I recently made a remark about taking the Islamic out of the Islamic Republic. That caused some criticism and even offense. It pays to be specific.
If you read Mousavi’s latest statement, you will see that he goes to great lengths to emphasize that he and his supporters have absolutely no intention of taking the Islamic out of the Islamic Republic. In fact, quite to the contrary, Mousavi argues that it is more Islamic to treat the voters with respect than it is to make up fake election returns. And that is all fine and dandy. But, the truth is that the Mousavi supporters are in the streets chanting ‘death to the dictator.’ And the dictator, in this example, is the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ali Khamenei. The situation has morphed, whether Mousavi likes it or not, into a revolutionary situation.
Now, it’s true that Mousavi’s supporters represent a broad and deep swath of Iranian society and that most of them probably are motivated less by the idea of upsetting the Iranian Constitution than by the idea of abiding by it. Moreover, most of them probably think that it is more consistent with Islamic principles to count the votes than to disregard them. But, the actions of the Iranian government have undermined their credibility. At the very minimum, the protesters want the Supreme Leader replaced (they are calling for his death, after all). And, since the principles of the reform movement heavily implicate the entire system of the Mullahocracy, it seems plain that they don’t just want to swap out one Mullah for another. They want a truer form of representative democracy that is not subject to the vetoes of the clerics.
They would argue that such a republic was more Islamic than the one they currently have. But, I would argue that it isn’t the adherence to Islamic principles that makes Iran’s Republic Islamic, but the control granted to the clerics that makes it so.
It’s a semantic argument, in part. But, give Iran a true Republic, and I won’t care whether someone wants to debate its Islamic credentials.
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Do not underestimate the role of women and women’s rights underwriting the demonstration and protests against president Ahmadinejad and Ayatollah Khamenei. Presidential candidate Mousavi was the first to campaign sise by side with his spouse Zahra Rahnavard …
Zahra Rahnavard has taken a visible role in the campaign. (cnn)This is a peculiarly modern “revolution,” where the call is not to overturn the Islamic system but for young people, and not only the young, to have a private life and speak freely to their companions, to play popular music and freely see and make movies – for girls to let their hair escape from under the veil and wear a touch of cosmetics.
It might be called a pre-political revolt. The countries this kind of revolt will eventually affect most, after Iran, will be Saudi Arabia and the other Muslim countries that are at the same time rich and repressive and suffer hypocritical male ruling elites.
The increasingly bizarre Col. Muammar Gaddafi of Libya visited Italy last week, accompanied by his bodyguard of Amazons. He asked to speak on women’s rights to an audience of a hundred prominent Italian women. The audience was assembled and the colonel said that it was absurd that in some Muslim countries women had to ask the chief of state for the right to drive a car. He said that’s something “their husbands or brothers should decide” – and seemed taken aback by the wave of laughter that followed.
Can you be an observant Muslim woman and drive a car, or wear cosmetics, or work outside the home? There are observant Christian and Jewish women, and Muslim women as well, who do this in the Western or Westernized countries. But Israel has thousands of strictly observant Orthodox Jewish women who accept a role not unlike that of Muslim women. Nuns have always played a vital role in the Catholic Church, although they at least rule their own convents and ways of life. This is a deep cultural matter, and an individual choice of life – so long as it is not arbitrarily, and forcibly, imposed.
West ‘seeks Iran disintegration’
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."I think the argument is about the form of theocracy. Right now the form, for all its nominal aristocracy of the grand ayatollahs, has become an autocracy of the Supreme Leader with the President functioning in a prime minister role. There are folks in the streets seeking democracy.
To use more familiar terms as an analogy, the current system is papal; the reformers seek presbyters. No doubt there is the analog of a congregationalist movement going on also. The analogy only goes to the religious politics going on, not to any controversies over doctrine. You see theocracy finally is not a form of government but a system that privileges adherents to a religion. To the extent that Israel intends to be a Jewish religious state in addition to being a Jewish ethnic state, Israel seeks to be a theocracy, one that is either aristocratic (rabbinical) or democratic.
To take Islam out of the Islamic Republic would be to demythologize Ruhollah Khomeini. Given the players, that is not likely to happen; it would be too much of a confession of error on their part.
The American Revolution occurred in a culture traumatized by religious war–thus its fundamental secular character. The Iranian revolution occurred in a culture traumatized by the forced secularization imposed by the shah–thus its fundamental religious character. Reality is more complicated, but those are two threads.
Now that I’ve offended everybody, I’ll stop.
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It appears Iran has changed to a military led dictatorship similar to Egypt with Mubarak, Pakistan under Musharraf and Saudi Arabia under monarchy rule. The election is bogus and framed for the outside world.
Revolutionary guard warns Iran protesters to be ‘prepared for confrontation’
(UNHCR) Feb. 2, 2009 – Alfoneh, a visiting research fellow at AEI, anticipates that the Islamic Republic will continue to transform “from a theocracy, governed [and] ruled by the clergy and guarded by the Revolutionary Guards,” into “a system which is both ruled and guarded by former officers of the Revolutionary Guards.”
Arash Sigarchi, former editor of Gilan Emrooz, the major newspaper of Gilan province, and founder of the blog Kanjarda al Tajab, or Window of Anguish, speculated that, “if you at this very moment ask Mr. Ahmadinejad or [Supreme Leader] Ayatollah Khomeini to which direction Islamic Republic is going, I am very sure that they have no idea.”
In reviewing the last three decades, Sigarchi, who came to the United States in 2007 after his latest release from prison, described a continual shrinking of the political freedoms enjoyed by Iranians, especially regarding freedom of speech and freedom of the press, but also concerning free and fair elections. Sigarchi believes incumbent authorities remain firmly in control in Tehran. “They [Iran’s leaders] use every method in order to preserve their power – any method – like mass killings in the 1980s, imprisonment and torture in the 1990s, and a militarist atmosphere in the current era.”
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."Here are a few good links I’ve found. (I’ve found it remarkably hard to find informative pieces providing background.) Sorry I don’t have time to give any extracts.
‘Color’ revolution fizzles in Iran
What Actually Happened in the Iranian Presidential Election?
Iran, Social Media and the Rise of Genetically Modified Grassroots Organizations:
The Fog Machine
It should be noted that Obama has been acting like a true statesman here, which is more than can be said for the leaders of the UK, France, and Germany.
This didn’t help. The statement is still unfortunate on a number of levels. It is no less offensive than it was before you “explained” it, it is still illogical in exactly the same way it was before, it still ignores the very real possibility that Iranians could remove the current regime and remain an Islamic republic with pretty much the same, or somewhat different, structure.
If it is a semantic argument, then your semantics are badly flawed and you need to rethink them.
“give Iran a true Republic, and I won’t care whether someone wants to debate its Islamic credentials.“
I am sure Muslims and Iranians everywhere are trilled to know this.
I’m actually in agreement with Hurria on this.
No, not at all. It is entirely up to Muslims to define what is and is not Islamic. If I rejected Jerry Falwell and his ilk defining for me what it is to be a Christian and if I reject Rush Limbaugh and his ilk defining for me what it is to be an American – and I do, emphatically – then I all the more reject non-Muslims defining for Muslims what is and is not Islamic.
I also agree with Hurria on this (and I don’t agree with him all that often).
Her.
Sorry. I don’t agree with HER all that often.