Iran arrests 300 ‘insufficiently veiled’ women

[MH1]

Source: MSNBC.com

TEHRAN, Iran - With the arrival of spring, Iranian police have launched a crackdown against women accused of not covering up enough, arresting nearly 300 women, some for wearing too tight an overcoat or letting too much hair peek out from under their veil, authorities said Monday.

The campaign in the streets of major cities was the toughest such crackdown in nearly two decades, raising fears that hard-liner President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad intends to re-impose the tough Islamic Revolution-era constraints on women's dress that loosened in past years.

The move highlighted the new boldness among hard-liners in Ahmadinejad's government, which has used mounting Western pressure on Tehran over its nuclear program and Iraq as a pretext to put down internal dissent.



Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18277927/

[Deep13]

1. Thank gawd they stopped that horrible crime spree!

:mad:

I guess the Iranian roller derby team never had a chance.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. I'm wondering if they are still persecuting Sufis in Iran

they bulldozed down a Sufi center in Qum and arrested about 1000 peaceful protesters.

[icymist]

18. I am sadden to hear of this.

:cry:

[Bicoastal]

3. I've heard enough...

...let's unilateraly invade their country under false pretenses! It's the only way they'll learn...

[MH1]

5. ??

Maybe we ought to think about developing relationships that promote an environment of tolerance and equal rights.

Maybe the US government ought not do things that cause people to support the hardliners.

But it's not like anyone here would care about women's rights anyway. Yes, let's unilaterally invade...that REALLY helped the women in Iraq, after all. :eyes:

[LostinVA]

7. I believe Bicoastal is being sarcastic

[Bicoastal]

9. You believe correctly...

Wow, I can't believe a fellow DU'er thought I was being serious.

Oh well, no harm done. :hi:

[MH1]

11. Actually I recognized sarcasm...

but I did think the tone was misplaced. What the article reports is very serious, and while not grounds for invasion (not like the * administration would use women's rights as sole grounds for it anyway), it does show that Iran is not a nice place to be under its current administration.

Maybe I just misinterpreted the direction of your sarcasm. Sorry! :)

[SayWhatYo]

28. There is no wrong place for sarcasm...

In my opinion :P

[Warpy]

4. Yeah, and when the morality cops leave the area

the veils get pushed back again. Young folks are in full rebellion in Iran, and if we could get Dummy to shut his fat, stupid gob for the next two years, Ahmedinejad would be out on his bony ass and the mullahs would be worried for their jobs.

There is tremendous pressure there to secularize. Without Stupid and his weenie wagging, NOBODY would support the hard liners except some of the more backwards country folks.

[Roland99]

13. Gee, your last line sounds like you're talking about HERE!

:)

[ohio2007]

21. He was mayor of Tehran,the people who voted him into office

are living off the state while inflation shrinks the middle class into a lifeless state of poverty. He was elected president with promises to feed the poor. Doing that costs money.

whack jobs saber rattling with Britain got a $10 spike per barrel of oil. That will get them only so far until he has to saber rattle up another $5 bbl spike in oil to float the govt accounting books for another fiscal quarter I suppose.

[CJCRANE]

6. Seems to me like

the police are also committing a sin if they're deliberately looking at women to see if they're dressed correctly...

[proud2BlibKansan]

8. This is the #1 email from our war mongering friends this week

Here is what to send as a response:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=740035&mesg_id=740035

Don't fall for the hype. Yes, they treat their women poorly but that certainly doesn't justify a US invasion.

[MH1]

12. It's insane

to think this would be a basis for invasion!

But I guess I shouldn't expect sanity from wingnuts.

This action by Iran *is* awful, though.

[proud2BlibKansan]

14. Oh I am sure this won't be their only piece of propaganda

It's just one part of their smear Iran machine.

[MH1]

16. "Propaganda"? - do you think this didn't happen?

Iran *is* a bad place, sorry to say.

That doesn't justify an invasion by the US, of course. But I don't think reporting about something like this is a "smear" if it is true. Why not talk about reasonable and helpful responses to the repression of women in places in Iran? It's not like the * administration can point to Afghanistan and Iraq as shining examples of how invasion by the US beneifts women. Well I guess they can if they lie about it. Okay, they always lie, so they will. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't recognize the behavior of Iran's leaders as problematic when it is.

Gee, I wondered why no one had posted this in LBN before I got to it - that almost never happens. I guess now I know.

[proud2BlibKansan]

17. It is propaganda in the sense that it feeds

their need to justify war with Iran. It is just one piece of their smear attack.

Adultery is punished by death in Saudi Arabia. But have you heard the war mongers talking about that?

