Wednesday 16 December 2009

We are all Majid Tavakoli

Majid Tavakoli is a student leader in Iran, who has been arrested several times by the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence, most recently on 7 December 2009, during protests over the disputed presidential election of 2009.

After his December 7, 2009 arrest, semi-official news websites published photos of Tavakoli dressed in women's clothing, taken while he was in custody. These media claimed he was arrested dressed in "women's clothing" to avoid the security forces while escaping Amirkabir University in Tehran. Eyewitnesses present at the time of his arrest have denied these claims and stated that he was forced to put the hijab on while in custody by the security forces, to discredit and ridicule him.

In solidarity with Tavakoli, some Iranian men are taking pictures of themselves while wearing the Islamic hijab, which is compulsory for women in Iran. They are calling for an end to Iran’s mistreatment of prisoners like Tavakoli. Their protest is also in solidarity with women in their fights for equal rights. One message echoed by many Iranian men is "Until Iranian women are free, Iran will not be free. Iranian men: let's begin wearing the chador in solidarity with Majid AND the WOMEN of Iran". (More at Wikipedia)









































Women are also expressing their solidarity with Tavakoli by drawing moustaches and beards on their faces and putting on the hijab.

Join the protest on Facebook!

4 comments:

Ainur Elmgren said...

WHY are Iranian men so handsome?

bubu said...

Persialaisia!

Rozmin said...

Agree about the handsome. :-)

I just love how this keeps snowballing. I'll bet that the government is wishing they had responded differently when this was still an election protest, not a regime protest. But then again, such a regime doesn't know a response other than violence I guess.

Anonymous said...

Handsone boys indeed