Iranian Women, Ayatollah: A Genesis of the Iranian Demonstrators
Jun 19th, 2009 | 8 responses
My dear Iranian women students:
It’s me, your teacher from long ago. I was still a struggling doctoral student back then when your fathers, wanting their beloved daughters to have an American education, sent you across the ocean to the small USA college where I had my very first job as a teacher. It was 1976. And there was tension between our countries. But education seemed the miraculous bridge that united us.
…and today in Iran, I see your children and your grandchildren in the streets.
How impressed I was with your fathers back in 1976. As you gathered in my class, I felt I could see the spirits of your mothers and fathers standing behind you, willing you to learn, not standing in the way, not putting stones on your heads.
This touched me deeply, that your fathers, who at that time were the patrons and gatekeepers of the family, wanted your minds and spirits to be free and filled the wild ideas, for you to shape your own lives to match your greatest moral desires for your own people…
I have never forgotten you– nor that your fathers, especially, as you told me time and again– wanted you to be friends with people from the United States who were also bent on education and learning. Your instinct were good. You came to the right place and people in the USA who did not fear ‘the stranger,’ who thought we, as we thought you, had much to love, and much to offer one another…
… and today in Iran, I see your children and your grandchildren in the streets.
And I remember too, how each of you dear souls, from the beginning through to the end of the semester told me time and again what good and gracious things you would do in social work, in psychology, in helping to develop instead of cut the spirit born into all children, how you planned to help relieve the torments of various classes of Iranian people, how you would shape and build a new day in Iran for family life and intellectual life, and the life of honor of storytelling and the crafts of the hands.
I remember how excited you were at semester’s end, to return home with your armloads of education that had validated your mind and soul’s best instincts.
I found your longing to go home and begin work astonishing too… for so many of my students from other nations wanted to stay in the USA permanently. What was about it you, you bevy of beautiful young women with long shiny black hair and sloe eyes gentle like those of deers… what was it about you that had no magnet inside grab-attaching to the steel of America, but instead you had a homing device that spoke Iran, Iran, Iran.
…and today in Iran, I find with certainty, these are your children and your grandchildren in the streets of Iran. They are the fruit from the tree of your lives as young, impassioned, ace-smart, hard working, heartfelt women.
We talked so often about the prisons built by old men for the young in Iran and elsewhere in the world. You spoke of the big guards that the old men conscript to cover their frail bodies with muscles not belonging to them… to give the appearance of power that is not theirs, but rather purloined by amassing the physical prowess of others, and augmenting that with ill-gained weaponry.
You were awake and aware, and spoke incessantly about how you would instead create a kind of ‘parallel culture’ and keep it fully alive and flowing beneath the ruinous culture of bearded old men— ayatollahs who are not religious holy men of Islam, not teaching the heart, but are political Islamists in black robes, spending far more time finger-pointing and unleashing death on others, rather than showing radiant Allahu in action… through human endeavors of mercy, nourishment, creative acts…
Seeing now, dear students from long ago, your children and grandchildren in the streets of Iran this day, fearing for you and your kin, praying deeply for you, knowing over these years how you have built a city beneath the city of Tehran: I know you, and I know your mental toughness and prayerful hearts.
We spoke of this many times, and you to your honor, have lived it: we know we can live in true heart and spirit, even under oppression of someone close up and daily; we can bear up under it and keep going and do what goodness we do, and urge courage into others, even going underground when necessary to keep the spirit of women and the spirit of men alive in a sundered world.
Last night I listened to the audio recording of your sons and daughters, your grandsons and granddaughters, calling in the dark from rooftop to rooftop in Tehran… from one rooftop came the cry Allahu, from another rooftop the response in the night: Akbar. “Allahu” “Akbar” “Allahu” “Akbar…”
This you taught me, that this phrase of ‘The One,’ and that the One is ‘Great,’ is used in times of happiness and joy, when one wishes to encourage others, or to express validation of action and words of another, when wishing to praise a thought or a thinker, when in struggle, it is also a battle cry.
Just this one act alone last night in Tehran, with call and response chant from rooftop to rooftop tells me your grace and visionary stances are alive in your children and grandchildren, that you absolutely fulfilled the promises you averred to bring forth, long long ago.
