JMS+375+Group+2

=Technology changing power structures in Iran =

A Twitter Revolution

In June 2009, after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was voted into office against opponents Mir-Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, major protests arose from the Iranian people who said the election was rigged. Often referred to as the "Twitter Revolution" or the "Green Movement," Iranians used the Internet, social media and Twitter to plan and congregate, much like the Egyptians did on January 25, 2011 when the people began protesting Egyptian President Honsi Mubarack's dictatorship. Just as the Egyptian government tried to restrict communication between the people, so did Iran. The government attempted to block cell phone use, text messaging and web sites. media type="youtube" key="nifgnonH-BU" height="349" width="425"

Media restrictions

Journalists in Iran found their jobs becoming increasingly difficult following Ahmadinejad’s re-election. Many were only given one-week visas and extension requests were rejected by the Iranian government. Many Western journalists who were headquartered in Iran were told by the country’s information ministry that they were not allowed to report on protests or conduct interviews outside, and were threatened with arrest if they were found ou tside with a camera .

Around 40 journalists were arrested in a “post-election crackdown,” said the Committee to Protect Journalists. Most were Iranian media workers, and about 25 of them were employees of an Iranian reformist newspaper. The committee also said six more journalists were already jailed before the election (Dalje.com, 2009).

Among those arrested in 2009 was female journalist, Nazanin Khosravani, who was detained in November 2009. Her computer and personal belongings were also confiscated. She was released in March 2010 on a $600,000 bail. In April 2011, she was sentenced to six years in prison by Iran’s Revolutionary court for “assembly and collusion for activities against national security and propaganda against the regime.” ( Radio Zamaneh, 2011 )

In October 2010, two Western journalists were arrested for interviewing the son of a woman whose stoning sentence sparked debate around the world. Others, including a longtime correspondent for Spain’s newspaper, //El Pais//, and journalist Angeles Espinosa, were ordered to leave the country.  In April 2011, Iranian journalist Ahmad Zeidabadi was awarded the year’s UNESCO Gullerimo Cano World Press Freedom Prize. He is currently serving a six-year prison sentence for his work during the country’s controversial 2009 presidential election.

According to The OpenNet Initiative, an organization that investigates Internet filtering and censorship, <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">Iran is the "least free" country in terms of internet freedom in a new report titled, [|"Freedom on the Net 2011: A Global Assessment of Internet and Digital Media."] The report, published by American NGO Freedom House, calculated Iran to be the most restricted country after China, Cuba, and Burma. ONI maps censorship of specific sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Flickr among many more and provide visual maps of how censorship ranges in different countries. According to map, Facebook, Twitter and Flickr in Iran are all "intermittently or is partially blocked" According to Reporters Without Borders, an organization that protects, defends and provides financial aid to journalists, ranks Iran's media censorship as "very serious," which is the worst score on their five-point scale.

<span style="color: #000000; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 24px; line-height: normal;">**Women in Iran** ===<span style="font-size: 1.3em; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 5px;"> === ===<span style="font-size: 1.1em; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 5px;">**<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 18px;">Many reforms were introduced in 1925 and 1979 regarding women’s rights. 1967 and 1973 Family Protection Laws required a husband to go to court to divorce his wife as ** === ===<span style="font-size: 1.1em; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 5px;">**<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 18px;">opposed to simply proclaiming “I divorce thee” without reason. These laws also allowed a woman to divorce her husband—a first in Iranian society. Child custody laws also changed: family protection courts decided who would be granted custody of the children in the event of a divorce as opposed to former laws which automatically gave the husbands custody. ** ===

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 8pt; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">In 1975, the minimum age for women to marry was increased to 19, up from 15 in 1967, and 13 prior to that. With these reforms also came the increase of participation from women in economics, education (increased literacy levels and as of early 2007, approximately 70% of Iran's science and engineering students are women), and the workforce (women make up nearly 27% of the labor force.)

