Woman

[Rasputin]

Iranian women outnumber men at university

TEHRAN (AFP) - From a small town in western Iran, Saeedeh Mahjoubi has come a long way to study chemical engineering at the country's prestigious Tehran University with her religious family's blessing.

More than half the seats in her freshman class are taken by women, who have accounted for 60 percent of university entrants over the past four years.

"Deep down in their hearts my parents would have liked me to stay home and get married, but I was a top student and they sent me away to make something of myself," said Mahjoubi, who hopes to work in the petrochemical industry after graduation.

Dressed in the enveloping traditional black chador, this bubbly 19-year-old jokes with a male classmate, challenging him over an upcoming calculus exam.

"Women face many limitations in Iran, but education is seen as an acceptable outlet for self-fulfillment and social participation," said Hamidreza Jalaipour, prominent reformist journalist and professor of sociology.

He believes the Islamic revolution of 1979, which made it obligatory for women to wear the headscarf, has encouraged religious families to send their daughters to college which was "Islamized and no longer regarded as an unsafe, corrupted place."

From 150,000 in 1979, the number of university students has risen to some three million in state-funded schools and the semi-private Islamic Azad University, founded in early 1980s to contain the ever-increasing hopefuls by setting up branches all over Iran.

For postgraduate anthropology student Mariam Ansari, studying has been a means for getting out of the house and meeting men as "young people are not allowed to mingle freely elsewhere."

She added: "College has boosted my confidence and taught me how to deal with men."

Under Iranian law, a husband can prevent his wife from working outside the home, but the prospect does not faze 23-year-old Ansari.

"I have learned to think for myself and I will not marry a man with such a mindset in the first place," she said.

According to Jalaipour, economic hardships are also responsible for women flocking to college.

"Few families can live on one income so women have to work and get educated to find better-paying jobs," Jalaipour said.

On the other hand, some analysts say a poorly performing economy and high unemployment rate -- officially at 15 percent -- have dampened young men's enthusiasm for college.

"In our patriarchal society the man is expected to be the bread winner and in the past years education has become less relevant to financial success," said single-mother Simin Ronaghi, 43, a university lecturer and PhD student of psychology.

The decreasing number of men in universities has prompted some conservative MPs to debate whether affirmative action needs to be taken for "adjusting" the male/female ratio, especially in medicine and engineering.

The argument, lambasted by reformists and women's rights activists, has never been introduced as a draft bill.

Ronaghi deems the growing number of women seeking higher education a natural process in modernization, saying "women are now less willing to sacrifice careers to stay home and care for children".

Despite their qualifications, women only form 15 percent of the work force and "still lots of them face discrimination by prejudiced employers over payment and promotion", Jalaipour said.

"Yet they stick with their jobs to be independent. A woman who brings food on the table is less likely to be bullied by a man."

For years Iranian women's rights activists have been challenging "unfair" laws, demanding equal rights in divorce and child custody as well as inheritance and blood money, which are half the amount of a man's under the Islamic republic's Sharia law.

Women are banned from being judges in Iran and two women's testimony is equal to one male witness in the court.

Despite attempts by MPs in the former reformist parliament, Iran has not joined the UN convention on eliminating discrimination against women -- finding it contradictory to Islam.

And since the hardline government of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took office in August 2005, voices have been raised urging women to put their traditional roles of a wife and mother first.

Jalaipour believes education has made women aware of their rights and emboldened them to question their status and press for equal rights.

"And they are not alone; men are becoming more democratic too and support better conditions for women."

"Women's traditional roles are changing. They will eventually impose changes on the system," he said.

[Rasputin]

Turkey court clears archaeologist

A court in the Turkish city of Istanbul has acquitted a 92-year-old academic of charges of insulting Muslim women and inciting religious hatred.
Archaeologist Muazzez Ilmiye Cig was prosecuted over a book in which she linked the wearing of headscarves with ancient Sumerian sexual rites.

The judge ruled at the first hearing of her trial that her actions did not constitute a crime.

Dr Cig's publisher was also cleared in a trial lasting less than half an hour.

The archaeologist was applauded by supporters as she left the courtroom.

Intellectuals prosecuted

This trial is the latest in a series of prosecutions of Turkish intellectuals, including 2006 Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk and novelist Elif Shafak.

Charges were brought against her by a Turkish lawyer who took offence at her 2005 book "My Reactions as a Citizen".

In the book Dr Cig said that headscarves were first worn more than 5,000 years ago by Sumerian priestesses who initiated young men into sex.

Dr Cig is an expert in the ancient Sumerian civilisation which emerged in Mesopotamia in the third millennia BC.

The issue of headscarves has polarised Turkey in recent years.

