Y, There Are Gay People Iran

Contents:

• WHAT 'S LIKE TO BE GAY IRAN
• Y, THERE ARE GAY PEOPLE IRAN
• IRAN'S PERSECUTN OF GAY MUNY REVEALED
• NFL'S KEV MAXEN COM OUT AS GAY, MAK HISTORY AS FIRST OUT MALE COACH MEN'S PROFSNAL SPORTS
• A BRIEF HISTORY OF LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENR SOCIAL MOVEMENTS
• GAY IRANIAN MAN AD ALLEGED 'HONOR KILLG,' RIGHTS GROUP SAYS

WHAT 'S LIKE TO BE GAY IRAN

Now, a forthg book by a leadg Iranian scholar exile, which tails both the long history of homosexualy that natn and the origs of the mpaign to erase s trac, not only provis a superlative reply to Ahmadejad, but monstrat forcefully that polil homophobia was a Wtern import to a culture which same-sex relatns were wily tolerated and equently celebrated for well over a thoand years. Its thor, Ja Afary, print of the Internatnal Society of Iranian Scholars, is a profsor of history and women's studi at Purdue Universy who has already published several thorative works on Iranian sexual polics, notably the revealg and award-wng "Fouult and the Iranian Revolutn: Genr and the Sctns of Islam" (2005), which she already monstrated a remarkable sympathy for gay and lbian people. In her new book, Afary's extensive sectn on pre-morn Iran, documented by a close readg of ancient texts, portrays the domant form of same-sex relatns as a highly-dified "stat-fed homosexualy, " which an olr man - prumably the active partner sex - acquired a younger partner, or amrad.

Afary monstrat how, this perd, "male homoerotic relatns Iran were bound by l of urtship such as the btowal of prents, the teachg of lerary texts, bodybuildg and ary trag, mentorship, and the velopment of social ntacts that would help the junr partner's reer.

One of her most stunng revelatns is how an Azeri-language newspaper eded and published the Rsian Cc, Molla Nasredd (or MN, which appeared om 1906 to 1931) fluenced this Iranian Revolutn wh a "signifint new disurse on genr and sexualy, " sharg Marx's well-documented ntempt for homosexuals.

Y, THERE ARE GAY PEOPLE IRAN

Wh an edorial board that embraced Rsian social mocratic ncepts, cludg women's rights, MN was also "the first paper the Shi'i Mlim world to endorse normative heterosexualy, " echog Marx's well-documented ntempt for homosexualy. MN nflated homosexualy and pedophilia, and attacked cleril teachers and lears for "moltg young boys, " played upon feelgs of "ntempt" for passive homosexuals, suggted that ele men who kept amrad ncub "had a vted terted matag the (male) homosocial public spac where semi-vert perasty was tolerated, " and "mocked the r of exchangg brotherhood vows before a mollah and pared to a weddg ceremony.

IRAN'S PERSECUTN OF GAY MUNY REVEALED

MN's attacks on homosexualy "would shape Iranian bat on sexualy for the next century, " and "beme a mol for several Iranian newspapers of the era, " which echoed s attacks on the nservative clergy and learship for homosexual practic. In the years that followed, "Iranian revolutnari monly berated major polil figur for their sexual transgrsns, " and "revolutnary leaflets acced adult men of havg homosexual sex wh other adult men, 'of thirty-year-olds proposng fifty-year-olds and twenty-year-olds proposng forty-year-olds, right ont of the Shah. Subsequently, "leadg nstutnalists enthiastilly joed the mpaign agast homosexualy, " wr Afary, notg that "the fluential journal Kaveh (1916-1921), published exile Berl and eded by the famo nstutnalist Hasan Taqizah, had led the movement of opn agast homosexualy...

NFL'S KEV MAXEN COM OUT AS GAY, MAK HISTORY AS FIRST OUT MALE COACH MEN'S PROFSNAL SPORTS

When Reza Kahn overthrew the monarchy's Qajar dynasty and ma himself shah 1925, he hered a new wave of reforms and mornizatn that clud attempts to outlaw homosexualy entirely and a feroc - ultimately succsful - asslt on classil Persian poetry.

"Classil poems were now illtrated by miature patgs celebratg heterosexual, rather than homosexual, love and stunts were led to believe that the love object was always a woman, even when the text directly ntradicted that assumptn, " Arafy wr.

In the ntext of a triumphant censorship that erased om the popular llective memory the enormo lerary and cultural herage of what Afary terms "the ethics of male love" the classil Persian perd, is hardly surprisg as Afary earlier noted "Fouult and the Iranian Revolutn" that the vilence of the current Iranian regime's anti-homosexual reprsn stems part om the role homosexualy played the 1979 revolutn that brought the Ayatollah Khomei and his followers to power.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENR SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

In "Sexual Polics Morn Iran, " Afary sums up the suatn for homosexuals unr the Ahmadejad regime this way: "While the shari'a [Islamic law] requir eher the actual nfsn of the acced or four wns who observed them flagrante licto, today's thori look only for medil evince of peratn homosexual relatnships.

GAY IRANIAN MAN AD ALLEGED 'HONOR KILLG,' RIGHTS GROUP SAYS

In this necsarily tnted summary of some of Afary's most signifint and nuanced fdgs and revelatns wh rpect to homosexualy, is impossible to do jtice to the full sweep and spe of "Sexual Polics Iran, " the larger part of which is voted to the role of Iranian women, and to their stggl for eedom which began the 19th century. Tehran, the pal cy of Iran, was once scribed the 70s by Jerry Zar (an Amerin profsor who ed to teach Tehran) as a sexual paradise, one that provid him wh the most excg time of his life which he wasn’t nstraed by Wtern rtrictns and homophobia. Due to the lack of documents about homosexualy durg pre-Islamic Persia, they propagated the ia that this culture was an novatn that took place Islamized Persia and we, as te heirs of the Persians of the past, mt not tolerate .

The fact that a few people who were associated wh the royal fay were gay – such as the queen’s drs signer, Keyvan Khosravani – created the image, propagated by the opposn, that the Shah was importg palistic cultur om the Wt, at the peak of which stood the unholy act of sodomy. However, Khomei’s hatred for gay people was only rivaled by his ttatn for irrelig mglg between men and women, which led to the plete dismantlg of mixed-sex spac the 1980s and the return to old-fashned same-sex environments.