The Shotgun Blog
« The Burma road | Main | Big oil seeks help from NAFTA »
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Iran Stepping Up Moral Crackdown
Don't worry women are still enjoying their freedom....
Iran is pressing on with one of its toughest moral crackdowns in years, warning tens of thousands of women over slack dress, targeting "immoral" cafes and seizing illegal satellite receivers, local media reported on Monday.
The Iranian police launched the crackdown in April in a self-declared drive to "elevate security in society" that encompassed arrests of thugs, raids on underground parties and street checks of improperly dressed individuals.
Reza Zarei, commander of police in Tehran province, said that since the drive began police in his region have handed out 113,454 warnings to women found to have infringed Iran's strict Islamic dress rules.
"Of these 1,600 cases have been given to the judiciary" for further investigation, he said.
He added that 5,700 people -- including 1,400 men -- have been sent to "guidance classes" on how to behave in society.
Zarei said police have been targeting billiard halls and coffee shops -- the latter hugely popular in Tehran as a meeting place for men and women -- as certain establishments promoted immorality.
"One of the main grounds for the creation of social and ethical crimes are billiard halls and coffee shops," he said.
The student news agency ISNA and the Kargozaran newspaper quoted Zarei as saying that police had shut down 3,000 coffee shops and billiard halls although the official IRNA news agency said the establishments had merely been given warnings.
"I am pleased to have carried out this plan to elevate security in society," Zarei said.
Posted by Leah Dowe on September 27, 2007 | Permalink
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
https://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d834515b5d69e200e54eff55b88834
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Iran Stepping Up Moral Crackdown :
Comments
"One of the main grounds for the creation of social and ethical crimes are billiard halls and coffee shops,"
...I always knew there was something fishy with Tim Horton's. It's a cult I tell ya.
Posted by: tomax7 | 2007-09-27 10:50:19 AM
Any internal gov't policy that pisses off the average Iranian man and woman is good news. I hope they see what is happening 3 doors down.
Epsi
Posted by: Epsilon | 2007-09-27 10:55:20 AM
Doesn't that smell like nazi behavior? Call it nazi or islamofacism, same virus.
If nothing is done pretty soon, it might invade other ME countries.
How about Saudi Arabia getting the same virus and ayatollahs?
Did we not learn anything from WWII?
Posted by: Rémi Houle | 2007-09-27 10:58:33 AM
Some of the greatest anti-Islamists I have ever met are in Turkey and surprisingly in Syria. There is a secular barrier that gets stronger as one moves west in the ME.
Curiously, that barrier's strength corresponds with the the duration that Greek/Byzantine influence was maintained in Ottoman Turk conquered lands.
Epsi
Posted by: Epsilon | 2007-09-27 11:11:29 AM
They must of watched some of the western quality music videos and porn movies.
Posted by: Frico | 2007-09-27 1:38:49 PM
Bizarre and completely incorrect Frico.
It has to do with impact of the values of the Greek Orthodox Church and humanism, the impressive legacy of Platonism and basic Greek characteristics of hard work, entrepreneurism and practicality that have endured in the people of Turkey and Syria despite the Muslim influences.
Also, it is "must have" NOT "must of"
Epsi
Posted by: Epsilon | 2007-09-27 2:03:23 PM
Still awaiting the screams and outcry from all the Western hard feminists.....
Posted by: Alain | 2007-09-28 12:15:02 PM
It is what the Taliban started with.
First the cut this, then that, then the other.
then, when that was not enough --as sadests are never really satisfied; like junkies, the need another fix--they then go and start beating people for looking at someone, or walking and having their ankles show--or not being accompanied with a male.
Then, they give permission (or do it themselves as they already do) for people to murder and beat others, and not register it as murder--like they did when families were forced to kill their daughters who did not want to wear the veil (some 10,000) and the pile of stuff goes on and on until women are dieing on their beds, without medical attention, and the entire economy has been kerfrazzeled into a hole in the ground! All the while they complain that the west has all the money--while rejecting our system.
Then they have the audacity of telling us that we are rude, when we call them on their sins.
So, where is the revolution in Iran?
Posted by: Lady | 2007-09-28 3:34:51 PM
Alain,
The hard core feminists got drowned out in relativity and stupidity--when they equated female genital mutilation, and all the toher crimes that they commit against women, as a cultural right. Culture, as they put it, was not anything you could judge--as everyone is entitled to their culture, so to speak. They drowned, when they equated their rights to earn a living as paramount to stopping crimes committed against women in these islamic nations. The hypocracy was so big--they all got sick to their stomacs.
As for whether they have a voice--it is dubious as to whether they had a legitimate one in the first place--given their current state of cowardessery!
Posted by: Lady | 2007-09-28 3:39:05 PM
The British had it right a century ago in India when they banned the burning of widows on their husbands' funeral pyres - culture be damned.
Sometimes you have to civilize the tribes - sometimes you allow their misguided traditions to continue.
It depends if someone is physically hurt or killed - or if they just want to dance around a maypole.
Posted by: obc | 2007-09-28 3:47:17 PM
The comments to this entry are closed.