Although predominantly Muslim, Turkey is a secular state and headscarves are banned in government offices and universities.

The ruling Justice and Development Party, which has roots in political Islam, has unsuccessfully tried to lift the headscarf ban.

[Rasputin]

NEW YORK • An Iranian woman now living in a homeless shelter in Manhattan, was once a leader in a terrorist group based in Iraq trying to overthrow the Tehran government, federal authorities said in court documents on Monday.

Federal authorities claim that between 1999 and March this year Zeinab Taleb-Jedi, a naturalized U.S. citizen, was a leader in the Mujahedin-e Khalq and her role included “making leadership decisions” and “approving specific acts of terrorism.”

The Mujahedin-e Khalq was designated a foreign terrorist organization in 1997 by the U.S. State Department.

Taleb-Jedi was among 200 of the group’s members questioned by American authorities at a base in Iraq in February 2004 after the U.S. military seized it, according to the court documents.

In some of the base’s 100 bunkers, along with mortars, rockets and missile launchers, was 420,000 pounds of plastic explosives, the documents showed.

During questioning, Taleb-Jedi said she did not want to return to America because she “wholeheartedly supports the Mujahedin,” the documents said.

She was arrested on March 31 when she tried to enter the United States through New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport on a flight from Jordan.

She was released on a $500,000 bond and has been staying at a homeless shelter in New York City, the documents say.

She is charged with providing material support or resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization and faces up to 15 years in prison.

Born in Iran, Taleb-Jedi came to the United States in 1978 to pursue a master’s degree. She developed a deep interest in Iranian politics, and joined the Mujahedin-e Khalq along with her husband, who left for Iraq in 1986 to cast his lot with its military wing, the documents said.

In June of 1999, she got word that her husband had been killed in a bombing along with several other group members.

“She then left her job, sold all of her belongings” and then went to the base in Iraq, the documents said.

A telephone call to Taleb-Jedi’s lawyer was not returned

[Sepideh_UK]

Emmmm.. Intresting...!!

[Rasputin]

Iranian woman shares her impressions of her nation and U.S.

UPPER NYACK — Leila Zand has firsthand knowledge of violent conflict. She was 6 years old when Iran's Islamic Revolution started and 8 at the beginning of the Iran-Iraq war.

Now, as the new coordinator of the Iran Program at the Fellowship of Reconciliation, Zand is determined to do everything she can to prevent the escalation of hostilities between the United States and her native land.

Growing rhetoric between presidents George W. Bush and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has led many to fear war may occur.

The dispute centers on Iran's nuclear aspirations. Iran, an Islamic theocracy, says its program is focused on providing energy, but the Bush administration has said Ahmadinejad's government may be developing nuclear weapons.

Zand participated in a meeting with religious leaders and Ahmadinejad during the Iranian president's visit to the United Nations last month, and came away with certain impressions of the man.

"As a religious preacher, he was really good," she said. "He just talked about, you know, 'all of us are brothers ... we love freedom for everybody.' But in the political perspective, I think he needs to go to school a little more."

Zand has been on the job for about a month at the Iran Program. The initiative, in its second year, sends citizens from America to Iran for short peace missions. She feels a personal commitment to creating mutual understanding.

"I remember the first time I was here, in 2000. It was Fourth of July. I didn't know what a Fourth of July is. I didn't have any idea, and I saw the fireworks. I (was) scared suddenly and I said, 'Wow, it's (an) attack, someone attacked here,' " she said. "And my husband's friend was with us and she just hugged me and she said, 'Don't worry. This stuff (is) never going happen here in the States.'

"And in 2001," she said, "we had that terrible attack at the World Trade Center."

Zand, an Albany resident who is married to filmmaker Mahmood Karimi-Hakak, said Ahmadinejad's "stupid" statements about Israel and the Holocaust should not reflect on her people.

"Ahmadinejad is not Iran," she said. But the world, she said, needs to understand that ordinary Iranians support a nuclear program for their country.

"They have very bad economic conditions in Iran. They are very sad because of that, but all of them want the nuclear energy. They want it; they said this is our right as a country, we want that, but nobody wants nuclear weapons," she said. "We have experience of a war. We don't want it; in any circumstance, we don't want it. But I think we have to talk. The only thing that can solve these problems is talk."

Zand, 34, intends to do what she can to improve peoples' perceptions by enhancing the work of the Iran Program.

Zand said she wanted to strengthen the interaction delegates had with the wider community upon their return, so that their stories, their impressions of Iranians, could be shared with as many Americans as possible.

That people-to-people interaction is critical to dispel harmful misconceptions perpetuated in the media, she said. She remembers being miserable about preparing to come and live in America, because the Iranian media portrayed the U.S. as crime-ridden and immoral.