[MH1]

19. I have heard many awful "legal practices" in certain countries.

Not the Saudi Arabia thing recently. But Iran cracking down on the dress code is being reported because it is a change. Has Saudi Arabia changed their practice lately?

[proud2BlibKansan]

20. That may be the reason it is being reported

But the rw war mongers are having a field day with it. It fits nicely into their "We need to bomb Iran" agenda.

[MH1]

22. True, and that is sick.

War mongers will latch onto anything. Never mind that invading Iran will NOT help this problem. (If we were worried about women's rights why would we overthrow a secular dictator - Saddam - to theoretically install a "democracy" in a country that is majority Shia?)

[The Stranger]

27. Have you been to that "bad place"? If so, when?

Know the people there?

[ohio2007]

30. you don't have have "been there" when net bloggers get the word out

(1of6) A 16 Year Old Iranian Girl Executed by Islamic Police


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jqQVqsOw4U&mode=related&search=

it's gonna suck being a woman a generation from now.

[The Stranger]

33. I see -- so you've never been there either?

Or know any of the people living there?

[ohio2007]

35. I take it by your defending the Iranian regime that you are a citizen of Iran ?

I have talked to Iranians using the ICQ software. They were in a coffee shop (internet cafe) in Tehran.
That was waaayy before the current 'glorious' leader of Iran was even a mayor of Tehran.

Those students have since dropped off the ICQ radar screen.

You can talk to anybody who has family or friends in just about any country.
Some can speak and type in English;

http://baghdadee.ipbhost.com/

Just an example of a forum message board with members who are very interested in Iraq.




Can't find the link to an Iranian forum message board I stumbled on. It went down a few months ago...

..go figger

[The Stranger]

36. So you've never actually BEEN to Iran?

Just talked to some random group of people on the internet? Never been there to meet the people that the current criminal regime and its Neocon supporters seek to bomb, and likely "shock and awe," using propaganda about an entire nation that is -- at best -- a laughable caricature of its true self?

[ohio2007]

37. ...strange....

you talk to random strangers over the internet that post at DU.
Have you ever BEEN OUT of the US ?


eom

[SayWhatYo]

31. When a non-American is critical of the US, do you ask them the same questions?

[The Stranger]

34. When a criminal, totalitarian administration is inundating the masses with war propaganda, and the

issue is the target of that war propaganda -- stories and ideas strategically and intentionally issued seeking to mobilize the populace to disengage people's natural inclination not to kill others by dehumanizing an entire nation of millions of other people -- then, yes, I ask them the same questions.

[CJCRANE]

15. It wouldn't be the basis

for an invasion but these sort of stories are emphasised to create a consensus that Iran is a "bad place" and that we'd be doing them a favor by invading them and overthrowing their rulers. (The actual casus belli will be some kind of trumped up incident).

The same thing was done against Afghanistan and Iraq. There are approx 57 muslim majority countries but the MSM only concentrates on one or two at a time depending on which ones are villains du jour. Not to mention there are many other non-muslim countries too that have human rights problems that we never hear about because they're not politically topical.

[piedmont]

10. Shameless hussies!

[youngdem]

23. I wish someone would do that around here

:hide:




:sarcasm: sort of

[IsItJustMe]

24. And this is why we fight. Sure glad those Iraqi woman are feeling the freedom we brought them.

[Bacchus39]

25. no more spring break in Iran???

n/t

[ohio2007]

29. oh, I thought it would be the "Girls gone wild" middle east video

where they show a finger or expose a toe or two .



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=py-0UoHlbFg

[The Stranger]

26. What about the Spartans?

This is that movie -- right?

[madville]

32. Oppression based on religion, there's a new one

I guess the women of Iran should be thankful they don't have to be circumcized (they don't do they ?), at least they have that going for 'em.

[ends_dont_justify]

38. It doesn't seem very masculine to openly admit you dislike looking at women

What, is their religion that of strong homosexuality?

[ohio2007]

39. the world's first "women's town," where men get punished for disobedience,

I don't think they are after the muslim tourist market

Women's town" to put men in their place

.....
.... "women's town," was based on the local traditional concept of "women rule and men obey," a tourism official told Reuters.

"Traditional women dominate and men have to be obedient in the areas of Sichuan province and Chongqing, and now we are using it as an idea to attract tourists and boost tourism," the official, surname Li, said by telephone.

The tourism bureau planned to invest between 200 million yuan ($26 million) and 300 million yuan in infrastructure, roads and buildings, Li said.

"We welcome investors from overseas and nationwide to invest in our project," he added.

.....
snip


http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070426/od_nm/china_womentown_odd_dc_1

Don't expect Saudi oil barons to line up as investors ;)