An Iranian chess player who moved to Spain in January after she competed without a hijab and had an arrest warrant issued against her at home has been granted Spanish citizenship, Spain said on Wednesday.
MADRID, July 26 (Reuters) - An Iranian chess player who moved to Spain in January after she competed without a hijab and had an arrest warrant issued against her at home has been granted Spanish citizenship, Spain said on Wednesday.
Sarasadat Khademalsharieh, better known as Sara Khadem, took part in the FIDE World Rapid and Blitz Chess Championships held in Kazakhstan in late December without the headscarf that is mandatory under Iran's strict Islamic dress codes.
Laws enforcing mandatory hijab-wearing became a flashpoint during the unrest that swept Iran when a 22-year-old Iranian-Kurdish woman, Mahsa Amini, died in the custody of the morality police in mid-September.
The 26-year-old has told Reuters she had no regrets over her gesture in support of the protest movement against her country's clerical leadership.
Spain's official gazette said the cabinet approved granting Khadem citizenship on Tuesday "taking into account the special circumstances" of her case.
A very gifted programmer I met from Iran had to do the same.
Originally from Iran, he wanted to marry a girl from Myanmar.
This was forbidden for some reason so they said "fuck it, let's go to where there is loads of tech jobs".
I was working in the Netherlands at the time when I met them. He's now flourishing in the open source software space over there. Brain drain 100%.
Someone from Iran marrying someone from Myanmar in the Netherlands sounds like a movie musical... "Two oppressed people from different parts of the world find love in beautiful Amsterdam!"
Actually there is no problem to marry someone from a different country. The problem is you cannot marry with a non-muslim person, so he/she should accept Islam first. 😟😄 weird like many other rules! I don't know if other religions have such restrictions or not, I would be happy to hear if someone knows.
Imagine not being able to return ‘home’ because you took your hat off. 🤔
I never quite realized just how pedestrian taking the hijab off is, yeah. Never really thought about it. It is quite literally just taking your hat or well, head-scarf, off. It's like when my great-grandma came in from the rain and took that plastic headband off she always wore to keep her hair dry.
Ridiculous how backwards we as a species can be, and sadly often are. 😔
Is it too reductive to conclude this is just men wanting to be able to dictate what women should and shouldn't do? Anyone claiming otherwise, even women who "would gladly wear it" feels like Stockholm syndrome to me.
Fanatics and extremists exist regardless of religions. The latter just allows them to control people easier, and islam happens to be particularly good at that.
Of course, most 'religious' people have enough common sense to not follow them to the T. When the government is religious though, like islam encourages, you have a big problem
The problem is when a government is captured by religion.
There is nothing quite so bad as religious types getting power based purelly on being religious types.
I suspect that, because it's the most fanatical power-hungry types (Moralism is really just a way of justifying the forcing of others to your will) who both have the most motivation to seek positions were they can have free rain to really go on powertrips on other people, and display more overtly the very religiosity that is the whole reason for a government whose power is based on religion.
Certainly those who feel no need to impose their will on others and who can even *gasp* see some actions as overzealous, don't have anywhere the same drive, zealotry and backstabbing instincts to climb up the ladder in such power structures.
While I agree strongly with the latter statement I have a lot of reservations with the former. I am incredibly happy for her. But this decision as has been the case most of the time in the past decade with the exception of Ukrainian refugees is a decision on an individual level instead of an institutional one. There are a lot of people who are either asylum seekers, people with asylum or quota refugees with similar situations and danger levels. Making individual decisions leaves them behind and only aids one person. Basically, it is good PR with limited results increasing already existent inequality among refugees in Spain.
Spain is a fairly difficult country to get into if you want the law to treat you in equal terms as any other citizen, if you belong to the wrong nationality. Latin Americans are often received with open arms, while Africans usually end up working below minimum salary without legal protections due to the lack of means to regularize their situation and the fear of getting deported.
Islam would be fine if they behaved more like moderate Christians or Jews. People seem to forget just how violent the Bible and the Torah are. But the modern versions of those religions don't take their cannon all that literally.
First of all, if she went home she would've just been arrested, how does that help anyone? And second, why's it on her to move Iran past it's issues? Good on her for her brave protest and good on her for not going back and choosing to do more with her life than end up a martyr in an Iranian prison.
The way to "help" Iran is for more people to leave. Significantly more, basically anybody with two brain cells to rub together. Leave only the most assinine idiots behind and then they can run their own country into the ground hardcore but they no longer affect anyone with it as everyone else has left.
Basically, Iran has to cease to exist in its current form. By burning itself out. This is incidentally the same way we could move past idiotic religious believes in the first place.
I would say that what you say makes sense but it doesn't really work super well in practice. I'll give the best example. North Korea. We have choked them on food, energy, medicine etc. For going on 70 years now. They are still a cancerous blight on the world. With nukes. Sure I guess the argument could be made that they stay inside north Korea and keep to themselves though.
If the Irani government already intends to arrest her, her only avenue to "help Iran" was taking up arms. I think everyone here has enough brain cells to understand why you can't shame any random person for just not making that choice.
Yeah, while I am happy for her and wish nothing but the best for her, is this really going to change anything back home? How many other women have the means and training to do what she did? I guess the one thing this does is highlight to the rest of the world how terrible things are in Iran, but I'm under no illusion that this is going to improve the lot of oppressed women in Iran. They might be even more restricted from attending overseas competitions.
I don't know why she would be responsible for changing anything in Iran?
She made a statement to highlight the atrocities in a terrible country and it put her in the crosshairs. This is the same thing as putting on your oxygen mask before you help others while on a plane.
It's not necessarily about what she specifically could do but it's emblematic of the greater issue. Not the first intelligent person to never return to Iran due to the leadership and she won't be the last