"I thought these Americans, they are very cold people, they don't like even their own kids, they kill their kids," she said. "My friends were sorry for me that I have to raise my kids over here, because this is the media over there, against America. But because I got the opportunity to come over here and see, it's not true. None of it is true."

Similar misconceptions about Iran abound here, said Zand, who is a doctoral student.

"People see Iran through media, and they say, 'Wow, Iranian people are so crazy ... they're all terrorists and they don't have any civilization in their country.' This is not true," she said, "and I think some people like me, who know that culture very well, and I know this culture a little bit, this is our responsibility to show each other we are just normal human beings.

"You are not scary," she said. "We are not scary."

FOR, a venerable Upper Nyack peace organization, has sent similar kinds of delegations to other troubled parts of the world. Interaction between regular citizens is essential, said Rachel Pfeffer, the organization's interim executive director.

In addition to her scholarship and creativity, Zand has "a political analysis very similar to FOR's, and is a peace and justice activist, so there were many many things that made her fantastic and the absolute right fit for FOR," Pfeffer said.

Zand's husband produced film and theater in Iran, but his work was censored. After being threatened, the couple and their twin daughters were forced to leave the country. Despite her family's experience, Zand said outsiders shouldn't feel obligated to orchestrate Iranians' freedom from repression.

The failure to unite tribal factions in an ancient culture such as Iraq should serve to show that democracy cannot necessarily be imposed, she said.

"If you cannot drive and I come and I feel pity for you and I bring the best car for you, you cannot use that car," she said.

"Sometimes when you talk to Americans and you say these things happen in Iran, they feel pity for us ... but I don't want American people to say, 'OK, that's good, we can attack them and help these people to get rid of that regime,' " she said.

"I don't want that they think that way, because we are doing a great job for ourselves," she said. "So please don't help us."

[Sepideh_UK]

OUfff
Its brave of her to say that

[Rasputin]

HOLLYWOOD starlets who regret topless appearances in B-list films made before they hit the big time should spare a pitying thought for their Iranian counterparts - who risk far more than mere embarrassment.

In a scandal now gripping the conservative Islamic country, police are investigating a private film circulating on the black market that purports to show a rising young soap star making love to her boyfriend.

The woman is being investigated for a suspected breach of the country's morality laws that prohibit sex outside marriage. Lashing is the penalty.

Her alleged partner in the footage, which has spread across the internet, is suspected of distributing the material illegally and could be jailed for a year. He is understood to have fled to nearby Dubai, home to a large Iranian expatriate community.

The distraught starlet, identified as Zahra Amir Ebrahimi, who is in her twenties, has strenuously denied being the woman in the grainy film. But her reputation has been built on playing wise and morally admirable characters. At the very least, her career could be destroyed by the scandal that has titillated a public unused to salacious gossip about celebrities - but not lacking an appetite for it.

The actress has denounced the events as an "immoral campaign" and spoke of "unjust and dishonourable accusations aimed at trampling over the honour of a woman".

She also reassured fans there was no truth to rumours she had attempted suicide because of the scandal. "I just want to tell my country's people that I am alive," she told the semi-official Ilna news agency. "I should think of Iranian women's strength and defend the respect for the girls and women of my nation."

Police have put a ban on naming anyone involved in the film, but photographs of the actress have been splashed across the front pages of the press, connecting her with the sex scenes.

In the newspaper pictures she appears demure in a headscarf, which is also compulsory in Iranian state television productions, where strict Islamic rules do not even allow the slightest touching between unrelated or unmarried men and women.

The sex film is thought to be two years old, but surfaced as a CD-ROM and on some websites last month. The scandal has become so prominent that Tehran's hard-line chief prosecutor, Saeed Mortazavi, is personally handling the case.

"A full report and a copy of the film have been sent to the prosecutor ... the results will be announced after the inquiry," a judiciary official said.

Mr Mortazavi has ordered the arrest of the man in the film, who is now a fugitive. "If the man is caught we will jail him for at least six months, up to a year," a judiciary official said.

According to Iran's Islamic law, any person convicted of encouraging prostitution, harming people's privacy or public morality faces jail. Any sexual relationship outside marriage is also illegal and is punishable by lashing. The penalty can be worse if adultery is involved.

An Iranian woman was stoned to death in 2001 after being convicted of "corruption on earth" and adultery for participating in a home-made pornographic film. Detectives examining that film tracked the woman down by reading the number on the electricity meter in the room.

