Irreligion in Iran

Irreligion in Iran is marginalized and by official 2011 census, 265,899 persons didn't state any religion (0.3% of total population).[1] However, in reality the number of nonpracticing Muslims is significantly higher.[2] Under Iranian law, apostasy from Islam is punishable by death. Non-religious Iranians are officially unrecognized by the government, and one must declare oneself as a member of one of the four recognized faiths in order to avail oneself of many of the rights of citizenship.[3][4] Citizens of the Islamic Republic of Iran are officially divided into four categories: Muslims, Zoroastrians, Jews and Christians. This official division ignores other religious minorities in Iran, notably those of the Bahá'í faith. Bahá’ís are a "non-recognized" religious minority without any legal existence. They are classified as "unprotected infidels" by the authorities, and are subject to systematic discrimination on the basis of their beliefs.[5]

Within Iran

The topic of irreligion in Iran is often a political one. Mehdi Bazargan noted "to oppose Islam to Iranian nationalism is tantamount to destroying ourselves. To deny Iranian identity and consider nationalism irreligious is part and parcel of the anti-Iranian movement and is the work of the anti-revolutionaries".[2] According to the Ali Reza Eshraghi, religious pressure and inadequate governing from the Iranian government have made Iranian people less religious.[6] Some Iranian feminists have also been noted as being irreligious and atheistic.[7]

Irreligious Iranian youth aim to moderate Iranian government policy,[8] and the Iranian youth are among the most politically active among the 57 nations of the Islamic world.[9] As the most restive segment of Iranian society, the young also represent one of the greatest long-term threats to the current form of theocratic rule.[9] After the 2009 presidential election, youth was the biggest bloc involved in the region’s first sustained “people power” movement for democratic change, creating a new political dynamic in the Middle East.[9] Iran is one of the most tech-savvy societies in the developing world, with an estimated 28 million Internet users, led by youth.[9] Most young Iranians are believed to want to be part of the international community and globalization.[9]

Persecution

Iran was reported by The Washington Post to be among the thirteen countries where atheism can attract capital punishment.[10] The last noted legal execution for apostasy in Iran was in 2014, when Mohsen Amir-Aslani was convicted and executed for making "innovations in religion" and insulting the Prophet Jonah.[11] Furthermore, many people, such as Youcef Nadarkhani, Saeed Abedini have been recently harassed, jailed and sentenced to death for apostasy.

List of Non-Religious Iranians

  • Armin Navabi Ex-Muslim atheist and secular activist, author, podcaster and vlogger including founder of Atheist Republic
  • Ashraf Dehghani Iranian female communist revolutionaries, and is a member of the Iranian People's Fedai Guerrillas
  • Aramesh Dustdar Philosopher, writer, scholar and a former philosophy lecturer at Tehran University
  • Afshin Ellian Iranian-Dutch professor of law, philosopher, poet, and critic of political Islam. He is an expert in international public law and philosophy of law
  • FM-2030 Belgian-born Iranian-American author, teacher, transhumanist philosopher, futurist, consultant and athlete
  • Hadi Khorsandi Contemporary Iranian poet and satirist. Since 1979, he has been the editor and writer of the Persian-language satirical journal Asghar Agha
  • Shahin Najafi Iranian actor, musician, singer and songwriter
  • Maryam Namazie British-Iranian secularist and human rights activist, commentator, and broadcaster
  • Ibn al-Rawandi Early skeptic of Islam and a critic of religion in general
  • Fariborz Shamshiri One of the authors of the Rotten Gods website and an Iranian blogger
  • Mina Ahadi Iranian-Austrian political activist
  • Sadegh Hedayat Iranian writer, translator and intellectual, Best known for his novel The Blind Owl

Among Iranian diaspora

Iranian Americans

According to Harvard University professor Robert D. Putnam, the average Iranian-American is slightly less religious than the average American.[12] Iranian-Americans are distancing themselves from Islam, having accepted the negative characteristics associated with the religion.[13] This is due to Islam being imposed on the Iranians through war and invasion, equating to authoritarianism, brutality and corruption.[13] In the book, Social Movements in 20th Century Iran: Culture, Ideology, and Mobilizing Frameworks, author Stephen C. Poulson adds that Western ideas are making Iranians irreligious.[14]

