If you go
What: Understanding Iran’s Feminist Revolution
When: 6 p.m. Thursday, April 20
Where: UW-L Centennial Hall room 1309
Cost: Free
By: Emily Pyrek
https://lacrossetribune.com/users/profile/emily%20pyrek/
The death of Mahsa Amini at the hands of “morality police” last fall drew global attention to the plight of Iranian women, leading to the defiant removal of hijabs in a show of feminism.
Amini, who was Kurdish Iranian, died Sept. 16, 2022, after being detained for wearing her head scarf in a fashion that allegedly exposed some of her hair, against the government dress code. Her beating sparked outrage, yet Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has maintained the hijab is a “religious necessity” and a “legal matter” that women must “adhere to.”
An opinion article published in the Washington Post two weeks after Amini’s death by Iranian American journalist Masih Alinejad and titled “Women are leading a revolution in Iran. When will Western feminists help?” sparked American Association of University Women La Crosse board member Erica Koonmen to ponder “What can we, in a fairly small Midwestern town, possibly do to show these women that they are not alone?”
Explained Koonmen: “Women are leading the new popular uprising against one of the main pillars of the Islamic Republic of Iran: compulsory hijab. They are facing guns and bullets and demanding an end to a system of gender apartheid. … Alinejad (took) Western feminists to task for failing to show support for both the women in Iran and in Afghanistan, also fighting for basic rights.”
The call for allyship led the association, in partnership with the diversity, equity and inclusion programs at Western Technical College and Viterbo University and UW-La Crosse’s Racial, Gender and Sexuality Department, to form the Women Supporting Women Globally initiative. A series of programs to raise awareness and show solidarity with the women and girls of Iran and Afghanistan, the initiative kicked off last month with a screening of “Persepolis” and will continue Thursday with a talk by UW-L assistant professor Sona Kazemi.
At 6 p.m. April 20, Kazemi will present “Understanding Iran’s Feminist Revolution,” discussing the oppression she experienced during her childhood and teen years in Iran, her ongoing advocacy, and why the support of individuals worldwide is needed to help “overthrow the Islamic state” so Iranians can “build democracy and gender equality for themselves.”
Kazemi was raised in the Islamic Republic, a gender apartheid state where girls and women were treated as “less than human,” Kazemi said.
“One way in which the state does that is by using the veil, the hijab,” said Kazemi. “Hijab is not just a piece of fabric in Iran — it’s a social marker that you are a second-class citizen.”
When Kazemi started school, she was required to wear a hijab, and while she didn’t realize its meaning at the time, she recognized only the girls had to be covered. At age 14, Kazemi was walking when three people jumped out of a mini-bus, took hold of her and shoved her in the vehicle.
“I knew at that time it was the morality police,” Kazemi said. “Mahsa Amini was grabbed and killed in a detention center. I am amplifying her voice because I could have been her. I want to acknowledge the fact that every woman is in danger of dying at the hands of the morality police every day in Iran. It’s not the odd occurrence.”
Kazemi was held at what translates to a “center for the fight against political corruption” for seven hours, without food or access to a bathroom. After convincing the guards to give her a list of phone numbers for the families of those detained, she called each contact. Kazemi’s dad was the one to pick her up, and he “blamed me for being arrested.”
“He’s an open-minded person and he knew what happened to me was terrible,” Kazemi said. “But at the same time, he was trying to tell me that if I had covered myself better, this wouldn’t have happened to me. But there were women who were arrested with me that were so covered you couldn’t even see a strand of hair. So it makes me so mad when people say Mahsa Amini was arrested for bad veiling. No, Mahsa Amini was arrested for being a woman. And that’s the mistake that people make.”