SATISH SHARMA - not just Rotigraphy.: Iranian women are strong and have spent decades fighting for themselves while building careers, movements, and communities. Reducing them to helpless, voiceless figures is ridiculous and unforgivable.

https://x.com/UnboundedVoice/status/2058010291699413107

As an Iranian woman who lived in Iran for 19 years, I grew up wanting to become a surgeon. I never once heard in Iran that surgery was “for men.” Ironically, the first time I heard certain STEM fields or specialties being treated as more suitable for men was after moving to the United States.

Being this uninformed is surprising, Alice. It is irresponsible, unprofessional, and dehumanizing toward Iranian women. We are far more capable than what you see on your Twitter feed.

Iran has serious issues involving women’s rights and legal restrictions, but presenting Iranian women as secluded figures who are barely allowed outside is a caricature closer to Taliban Afghanistan than reality. 

Iranian women are educated, visible, and active across society. The World Bank reports female youth literacy in Iran at about 99% for ages 15 to 24, which directly contradicts the image of women isolated from education or public life.

According to the World Bank Gender Data Portal, women’s formal labor-force participation in Iran is low, around 13 to 14%, while men’s is around 67%. That gender gap is real. But labor-force participation only measures paid work or active job-seeking. Research also suggests women’s informal, family-based, agricultural, and unpaid work may be undercounted. Using that number to portray Iranian women as secluded or invisible locked up in their homes is misleading.

If you want to discuss life for Iranian women, talk about how sanctions affect access to cancer diagnosis and treatment, including breast cancer care, since breast cancer is the most common cancer affecting Iranian women. Talk about how sanctions restrict livelihoods, increase economic pressure, and make it harder for men and women to find adequate jobs and build stable lives.

Iranian women are strong and have spent decades fighting for themselves while building careers, movements, and communities. Reducing them to helpless, voiceless figures is ridiculous and unforgivable.

#Woman_Life_Freedom #زن_زندگی_آزادی #از_دموکراسی_بگو

Quote

Alice Evans

@_alice_evans

13h

Superb cartoon by Nahid Zamani (Iranian).

This encapsulates the most extreme form of patriarchy, where women are secluded, barely allowed out of the house, thereby ensuring men's dominance of the economy, religion and politics. 

For more of her work see link below