[Rasputin]

The question of the veil has become a heated debate in the British media. In this debate some fundamental principles seem to be at stake: Individual freedom to practice one’s religion, freedom of choice, freedom of clothing and discrimination against a particular community, that is, the so-called Moslem community. Islamists and some human rights activists maintain that the so-called Moslem community is being stigmatized and have been under racist attack since September 11th. They argue that the latest attempts to ban burke or the nighab is a violation of individual freedom and another racist attack on Moslems. Let’s examine these issues closer.

Two events following one another brought up the question of the Islamic veil in the British media: Jack Straw’s comment on the women wearing the nighab and the case of Aishah Azmi, a 24 year old support teacher, who was ordered to take off her full veil, including the nighab. She took the school to court and the court decided in the school’s favour, and so she appealed against the court’s decision.

In my opinion defending the right to wear the veil in any form or shape and in any circumstances as freedom of choice is fallacious. It overlooks other, just as important, rights recognised by modern civil society. In unconditionally defending the right to wear the veil, one comes, at best, in collision with other set of rights, i.e. children’s rights, women’s rights, societal rights, and the principle of secularism. In debating about the freedom of wearing the veil, one must take different circumstances into consideration. 1. The age of the person wearing the veil. 2. The extent of the veil and 3. Where the veil is worn.

Why are these factors relevant in the discussion?

First and foremost it is important to define what the veil is. Is it only a fashion item, a mere clothing style? The argument that classifies the veil as a style of clothing is totally misleading.The veil is a religious ritual, a religious costume. Moreover, nowadays the veil has become the political banner of a political movement, namely, political Islam. The veil has become the symbol of Islamic power. Wherever, Islamists gain power, they force the veil on women, as a sign of their victory and supremacy.

Why is this argument relevant to our discussion? It may be argued that irrespective of its religious or political character and significance, one must be free to wear any “political or religious symbol” one chooses to wear. My response, and I believe many others’, to this is a categorical NO. It must be said that in most countries, including Western democracies, there are certain dress codes at workplaces and wearing different political symbols or religious ones are not allowed in the workplace. Therefore, the veil must also be viewed in this light. We should tear out all this romantic falsification surrounding the veil. The veil is a religious and political symbol of a religion and movement that degrades and deprives women.

The veil as a symbol of women’s subjugation

The veil is both the symbol and the tool for women’s subjugation. Islam, as in fact, all other religions, is a misogynist ideology. Islam is a direct product of sheer patriarchy. Islam, particularly, due to its earthly characteristics, penetrates every aspect of private and social lives of men and women. A woman, according to Islam, is an extension and subject of a man. She does not have an independent identity and is defined by her master. The veil has been prescribed to hide men’s property from potential violators. A “free” woman, according to Islam, is considered an open and free target, a free ride.

It is absurd to regard the veil as a fashion item, or a dress style. We should define the veil as it really is, and as it really functions in the lives of many women under the rule of Islam: a symbol of servitude and subjugation.

Nevertheless, it may be argued that, if one chooses a life of servitude, one should be free to do so. The modern civil society has a different answer to this argument. In a free, modern civil society when safeguarding human rights, children’s rights or women’s rights there are laws limiting an individual’s right to harm oneself or to deprive oneself of certain rights and privileges. By the same token, there must be some limitations imposed on the use of the veil. This is perhaps where some disagreements arise. This is where those above-mentioned circumstances come into the picture.

Veil must be banned for underage girls

One of the achievements of the modern civil society is the recognition of society’s responsibility to safeguard children from any kind of abuse. The society must be responsible for a child’s safety, happiness, health and their normal growth and development. Past decades have witnessed a great struggle by decent, human-loving individuals to establish the concept of children’s rights, to recognise a child as an individual and not the property of their parents. This is a landmark achievement, which contradicts the essence of religion. According to Islam, the child is the property of the father or grandfather and they even have the right to take the child’s life. Therefore, the modern children rights charters are in basic contradictions with religious laws and customs. They, in fact, nullify certain religious or “divine” rights. This must extend to girls living in Islamic communities.

The veil is a pure discrimination against girls. It hampers their physical and mental development. It segregates them from the rest of the society. It restricts their growth and future development. It assigns to them a prescribed social role according to their gender and a division of labour. Therefore it must be banned. Society is duty-bound to safeguard free, healthy and normal development of these girls. It is a crime to ignore this obligation. Freedom of choice is purely nonsensical regarding the veil for underage girls. “A child has no religion”. It is the parents’ religion that is imposed on the child. The society must respect the child’s right to a free development. Just the same way that modern society recognises the undeniable right to education for all children, bans child labour and regards physical abuse of children as a major crime, it must also ban the veil for underage girls. This must be added to all international children’s rights charters. The veil is a physical, mental and social abuse of girls and it must be recognised as such by the international community.

