The Rights of Women in Iran

A disturbing report from the Jerusalem Post‘s Sabrina Amidi:

In a shocking and unprecedented interview, directly exposing the inhumanity of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s religious regime in Iran, a serving member of the paramilitary Basiji militia has told this reporter of his role in suppressing opposition street protests in recent weeks.

He has also detailed aspects of his earlier service in the force, including his enforced participation in the rape of young Iranian girls prior to their execution.

…

He said he had been a highly regarded member of the force, and had so “impressed my superiors” that, at 18, “I was given the ‘honor’ to temporarily marry young girls before they were sentenced to death.”

In the Islamic Republic it is illegal to execute a young woman, regardless of her crime, if she is a virgin, he explained. Therefore a “wedding” ceremony is conducted the night before the execution: The young girl is forced to have sexual intercourse with a prison guard – essentially raped by her “husband.”

“I regret that, even though the marriages were legal,” he said.

Why the regret, if the marriages were “legal?”

The Religion of peace in action

“Because,” he went on, “I could tell that the girls were more afraid of their ‘wedding’ night than of the execution that awaited them in the morning. And they would always fight back, so we would have to put sleeping pills in their food. By morning the girls would have an empty expression; it seemed like they were ready or wanted to die.

Shift back to a post at Stop The ACLU, dated June 23, 2009 a repost by Anne Bayefsky:

And when asked again, “If you do accept the election of Ahmadinejad … without any significant changes in the conditions there, isn’t that a betrayal of what the demonstrators there are working to achieve?” He answered: “We can’t say definitively what exactly happened at polling places.”

And asked again: “Why won’t you spell out the consequences that the Iranian people…” He answered: “Because I think that we don’t know yet how this thing is going to play out.”

And yet again: “Shouldn’t the present regime know that there are consequences?” He answered: “We don’t yet know how this is going to play out.”

The context of Obama’s statements of course, can be found in smaller amounts on any stable floor. That’s clear.

The article goes on:

The president’s storyline that we don’t know what has transpired in Iran is an insult to the intelligence of both Americans and Iranians. Our absence from the polling booths doesn’t mean the results are a mystery. The rules of the election were quite clear. Candidates for president must be approved by the 12-member Council of Guardians. As reported by the BBC, more than 450 Iranians registered as prospective candidates while four contenders were accepted. All 42 women who attempted to run were rejected. So exactly what part of rigged does President Obama not understand?

Instead of denouncing the fake election, President Obama now tells Iranians who are dying for the real thing “the United States respects the sovereignty of the Islamic Republic of Iran.” Whose sovereignty is that? The Hobbesian sovereign thugs running the place? Sovereignty to do what? To deny rights and freedoms to their own people? In a state so bereft of minimal protections for human dignity, why should the sovereignty of such a government be paramount?

But President Obama didn’t want to dwell on the daily reality of sovereign Iran: A criminal code that permits stoning women to death for alleged adultery and hanging homosexuals for the crime of existing. Instead, he repeatedly invoked “respect” for “their traditions and their culture.”

This is a mantra we’ve heard from the left for far too long.  Consider the juxtaposition, of a left who will invariably argue vehemently against traditional western culture and yet will argue for at culture that mandates rape as punishment. Cold Fury notes the same article, and says, angrily:

All the oh-so-tolerant, politically-correct “religion of peace” bullshit in the world can’t erase the stain of a hideous crime like this. And you can bet Western liberal apologists will get busy quick to find a way to either ignore it, or excuse it by saying it has “nothing to do with Islam” or is an isolated incident, a perversion of a noble religion.

But fundamentalist Islam is itself a perversion — and most especially Iran’s theocratic version — its very core being the indulgence of a sick, juvenile sexual insecurity; everything else seems to flow from that diseased center. It is a blight on humanity, and very little else.

Mark Steyn, who is a master of saying it in one line, agrees:

Must be convenient to have a legal code that obliges all your pathologies

I mean, can someone please explain to me why we’re to show any respect whatever to these animals?
And before you start… no, this is not an isolated incident. Amidi points up the long track record with this kind of horror. And the Democrats have their own record of support for the regimes involved.

Eventually, one would hope that liberals… and Feminsits in particular, would catch on to this barbarity, and understand what it is they’re supporting. The recent moves by Obama with Iran, though show otherwise.