Nearly as many Iranian Americans identify as irreligious as Muslim, and a full one-fifth are Christians, Jews, Baha’is, or Zoroastrians.[15] Additionally, the number of Muslim Iranian-Americans decreased from 42% in 2008 to 31% in 2012.[16][17]

European Iranians

The Central Committee for Ex-Muslims was founded by Dutch-Iranian Ehsan Jami with an aim to support apostates and to bring attention to women's rights violations.[18]

Organizations

A British-Iranian organisation, “Iranian Atheists Association”, has been established in 2013 to form a platform for Iranian atheists to start debate and question the current Islamic republic’s attitude towards atheists, apostasy and human rights.[19] A significant number of Iranians abroad, especially Iranian-Americans, are irreligious, agnostic or atheist.[13][20][21]

See also

References

  1. ↑ SCI (2011). Selected Findings of National Population and Housing Census Archived 2013-05-31 at the Wayback Machine.. Tehran: Statistical Centre of Iran, p. 26, ISBN 978-964-365-848-9.
  2. 1 2 Iranian identity iv. 19TH-20th centuries at Encyclopædia Iranica
  3. ↑ Public Opinion Survey of Iranian Americans. Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans (PAAIA)/Zogby, December 2008. Retrieved April 11, 2014.
  4. ↑ "Disparaging Islam and the Iranian-American Identity: To Snuggle or to Struggle". payvand.com. 21 September 2009.
  5. ↑ International Federation for Human Rights (2003-08-01). "Discrimination against religious minorities in Iran" (PDF). fdih.org. Retrieved 2006-10-20.
  6. ↑ "Iranians under the Islamic regime: more or less religious?". aljazeera.com. August 6, 2013.
  7. ↑ Making History in Iran: Education, Nationalism, and Print Culture. Stanford University Press. 2015.
  8. ↑ "A different view of Iran's soldiers". Los Angeles Times. September 14, 2008.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 "The Youth". usip.org.
  10. ↑ Fisher, Max (10 Dec 2012). "The seven countries where the state can execute you for being atheist". The Washington Post. Retrieved 16 December 2012. Though that list includes some dictatorships, the country that appears to most frequently condemn atheists to death for their beliefs is actually a democracy, if a frail one: Pakistan. Others include Saudi Arabia, Iran, Afghanistan, Sudan, the West African state of Mauritania, and the Maldives, an island nation in the Indian Ocean.
  11. ↑ "Iran executes man for heresy". The Guardian. September 2014. Retrieved 17 September 2018.
  12. ↑ "Losing Our Religion: The Growth Of The 'Nones'". NPR. 13 January 2013.
  13. 1 2 3 "Disparaging Islam and the Iranian-American Identity: To Snuggle or to Struggle". payvand.com. 21 September 2009.
  14. ↑ Social Movements in 20th Century Iran: Culture, Ideology, and Mobilizing Frameworks. Lexington Books. 2005.
  15. ↑ Multicultural America: A Multimedia Encyclopedia, Volume 1. Sage Publications. 2013.
  16. ↑ "2012 NATIONAL PUBLIC OPINION SURVEY of IRANIAN AMERICANS regarding Potential Military Strike Against Iran" (PDF). paaia.org. 2012. Retrieved 2013-07-20.
  17. ↑ "Public Opinion Survey of Iranian Americans" (PDF). PAAIA. December 2008. Archived from the original (PDF) on December 21, 2008.
  18. ↑ "Reacties stromen binnen bij Comité voor Ex-moslims" [Reactions flows within the Committee for Ex-Muslims], NU.nl (in Dutch), 2 June 2007
  19. ↑ "Iranian Atheists Association: About Us". Iranian Atheists Association.
  20. ↑ Public Opinion Survey of Iranian Americans. Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans (PAAIA)/Zogby, December 2008. Retrieved April 11, 2014.
  21. ↑ "Persian NYers Show Their Pride at Murray Hill Parade". Time Warner Cable News. Archived from the original on April 19, 2014. Retrieved April 20, 2014.
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