[Rasputin]

Secular society verses the veil

In a secular society, religion must be a private affair of any individual. The state must be separated from religion and stay away from promoting any religion. A secular society can better defend individual rights and civil liberties. Contrary to the commonly held belief, religious hatred or communal stigmatization can better be avoided in a secular society. In a secular society wearing or carrying any religious symbol at state institutions and in the place of education must be prohibited. By doing this, the state and the educational system do not promote any particular religion. Religion remains in the private sphere and clashes between followers of different religions is somewhat avoided. Therefore, I believe that the recent legislation in France regarding the banning of wearing any religious symbols in state institutions and schools is an appropriate step in the right direction.

However, I believe that its main shortcoming is to still allow private religious schools to operate. This leaves the girl’s fate in the hands of religiously-fanatic parents to send her to private religious school and ghettoize her life completely. This is not respecting individual freedom and civil liberties; this is discrimination against a group of girls who are isolated from the society at large and their lives are ghettoized by their parents and so-called leaders of their communities. The society must defend the right of children; girls living in Islamic communities are no exception. The society and the state have responsibility for their normal, healthy and happy development.

Burke or the nighab, an individual right or a societal right?

The veil comes in different forms and shapes, from a scarf, to a robe-like loose garment that covers the woman’s whole body (it looks some what different in different countries, or according to different Islamic sect’s rules) and finally the burke or the nighab. Burke has become known as the symbol of Taliban, the most severe restriction imposed on women’s appearance.

Must a woman be allowed to cover herself under this most severe form of the veil? In my opinion: NO. The banning of burke or the nighab can be argued from two angles, 1) the societal right and 2) the women’s right.

Firstly, in my opinion, when dealing with burke or the nighab, we surpass the sphere of individual rights. Here, we enter the sphere of what I call societal rights. The person under this kind of veil has no identity in the face of fellow citizens. The society cannot work with faceless humans. At a workplace, and I mean any workplace, it is the right of the fellow workers and customers to see the face of their colleagues or the personnel. There is also the issue of trust at stake. You can not trust the person who has covered their face. Eyes and facial expressions are the key to communication, if you hide these, there can be no real communication. Therefore, wearing burke or the nighab must be banned at the workplace.

I believe that the question of trust and identity goes further than the workplace. It is just as important on the bus, in the park, in the recreation ground, etc, that you can see the face of the person in your immediate surroundings. Here it is the question of individual rights verses the societal rights. There are instances where the society rightfully decides to deprive certain individuals of certain rights for the benefit of society as a whole. For example, banning smoking in public places and imposing severe restrictions on smokers, limits the individual rights of smokers, but it is defended on the basis of health benefit for the whole society. Burke or the nighab must be banned for the benefit of society.

Secondly, we argued above, that the veil is a symbol and a tool for women’s subjugation and degradation. This is one of the main reasons for demanding that it be banned for underage girls. Nevertheless, we agreed that in a free society an individual has the right to choose servitude, if he/she chooses to do so. However, we also argued that there are certain limitations imposed on self-harming practices by individuals. Female circumcision, which after a long and hard battle became known as what the practice really is, being female genital mutilation, is now banned by many Western governments. Women rights activists had to fight vigorously in order to bring consciousness about this brutal religious practice and succeeded to ban it in these countries. There are many different religious sects and not all their practices are permitted by the law. Therefore, religious freedom does not mean freedom to practice just any religious command or custom.

I believe that burke or the nighab should also be categorized as those religious practices prohibited by the law. Burke or the nighab deprives a woman of any identity. By allowing its use, we recognise the existence of some identity-less women who walk around in a ghost-like shape. This is a real insult to human dignity. Society should not permit such degree of degradation and humiliation of humans. This is outrageous. This must fall under the category of the limitations society imposes on self-harming practices. I add in passing that I doubt deeply the nature of voluntary and free choice regarding the veil, particularly in this severe shape. But we will not get into this debate here.

We should redefine the veil. We should debate this question widely and openly. Hopefully, we come to the agreement that certain limitations must be imposed on the veil: banning of all shapes of the veil for underage girls. The use of the veil at public workplaces and educational institutions and total ban on burke and the nighab.

[Rasputin]

Royal in bid to lead French left

France could be about to take a major step towards electing its first woman president.

If Segolene Royal wins the Socialist nomination in Thursday's ballot, it will also deal a significant blow to the party's traditional left wing.

The campaign has drawn comparisons to US politics. The three televised debates may have been dull, but the off-screen mud-slinging would have been worthy of the American presidential election itself.

Internet users have devoured websites, such as one called the "dustbin of the primaries", to read the latest blogs rubbishing opposing candidates.

Segolene Royal drew whoops of laughter at her final rally in Paris this week by attacking the "male chauvinism" of her competitors.

