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Features

Mehrangiz Kar: Self-Censorship Is Addictive

May 8, 2017
Mohammad Tangestani
6 min read
Mehrangiz Kar: Self-Censorship Is Addictive

 

In this series on self-censorship, we asked writers, artists, journalists and human rights activists to define self-censorship. Where possible, they are invited to give examples of their experiences, and to describe what they have witnessed.

We presented each interviewee with the same set of questions, adapting them or asking further questions where relevant.

Our intention was not to challenge the interviewees. We wanted them to express their own perspective of self-censorship.

***

Mehrangiz Kar is a prominent Iranian jurist, human rights activist and writer. Agents of the Islamic Republic have harassed, detained and prosecuted her. In 2001, she was forced leave Iran after a Revolutionary Court sentenced her to four years in prison on a range of charges, including activities threatening national security, propaganda against the regime, wearing un-Islamic dress and violating religious commands.

When she left, she was forced to leave behind her husband Siamak Pourzand, also a journalist. He was arrested two months later. His forced confession, which was broadcast on Iranian TV, showed a man that had been visibly tortured. He confessed to espionage and the court sentenced him to 11 years in prison and 74 lashes. In 2011, Pourzand was placed under house arrest after being released from prison. He was harassed relentlessly and committed suicide.

In 2002, Mehrangiz Kar received the American National Endowment for Democracy's Democracy award from the US First Lady, Laura Bush. Mehrangiz has received many awards for her human rights work and promotion of democracy.

Mehrangiz Kar currently works at the Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women at Brown University in Rhode Island, United States. She continues to write about human rights violations and women’s rights in Iran. She has also published a memoir, Crossing the Red Line: The Struggle for Human Rights in Iran.

 

How do you define self-censorship?

I worked under both the Pahlavi monarchy and the Islamic regime. In both cases self-censorship has had the same definition: The writer and the creator must shape his work in a way that conveys his message to his audience but, at the same, saves himself from running afoul of the government, which can ban him from artistic or social activities — or, worse, prosecute him on legal or security grounds.

To put it in simpler terms, self-censorship is a technique or a set of techniques that a creator of literary or artistic work or journalism discovers to survive in the cultural and artistic life of his country — in places like Iran, where authorities are insistent on specific values and beliefs. It is only [because of] self-censorship that an artist in Iran can publish his work. But self-censorship more often than not ends with censorship by the government. It is enough for the artist to make the smallest mistake or slip a little in his expression, and he can be eliminated from the artistic and literary scene.

 

In a general sense, you have said that self-censorship is a result of government ideologies. How deeply is this misconduct rooted in culture or religion?

In some cases, self-censorship has nothing to do with the government. Sometimes the government leaves the door open for writers, poets and artists. Under the shah, the space for creating and offering up works of art was not completely closed off. Only a clear criticism of the governing system could lead to trouble. At the same time, society pushed back against any attempt to break traditional values. For example, Forough Farrokhzad, who expressed her sexual desires through her poetry, was considered a dangerous taboo-breaker and even [some] intellectuals could not suffer her poetry.

So traditional societies impose a certain kind of censorship on artists that has nothing to do with the government. Farrokhzad’s poetry with its bold language was printed and published without either self-censorship or censorship. But at the same time she was the target of insults and humiliation by the people, and even in intellectual journals. It took years for Forough Farrokhzad to be accepted as a serious literary figure, and even now we cannot say that the majority of people have come to terms with her. But, in some cases, generations of people born and who grew up after the 1979 revolution have just discovered Farrokhzad. For all practical purposes she was discovered after the revolution, and that is because a theocracy is more suffocating than the usual traditions.

The social environment can make life for certain members of society unbearable, such as the censorship of references to homosexuality and LGBT issues in social and artistic areas. This leaves no openings for discussing these issues or for arriving at solutions that some other countries have successfully found. At this moment, those who are active in literary, cultural, psychological, sociological and civil rights fields in Iran prefer to stay away from LGBT issues. So we can see that the social pressure emerging from values that a large segment of people believes in plays a direct role in self-censorship. In turn, reactionary regimes take advantage of these traditional beliefs to legitimize censorship and suppression.

Is self-censorship an example of social misconduct or prudence?

In most cases both are responsible for self-censorship. When the creator of artistic works concludes that self-censorship is the only way to survive in social and artistic arenas, then he becomes addicted to it. He must find innovative techniques to continue to survive. Sometimes these innovations go much further that what the government demands and they become nauseating. On the other hand sometimes they are minimal, elegant and beautiful and make the work more charming. One perhaps can find both examples in Iranian cinema — and I mean Iranian cinema after the revolution.

Can you give us an example of when you have practiced self-censorship?

We all have exercised self-censorship in talking about our private lives without concerning ourselves whether the government approves of our lives or not. I do not find my own narrative of my private life in Iran correct or complete. I have done a lot of self-censorship in narrating the story of my private life. Not only the regime has censored me but I, myself, have sometimes committed self-censorship for purely personal reasons.

For example, I have never correctly portrayed my personal relations with people who have impacted my life, whether in victory or in defeat. I have been forced to keep silent not only to protect my personal interests but also to protect theirs. Some time ago, at a gathering to exchange ideas, I whispered into the ear of a friend. I  asked her whether I could recount a related anecdote from a party at the home of the German consul where we were both present. For whatever reason this friend asked me not to talk about it and not to bring up her name. I have many examples like this but I cannot talk about them, and this is a kind of self-censorship as well. It has become a habit with me, too.

I hope young generations can overcome self-censorship to some degree, though I do not think that it will be easy for them.

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