The Imprisonment of Iranian actresses: Marzieh Vafamehr

The Feminist School – A month ago, Marzieh Vafamehr, an actress and documentary producer was detained and sent to the notorious Gharchak-Varamin prison; a place known as a torture chamber that possesses the bare minimum facilities. Her husband Nasser Taghvaie said that the accusations against his wife are “legal” (according to Sharia law) and not political.

Marzieh Vafamehr’s colleagues, actresses Pegah Ahangarani and Mahnaz Mohammadi are held in ward 209 of Evin prison. Apart from them, more than 30 women are currently held in Evin prison on political charges. Outside Tehran and in Shiraz Maryam Bahreman is still in prison even though she has paid the heavy bail amount.

All these women reflect their generation.

In a note on the Feminist School’s Facebook page Sepideh Yousefzadeh wrote about Marzieh Vafamehr:

I only saw her once in a large crowd. She sat silently and never opened her mouth. She is from the war generation.

The cold revolutionary atmosphere is evident in documentaries on the effects of the Iran-Iraq war on schools in those years. Early morning exercise in the school yard were led by women who wore large glasses and thick scarves (roosari, a form of hijab). They wore long, dark fabrics that reached their ankles (chador, a form of hijab). They had coarse voices and did not smile. They jumped up and down and recited war songs. The students were forced to jump up and down with them.

Through her films Marzieh showed the hustle and bustle of modern Tehran and the suppression of the people, as demonstrated in “My Tehran for Sale”, [written and directed] by Granaz Moussavi. Her films show a different generation in Iran: modern, sophisticated, and full of joy, who possess an urge to show the world their underground music and joys of life. This generation broke taboos and refused to fit the mold. This is the generation that is scared of suppression (crackdowns) but hard to scare. This generation surpassed the revolution and its ideological teachings and the state media and learned to say, “No”.

Women, who make up half the population in Iran, will demonstrate one day that they are more than *”half”.

*Under Iranian (Sharia) law, a woman is treated as half the worth of a man.

Translation: Amnesty International UK Blogs
Edited by: Persian2English