Laurent Fabius had reacted to her presidential bid by asking: "Who's going to look after the children?"

Dominique Strauss-Kahn had commented on one of her TV performances with the words: "She would have done better to stay at home rather than read from her kitchen recipes".

For good measure, she recalled the same candidate's mockery of her brief when she was environment minister in the early 1990s. "Those are girl's topics", she was told.

Teachers angered

Both her rivals deny making the comments. "I am not a chauvinist", repeated Mr Fabius.

"I never said anything of the kind," said Mr Strauss-Kahn, accusing her of making the allegations without the slightest proof.


Dominique Strauss-Kahn rejects allegations of chauvinism

Perhaps Ms Royal needed to deflect attention from the row which engulfed her over the weekend.

In a video recorded back in January, but only released on the internet last week, she told a party meeting she wanted to create a "revolution" in education to tackle "school failure".

Teachers, she said, should spend longer hours on school premises, instead of often giving private lessons outside.

Such comments fit a pattern: she has openly taken on her party's traditionalists by calling for a shake-up of the system that determines which children go to which schools.

But her acknowledgement that she did not want to "shout from the rooftops" her ideas about teachers obviously backfired. The video has been watched by hundreds of thousands of web users.

Teachers, many of whom are Socialist party members, have reacted angrily.

New members

Opinion polls have continued to give Ms Royal a significant, if reduced, lead over her two rivals.

But, as many people are now realising, the views of those who matter are something of an unknown quantity. The surveys have questioned party supporters, not the actual members who will be casting their votes.

The past few months have seen tens of thousands of people part with 20 euros (£13.50) to join.


Royal is promising a clean break with Socialist convention

Have they been inspired by the frontrunner's fresh approach, by her willingness to challenge old party formulas, by her glamour?

Or have they signed up to defend traditional socialism, alarmed at what they see as a betrayal of the left's core values?

Perhaps a clue can be gleaned from the hordes who have turned out all over the country whenever Ms Royal makes an appearance.

There is no doubt that she has dominated the campaign. Almost half the questions put to the candidates by readers of one newspaper were addressed to her.

But whether she can garner enough votes to win an outright majority at the first hurdle is open to question. Should she fail and be taken to a second round next week, an alliance of her left-wing opponents could pose a serious threat.

Wavering Socialist voters may have been given food for thought by a poll published in Le Figaro this week.

A survey of first round voting intentions at the presidential election puts Segolene Royal neck-and-neck with Nicolas Sarkozy.

It also suggests her two Socialist rivals would be soundly thrashed by the expected candidate from the right.

[Rasputin]

The actress, the Internet, the sex film and Iran

Sex films, soap stars and international fugitives were an unheard of combination on the front pages of newspapers in conservative Muslim Iran until now, Reuters reported.

For Western readers who regularly feast on celebrity antics in popular scandal sheets, a grainy film of sexual activity is probably no big deal.

But Iranians have been transfixed by a judicial inquiry into media reports that a budding starlet is the woman in a graphic film widely distributed across the Internet.

The starlet denies she is the woman in the film. The man who appears in the movie is said to have fled the country. The punishment if either are found guilty could be severe.

"If the man is caught we will jail him for at least six months, up to a year," said an Iranian judiciary official who declined to be named. "He will face charges of distributing immoral material."

But worse could come for the young woman.

Pictures of an actress, dressed in the close fitting Islamic headscarf mandatory in Iranian state television productions, have been splashed across the front pages connecting her with the sex scenes. The soap star, in her 20s, denies she appears in the film and media reports she has tried to kill herself since.

"It depends on finding out whether she had a deliberate role in the case," the judiciary official told Reuters. "If so, it is going to be dealt with as a case of corruption and prostitution."

Those convicted of such crimes can face a range of punishments ranging from lashes to imprisonment or even death if the woman is married and is thus committing adultery.

An Iranian woman was stoned to death in 2001 for appearing in a home-made pornographic movie, though authorities have since officially banned stoning. Investigators examining that film tracked the woman down by reading the number on the electricity meter in the background of the film, Reuters added.

At the very least, this latest film is likely to ruin the actress's career. One Iranian actor was barred from television after he was filmed dancing with a woman at a wedding party, the report noted.

