Iran. This is exactly the trap that the
By supporting this march you are supporting the
struggle of women in
I am asking: the women of Iran are standing up.
Are you standing with them?