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 8pt; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding: 0px;">Women held high official positions being ministers, artists, judges, scientists, athletes, etc. However, much still needs improvement. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Iran became an Islamic Republic after the 1979 revolution and when this happened, women lost many rights gained under the prior regime. Oppressive rules are still being dealt with today. These include the fact that a woman's testimony in court is worth half a man's, and women's right to inheritance is half of men’s. Women are unable to lawfully fight these restrictions as doing so would be challenging the basic format of Iranian society. Women’s protests are one of the most sensitive matters for the government. As the result of even minor protests, women face being arrested, jailed or banned from working. This, however, does not deter all protests.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">For example in 1997, women defied the ban on entering soccer stadiums in an act of protest against gender segregation. This "<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-color: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: windowtext; cursor: pointer; padding-right: 10px; text-decoration: none;">[|soccer revolution] " consisted of 5,000 women forcefully entering the stadium where 120,000 men were celebrating the Iranian soccer team’s return from the <span style="background-attachment: initial; background-color: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: windowtext; cursor: pointer; padding-right: 10px; text-decoration: none;">[|World Cup]. This act was a catalyst in the 2006 decision of <span style="background-attachment: initial; background-color: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat; color: windowtext; cursor: pointer; padding-right: 10px; text-decoration: none;">[|president] [|Mahmoud Ahmadinejad] to lift the ban on women in stadiums. This ban, however, the ban was reinstated by the Supreme Justice <span style="background-attachment: initial; background-color: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat; cursor: pointer; padding-right: 10px;">[|Ali Khamene] in 2006.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 24px; font-weight: 800;">Citizen Journalists and Bloggers
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">Citizen journalists are utilizing social media tools such as websites, blogs, YouTube and Twitter to get the word out about what is happening in Iran as their government is censoring coverage in newspapers and on television. Citizen jou<span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">rnalists and protestors are risking their lives to expose the corrupt government, which they are subjected to. Murders are being caught on camera and are being posted to Facebook as well as YouTube. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 19px; font-weight: 800;">Web Sites > <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 19px; line-height: 27px;">**<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 19px; line-height: 27px;">We-Change.org ** <span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; cursor: pointer; padding-right: 10px;">We-Change.org is a website created in 2006 by Iranian women bloggers who blogged about the 2009 Iranian <span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; cursor: pointer; padding-right: 10px;">post-election unrest. The website has created new spaces for expression for Iranian women. In fact, Iranian women use the website for reference when it comes to information on women’s rights in Iran. The site also works as a call for help from Iranian citizens, showing the world the abuses of power in Iran and how the population has been suffering. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">We-change.org was a recent winner of the “<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; cursor: pointer; padding-right: 10px;">Net Citizen ” award, awarded by Google and <span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; cursor: pointer; padding-right: 10px;">Reporters Without Borders (RSF) for its expression of freedom online. One of the web sites’ many members, Parvin Adalan said, “The Iranian women’s movement is bringing its experience and methods of working democratically into cyberspace.” As a result of this website, site contributors have been detained for reporting online about anti-government demonstrations that broke out amid claims of election fraud, says RSF. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 19px;">**YouTube** <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">After the death of Neda Agha-Soltan the video went viral and gained international attention. The hastag "#neda" was a trending topic on Twitter, and was aired by multiple news organizations around the world. Neda was shot in the heart by Iranian police during the election protests in 2009, was caught on camera by a bystander. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">media type="youtube" key="fJV1AQfp7Ns" height="349" width="425" <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 19px; line-height: 18px;">**Twitter** <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">These were some of the key handles that were used during the Iranian protests in 2009:
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-color: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat; cursor: pointer; padding-right: 10px;">Front Line: Tehran Bureau Because there is no real establishment of professional, independent journalism in Iran, and no Western news organization has had a bureau in Iran for over a decade, according to this Tehran Bureau, this web site is an example of how information about Iran is being shared with the rest of the world.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">[|Iran Facebook Page]
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Change_For_Iran
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">TehranBureau
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">PersianKiwi

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 24px; font-weight: 800; line-height: 36px;">Technology Statistics <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">According to a 2010 world statistic, a little over 43% of Iranians use the Internet, whereas back in 2000 only about 4% used the Internet (the population only grew by ten million). Most of these users have Facebook and Twitter accounts, which has been most accredited for keeping the citizens connected and able to share information.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 24px;">Future of Iran
==<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: normal;">Governments such as that of Iran's that have experienced unrest and protests from unsatisfied citizens will try to suppress and control their population much more, especially in the virtual world. Despite this, according to an article in BBC News, during the elections Iranians were fed up with being controlled and were trying to go around the government's controls. Even though Twitter and Facebook were blocked, citizens found alternative ways to communicate and protest against the government. == ==<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-weight: normal;"> ==

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">While Iranian's show a desire for more personal freedoms, the government is reacting with more intolerance and stringency. An example of this is the arrest of Roxana Saberi. Saberi is an American journalist who was charged with espionage and sentenced to eight years in prison. She had been preparing for her Master’s degree in Iran. Because she had documents concerning the U.S.-Iraq war, she was considered a spy. After a lot of talk between the US and Iranian government she was released, however, it was not easy.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">Another jourmalist that had been arrested in Iran is Nazanin Khosravani. She was arrested in 2009 but released and arrested again in 2010. She was sentenced earlier this week to 6 years in prison. According to Payvando.com, a site that provides Iranian news, Khosravani was charged with "assembly and collusion for activities against national security and propaganda against the regime".

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">These arrests are examples of the Iranian government's intolerance towards freedom of speech and criticism of the government. Unrest in Iran will continue until the government finds a way to change and satisfy its people. Currently, protests continue. Social media has been used in Iran to organize protest in the Iranian province of Khuzestan. Social media has helped these people not only by organizing the events but also from getting help form people outside of Iran.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 19px;">**References:**

<span style="font-family: Helvetica,helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: Helvetica,helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: Helvetica,helvetica,sans-serif;">
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