My blogfather linked to this article in the Asia Times. I had not realized Iran was suffering from such a dramatic female flight/female despair. It seems to make sense, considering the official culture and mores of Iran.
It also happened to remind me of a thought I had a few months back… I think things in the vicinity of Iran are going to get a lot less stable in the short and medium term. Ugh.
Verrrrry Innterrrrresting.
Please don’t take this as a swipe or insult of any kind, but I’m actually interested in actus’ take on this as he has talked often of being proactive with Muslim women.
Thnaks for the perspective, Major, on Iran’s overextention. It’s so easy to get caught up in all of the bully boy rhetoric that comes out of that country, inflating their capabilites beyond the actual resources.
The assasination of Gemayel in Lebanon may very well be a sign that the pace of Iranian activity is speeding up.
BJ,
Japan promised a horrid, flaming death to any who opposed them and their invincible kamikazes, as late as July 1945…
Hmmm.
1. Frankly I’d that take “female flight” analysis with a great deal of salt as it may be describing multiple completely unrelated symptoms with different underlying causes.
2. A case in point is that women don’t generally engage in prostitution out of desire but out of need. So it’s not necessarily cultural factors that push women towards prostitution but economic ones. And economic factors are often the quickest to change and thus will change the rate, quantity and availability of economic opportunities that will suppress the need for prostitution as a means of earning income.
Instead what this declared point exemplfies is that the mullahs running Iran are complete and utter imbeciles and that being able to memorize the Koran doesn’t mean that you know how to run a country.
3. The whole birthrate cause is not something I’d put a lot of faith into with respect to Iran. A lot of people, including the author of the Iranian analysis, have seem to have forgotten about the Iran/Iraq War. The reason why there is such a large “hump” of population demographic in the young adult age group is because of the massive losses in the adult population during that War.
What happened was that so many adult males were killed during the Iran/Iraq War that it literally depleted the young adult, adult and middle age adult demographic ranges for the past 20 years. Additionally during wartime it’s common for birthrates to increase dramatically, which is also what happened to Iran during the War.
So the children born to dead soldiers have now grown up to be young adults. Because they are just now becoming young adults they haven’t had the length of time necessary to replenish the newborn-toddler age group. In addition the depletion of the older age groups prevented replenishment over the last 20 years.
This loss in adult men also contributed heavily to the problem of Iranian prostitution as a hardline Islamic country doesn’t offer much opportunity for widow with few, or no, male relations to support her children. This same mechanism also explains why there was such increased prostitution in the immediate post-WWII period. A lack of men, resources and a need to support a family in an environment where there are/were few social services and little economic opportunity.
…
So I’d suggest that the primary analysis, that the existence of large-scale Iranian prostitution is a clear signal of Iranian social collapse, is greatly overblown and in fact may be mistaken. Are there vast problems in Iran? Sure there are. There are enormous problems in Iran. But it takes a lot for a soceity to collapse and generally it takes an outside force to accomplish it.
Whether that outside force is available or even what that force is, which doesn’t necessarily imply military or violent force, I don’t know. But I’ll reiterate that prostitution on this scale is a symptom of economic issues not societal rot.
*shrug* but that’s my opinion.
I would agree with ed, although the article does make some interesting points. I am particularly interested in the growing number of drug addicts in Iran; this is probably the third time I have seen it mentioned of late. I don’t know offhand how Iran’s unemployment rate among young people compares to Iraq’s, or if a comparison is even valid. The level of unemployment would likely contribute to frustration that would lead to drug abuse. And prostitution as well, I suppose, although I wonder if all these Iranian women are willingly selling their bodies. I have heard of the “lipstick revolution” within some Muslim societies, although I think this applies to the well-off females, and the poor females are still at the mercy of the men in their families. Hmmm…
Sorry to bounce around, but what really fascinates me about the drug addiction in Iran is that the drug of choice is heroin. Apparently it is quite cheap and easy to obtain, which no doubt adds to its use. Maybe we should forget about any pre-emptive strike against Iran and just let Afghanistan do the job for us.
At first, I was on board with that scenario, but then an equation came to mind:
Heroin Addiction + Death to America + Nuclear weapons = UH OH!!
Now, not so much… Maybe we can smuggle in Trans Fats or sumthin’ …
BJ – seems like we might have a surplus of transfats soon, what with all the fast food chains bailing out on them. You might be on the right path!