[abadani69]

زن

قلب زن پرتگاهي است هولناک که عمق آن را نمي توان حدس زد - لامارتين
زن ها جنگ ها را شروع مي کنند و مردها آن ها را ادامه مي دهند - ارنست همينگوي
لبخند زن دردو موقع آسماني و فرشته مانند است . يکي هنگامي که براي اولين بار با لبخند به معشوق مي گويد دوستت دارم وديگر هنگامي که براي اولين بار به روي نوزادش لبخند مي زند - ويکتور هوگو
عقل در دست نفس چنان گرفتار است که مرد در دست زن گريز راي - سعدي
زن تنها حريفي است که پس از شکست مطالبه خسارت و غرامت ميکند - ناشناس
دو زن هرگز با يکديگر دوستي و محبت نمي ورزند مگر به خاطر توطئه بر عليه زن سوم - آلفونس کار
در آغاز هر کار مهم پاي زن وجود دارد - لامارتين
زن زشت در دنيا وجود ندارد، فقط برخي از زنان هستند که نمي توانند خود را زيبا جلوه دهند - برنارد شاو
زن زيباترين و با ارشترين تحوه آسماني است - ميلتون
بهتر است برده شيطان باشيد تا غلام زن - شللي
هر چيزي که در زندگي من يافت مي شود نتيجه همکاري و صيميت زن من است - کنفسيوس
با زني ازدواج کنيد که اگر مرد مي بود بهترين دوست شما مي شد - ناشناس
مردها را شجاعت به جلو مي راند و زنها را حسادت - برنارد شاو
همسرم من را به سوي موفقيت رهبري کرد - چارلي چاپلين
زنها ما را جستجو مي کنند که آنها را درک کنيم نه آنکه آنها را دوست بداريم - اسکار وايلد
در زندگيم دو بار زانو زدم يک بار براي آفريدگارم و يک بار براي محبوبم - شللي
يک زن قشنگ و نيکو صورت در نظر زيباست ، ولي يک زن خوب و نيکو سيرت در قلب انسان جاي دارد ناپلئون
وقتي زني از زيبايي زن ديگر تعريف مي کند ، حتما در زشتي او شک ندارد - ويتوريو ديسکا

[Rasputin]

Fatima’s Love For Sale
Interesting article, my opinion is that a culture that treats women as property of men encourages pimping and prostitution. Also the failure or Iran’s government to properly address economic issues also contributes.

Asia Times: Wars are won by destroying the enemy's will to fight. A nation is never really beaten until it sells its women…

…To understand Iranian politics, cherchez les femmes: the fate of Iranian women sheds light on the eccentricity of President Mahmud Ahmadinejad. By Spengler's Universal Law of Gender Parity, the men and women of every place and every time deserve each other. A corollary to this universal law states that the battered Iranian whore is the alter ego of the swaggering Iranian jihadi…

…Nothing is more threadbare than the claim of Islamists to defend Muslim womanhood. Islamist radicals (like the penny-a-marriage mullahs of Iran) are the world's most prolific pimps. The same networks that move female flesh across borders also provide illegal passage for jihadis, and the proceeds of human trafficking often support Islamist terrorists. From Jakarta to Kuala Lumpur to Sarajevo to Tirana, the criminals who trade in women overlap with jihadist networks. Prostitutes serve the terror network in a number of capacities, including suicide bombing. The going rate for a Muslim woman who can pass for a European to carry a suicide bomb currently is more than US$100,000. The Persian prostitute is the camp follower of the jihadi, joined to him in a pact of national suicide.

Or it could be the “Subhuman” status of women in Islamic nations that robs them of their pride and makes prostitution seem logical? If a woman is treated as a piece of meat then should she not use that to feed her child’s hunger? If she were "human" or an equal to men she might make another choice. She just lacks the opportunity. The following video has had only 9 views on youtube. It deserves many more.

http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/185450.php

[Rasputin]

Colors of Festivity: Mountain View arts exhibit

Colors of Festivity: A Holiday arts exhibit and sale featuring works in acrylics, ceramics, jewelry, mixed media, oil, photography and more. Saturday, Dec 2, 11:00-6:00, The Americana, Mountain View, CA. For more information 408 438-3893, 679-0238.

https://www.ArtThroughWomensEyes.com

[Rasputin]

It is crucial to speak about the rights of ‘Muslim’ women, go beyond the issue of the veil, and talk about secularism, particularly in light of the political Islamic movement’s assault on women and their rights, but restricting the debate in this way is seriously flawed.

Firstly, the so-called grouping of Muslim women is a constructed one. Out of the innumerable characteristics women have, why focus on their beliefs? Doing so, implies that religion informs the rights of all those labelled as Muslim (including very often people like myself - an atheist). This is not usually the case.

More importantly, why must women’s rights issues be discussed within the framework of religion or for that matter, with regard to the beliefs -- real or imputed - of the woman whose rights are being discussed? Generally, this is not how rights are examined. For example, do we discuss domestic violence vis-à-vis Christian women or in the context of Christianity?