May your fathers and mothers and you and all your offspring live long. And for all the reasons listed above: “Allahu” “Akbar…”
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8 Responses to “Iranian Women, Ayatollah: A Genesis of the Iranian Demonstrators”
Yes. The protesters cry Allahu Akbar. In emulation of Islamic Revolutionaries that overthrew the American-backed Shah.
Mousavi is a gentler, kinder face of Persian Shia Islam, but, per Daniel Larison, it's Moslems not Zorasterians out there in the streets.
As your post inadvertantly points out, the Greens in Iran are not secular; they see Ahmadinejad & Ayatollah Ali K as betraying the Islamic Revolution, not forcing it on them. They seek reform not overthrow. Not necessarily a bad thing, but it's still political Islam. The Ayatollahs are not going away. If we're lucky, they will eventually become something like the equivalent of the English monarchy/House of Lords/Church of England prelates.
Btw, h/t to @t3knomser for the latter trope.
When I was in the Academy of Art (San Francisco), one semester, late at night, I received a phone call from one of the other students.
).
She was Iranian and literally begged to come over to my house.
She needed to speak to me.
It was not a good time in Iran and she was “in a lot of trouble.”
I still don't understand all the “why's” of what happened that put her and her best friend into so much trouble but I do know that overnight (ok, exaggeration – it was 3 days), all the Iranian students were pulled out of the school and sent home.
My friend showed up and asked if I would marry her friend, Achmad (sp?).
And, did I know any man that could or would marry her.
Even as she sat in my living room asking me this rather bizarre thing, my phone started to ring, and there were more requests. More Iranian students asking about marriage…etc.
The woman I'm referring to, the one sitting in my living room, was a “modern” Iranian woman. She did not wear the veil and was having lots of fun with makeup and experimenting with new hairstyles.
She used birth control.
She loved to dance to any type of music but most especially she, at that time, liked dancing to punk rock (I did too, it was a short lived love but ya know)…
She was actively bisexual.
She smoked cigarettes (not often, but she did).
I couldn't swear to it but as I remember, she had a beer at my house once.
She was a woman with a deeply philosophical nature and was forever inquiring into different political ideologies and, which system worked best for who in what area of the world, was something she spoke about often.
She was endlessly fascinated by the different cultures that San Francisco was home to.
She really loved the City. She spent hours every day just walking around San Francisco to “watch” all the people.
She loved to go out and party at the gay bars (my apologies to the het's but in 1980 the best dance floors were to be found at the gay bars
She informed me that once she was sent home, her “modern lifestyle” would no longer be tolerated. Things had changed since she left and now, she would go home and be forced to live a life she no longer felt to be hers.
I thought I understood and expressed my regret and concern over her situation but I was at a loss.
What could I do?
I mean, in less than a half an hour I had many other students calling asking if I would either marry them, or a friend of theirs and frankly, I would lose most of my student support if I married one of these guys (most of these men came from families with money which would truly complicate me receiving scholarships, grants, etc) so …?
As for my buddy herself..
I didn't know any male citizens that were up for marriage of any kind, much less one involving politics.
(I truly didn't .. I did try calling around and asking though .. nada).
Well, she lost it. She became hysterical. She was sobbing and pulling her hair screaming, “I won't be able to chose my husband! I will never be able to leave the house without a male in tow! My father says we have to go back to how it used to be or we'll be killed! You don't understand!”
My significant other (Linda) grabbed the woman and held her still until she calmed down (looking at me with this look of, “WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE?”).
Linda apologized to Achmad but explained that she couldn't help out. Linda was Mexican and although she had been here since she was seven years old, she wasn't a citizen so, a marriage to her would possibly do more damage than good.
I explained, “If I marry you, all of student grants, loans and even my scholarship will come under question and, frankly, you can't support my college career….or can you?”
Achmad sighed and said, “No. My father might be able to come up with ten thousand dollars to pay you to marry me but dad feels that supporting me is more than enough. He'd never agree to support my wife through college as well.”
So, no. This was not doable either.
