Woman Murdered in Iran for Not Wearing a Hijab: Where Are the Feminists?

     Liberal women in America love to talk about how oppressed they are. They are, of course, oppressed by men. But if you compare them to other women around the world, that claim becomes instantaneously absurd. At one time yes, American women did not have a lot of say in the direction of their own lives. But with a lot of blood, sweat, and tears, American women were able oversee their own destinies. We can work, go to school, get married, or not, have children, or not. Our lives are in our hands. But in other corners of the world, nothing could be further from the truth.

     Americans have a basic idea of how women are treated in Muslim countries. The leaders of those countries like to perpetuate the myth that oh yes, everyone is treated equally. That also, couldn’t be further from the truth. A recent event in Iran illustrates exactly what it is like to be a woman in a non-western nation. If you go back and look at pictures taken before the 1979 revolution, you see a very modern society. Women that are dressed in the latest styles of the day, even in bathing suits at the beach. But all that changed as the Mullahs took over and made Iranian women second class citizens. The recent event is the death of Mahsa Amini.

     Mahsa Amini was 22 years old. Mahsa was visiting relatives in Tehran from the town of Sanandaj Kurdistan. Mahsa was walking on the street with her brother, Iranian hardliners like when women have a male escort. She was arrested by the Gasht e Ershad, otherwise known as the morality police. They enforce the strict dress code for women. Mahsa was not wearing her head covering, or hijab correctly, and a bit of her hair was showing. She was thrown into a van and told that she was being taken to the Vozara Detention Center, and then would be sent to “re-education camp.” Gee, what could go wrong at “re-education camp?” While at the detention center, something happened. No one knows exactly what. Mahsa was taken to the hospital. Shortly after she arrived, she was declared brain-dead. The Iranian government insisted that Mahsa was suffering from some sort of pre-existing condition. However, Mahsa’s family says that is not true. Opponents of the Iranian regime say that the morality police often treat violators brutally. And in this case, it was clear that Mahsa Amini was beaten to death.

     The residents of Mahsa Amini’s hometown know what happen to her. They know that this brutal regime beat her to death because a bit of her hair was showing from underneath a hijab. There have been protests in Sanandaj. Women and even men chanting things, like, “Death to the dictator,” “Shame on us, our shame/our Al-Dang leader,” “Death to Khamenei,” Out of these local protests, something amazing has begun to happen. Iranians who have escaped the clutches of this brutal regime are speaking out, making it impossible for the Iranian government to hide what goes on there, and exactly how women are treated any longer.

     Marziyeh Amirizadeh, along with her friend Maryam Rostampour were held in the Vozara detention center in 2009 for professing Christianity and handing out Bibles. The treatment of female prisoners that Marziyeh describes is horrific. Very little food and clean water, sleeping on concrete floors, and subject to verbal and physical abuse. Miraculously, both were released, and Marziyeh has become an American citizen, and is running for a State Representative seat where she lives in Georgia. Speaking recently of the upcoming arrival of Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi to speak at the United Nations she said, “It is so disappointing to see the Biden administration is trying to bury the human rights violations under the nuclear deal negotiations with Iran, appeasing the misogynist and criminal leaders in Tehran, and lifting the sanctions and travel ban on criminal government officials, and their family members who support religious persecution and the enforcement of sharia law. The U.S. government is using our tax money to provide security for Iran’s President, Ebrahim Raisi, who is famous as “the butcher” because of killing many innocent Iranians to attend this month’s session of the UN General Assembly in New York City.”

     Lisa Daftari is a journalist who focuses on Middle Eastern foreign affairs. She raised the most glaring questions in a tweet. She wrote, “Posting this again. And we will tell her story again and again until the west understands that a regime that will kill a young woman for showing a bit of hair should not be acknowledged. They should not be given billions of dollars to continue their butchery inside and outside Iran. The people of Iran are asking for our help. Where are the “humanitarians?” Where are the “feminists?” Where are the so-called champions of global rights? Where is the mainstream media? I guess when they defend Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Taliban, we should expect them to defend the brutal mullahs who have occupied Iran.”

     And where is the mainstream media? It appears that Iranian activist Masih Alinejad at least found CBS “60 Minutes” correspondent Lesley Stahl. She found Stahl interviewing Ebrahim Raisi, and wearing, wait for it, a hijab. Alinejad also took to Twitter to blast Stahl for playing along saying, “…by obeying forced hijab, you legitimize our oppressors to kill more of us.” Marziyeh Amirizadeh also slammed female European politicians who “sweep the truth under the rug.”

     The Biden administration, and their willing accomplices in the mainstream media will not say a word when Iranian President Raisi arrives in the U.S. to speak at the UN. To a President that is the head of the “party of women,” a nuclear deal with Iran that will endanger the entire world is more important than women’s rights.