This seems to happen especially when it comes to Islam because of cultural relativism and a policy of minoritism. The British state prefers it to be so as it can ensure that these so-called Muslim women are forever alien to British society, ghettoized in regressive fragmented "minority" communities where they continue to face sexual apartheid and Islamic laws and customs. Their rights are not the highest standards available in society as one would expect but the most regressive and reactionary.

To help ensure that it remains so, the state leaves the running of these Bantustans on the cheap to self-appointed ‘Muslim community’ leaders and ‘consultants on Muslim women’s affairs’ and continues with business as usual in wheeling and dealing with repressive Islamic states. The left, which is the traditional defender of women’s rights, shamelessly endorses the situation as it sees Islam and political Islam as ‘anti-imperialist’.

As a result, no matter what happens - stonings and hangings in city squares in Iran or segregated Stop the War Coalition meetings in Birmingham and the manhandling of Iranian women’s rights activists in Manchester - they are quick to ignore violations of women’s rights. Hand in hand, they excuse and justify Islam and the political Islamic movement at the expense of women and their rights.

Clearly, a rights-based discussion can’t begin with Islam but has to begin with the woman and her rights. In my opinion, you can either defend women or you must defend Islam. You can’t defend both because they are incompatible with and antithetical to each other.

In Islam a woman is sub-human, subservient, vilified and the property of men. To say that women have an elevated position under Islam is an insult to our intellect. Islam has wreaked more havoc, slaughtered more women, and committed more misogyny than can be denied, excused, re-interpreted, or covered up with such feeble defences.

According to the Koran, for example, those who are guilty of an 'indecency' must be 'confined until death takes them away or Allah opens some way for them.' (The Women, 4.15). 'Men are the maintainers of women' and 'good' women are obedient. Those that men fear 'desertion', can be admonished, confined and beaten' (The Women, 4.34). Wives are a 'tilth' for men, which they can go into their 'tilth' when they like (The Cow, 2.223) and on and on.

To say it is a problem of interpretation as some ‘Islamic feminists’ do is at best self-justification of one’s beliefs or at worst the justification of a right wing political Islamic movement, which targets women first and foremost.

Let me give you an example of the absurdity of re-interpretations. On the verse that allows women to be beaten, so-called Islamic feminists say ‘Islam only permits violence after admonishment and confinement and as a last resort. They say, since men would beat their wives mercilessly at that time, this is a restriction on men to beat women more mercifully’ (Women Living Under Muslim Laws, For Ourselves Women Reading the Koran, 1997). Or another says 'In extreme cases, and whenever greater harm, such as divorce, is a likely option, it allows for a husband to administer a gentle pat to his wife that causes no physical harm to the body nor leaves any sort of mark. It may serve, in some cases, to bring to the wife's attention the seriousness of her continued unreasonable behaviour' (Gender Equity in Islam Web Site).

Suffice it to say that misogyny cannot be interpreted to be pro-woman even if it is turned on its head.

Of course everyone has the right to believe anything they choose -- however medieval and reactionary. Moreover, tolerance of the right to hold such beliefs is part and parcel of a civil society but that is very different to allowing beliefs to inform women’s rights or even tolerating the belief itself. Moreover, the question of choice is a questionable one when it comes to this situation.

Of course an adult woman has the right to believe she must be veiled; must be beaten by her husband if she disobeys him; must be given the permission of her male guardian before she can travel or work; is not eligible for certain areas of study or work because of her ‘emotions’; should be stoned if she has sex outside of marriage and so on and so forth.

But if you remove all forms of intimidation and threats by Islamists, Islamic laws, racism, cultural relativism and ghetto-isation, the recruiting grounds for the political Islamic movement, etc., I can assure you that there will be very few women who will want to discuss their rights within the framework of Islam.

That rights are discussed in this way is more of an indication of the strength of the political Islamic movement in this country than anything else. Which is why ‘Islamic feminists’ or ‘consultants on Muslim Women’s affairs’ are more concerned about Islam than the woman and her rights.

Another example of this is their constant attempt at setting limits for who can and can’t discuss ‘Muslim women’s rights’. I thought the whole point of defending rights was to mobilise as much support as you can rather than establishing an exclusive club of the few who are allowed to say anything on the subject!

Anytime anyone discusses women’s status under Islam, s/he is labelled ‘Islamophobic’ and ‘racist’, a ‘white feminist’ supporter who ignores European and US imperialism’s battle over ‘Muslim women’s bodies’, a supporter of the USA’s threats and militarism, a ‘supporter of the war on terror’, and so on and so forth. Not to forget that s/he will be told that there are more important things in the world today -- like poverty or US imperialism (this one crops up all the time), and of course that the crimes of the US government is much worse and must be the main and only focus ...