After a few hours of trying to figure out what could be done (which was a gesture in futility if ever there was one), my buddy and her male friend left, very depressed and very upset.
Linda was quiet for days after this occurrence.
I found her reaction to the situation a bit odd.
Linda was one of the most down to earth, pragmatic, stoic women I had ever met. She loved to laugh but she would eat nails before she would cry.
She was acting like a woman in mourning.
I decided it was best to allow Linda to process this issue on her own and kept quiet.
However, two weeks later and Linda still wasn't talking, I finally asked her when was she going to get over this issue.
She told me, “I'm not really sure Chris.. I just keep thinking that I would rather die than be actually forced to return to Mexico.”
She then broke into tears.
Now, twenty eight to thirty years later, I'm not sure how to feel about the incident.
I keep wondering why I didn't marry that fellow. At the time, I kept thinking, “My college? What about my college,” and then, “marriage regardless of reason or reality (i.e. he and I would not have had a “real” marriage) can turn ugly very quickly…”
Now I sit and wonder how many of those students returned and were unhappy for the rest of their lives or were they unhappy?
Did they think they would be unhappy but when they got home, they found that it wasn't what they thought it would be and that actually it felt good to be home?
Did they go home and readjust?
And…
Where are they today?
Did those who really didn't “fit in” when they got back home manage to live through some of the madness that's occurred over there and did they make it to the streets the other night?
I'll never know for sure about the woman who came to my house but I was told that after arriving home and then trying in every way she possibly could to come back to the states, that six months later she committed suicide.
I don't know for sure though.
I'll never know …
I think about Linda and how she reacted…
“forced to go return ..”
(Shakes head)
It is ironic.
Before even finishing college (one class short) I would suffer a massive breakdown and get diagnosed with a psych disability and then wind up living in a VA hospital for the better part of seven years (8 months here, 3 months there, 7 months here.. altogether it actually adds up to seven years .. I'm amazed when I think about it for too long).
so, in truth, it wouldn't have mattered a bit if I had married that fellow.
I shoulda done it and at least he would have had more choices in his life.
I feel a deep, sad guilt over the whole thing.
I often cry for Iran. She suffers so.
I also know that there is at least one person over there that I could helped to make their life different and I made a choice that may have helped to make his life a misery.
I hope he's done well though ..
I hope for my buddy that she made it too.
I hope they all are well but fear they are not.
my two cents (and that's just about what my rambling is worth) LOL
Ghost
dear TinyDoctor:
” If we're lucky, they will eventually become something like the equivalent of the English monarchy/House of Lords/Church of England prelates.”
Thank you td. From your heart to God's mind.
dr.e
Dear Ghost,
thank you for the story out of/from your life. We have these 'lessons' that unfold suddenly in our lives. They become teaching points, reference points, over and over, seeing something different, hopefully more useful, each time… even though the examination seems to 'have to' open old scar tissue.
That we can still be affected by past hopes informed by current knowledge… those 'wish I could have, wanted to but couldnt figure out how, didnt have the resources, couldnt find the help needed, was so helpless, and often unknowing”… that we can still be affected, is a mark. Not of wrong. Rather of holding on to humanity despite our helplessness of the time. That we have still held to it, even though it or we might look awfully ragged at times.
I dont now that we get over 'remembering being helpless and the thoughts and feelings that go with it…” but often, we do not waste those memories by blowing them off, by diminutizing them, devaluing their magnitudes… but neither letting them lead all of our lives leaving a pall over us… neither of those.
Just remembered when remembered, and hopefully we can find ways to put the past to good/better/excellent use here and now. Like telling the story Ghost. Someone who needs it might see it, likely so. We never know, regardless of who diverts or scorns or throws away anyone's story, who will pick it up and dust it off and know and need its exact use.
Peace with you.
dr.e
Doc,
Thank you very much for your kindness.
Your voice remains a constant reminder that our sorrow is not suffered in vain.
Somewhere, someplace, it does matter and it does make a difference.
Many blessings,
Ghosty
A Poem from the rooftops of Iran: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKUZuv6_bus
I grew up with a lot of Persians (Dearborn MI). Such a land of poets.
xoxox