Iran's brutal regime of Dark Ages style Islam is quickly destroying the faith of Iranians. Of course, this is not acceptable to the theocratic regime of male bullies, so expect life in Iran to continue to get worse, especially for women and girls who are blamed for everything.
Iran is No Longer a Majority-Muslim Country
An online survey about the religious beliefs of Iranians, with replies given anonymously so as to prevent any possible retribution, was conducted several years ago in the Islamic Republic.
In June 2020, our research institute, the Group for Analyzing and Measuring Attitudes in IRAN (GAMAAN), conducted an online survey with the collaboration of Ladan Boroumand, co-founder of the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran.
The results verify Iranian society’s unprecedented secularisation.
Iran’s census claims that 99.5% of the population are Muslim, a figure that hides the state’s active hostility toward irreligiosity, conversion, and unrecognised religious minorities.
Iranians live with an ever-present fear of retribution for speaking against the state. In Iran, one cannot simply call people or knock on doors seeking answers to politically sensitive questions. That’s why the anonymity of digital surveys offers an opportunity to capture what Iranians really think about religion.
Our results reveal dramatic changes in Iranian religiosity, with an increase in secularisation and a diversity of faiths and beliefs. Compared with Iran’s 99.5% census figure, we found that only 40% identified as Muslim.
So Iran, for the first time in more than 1,200 years, is no longer a majority-Muslim country. And just before the Islamic Revolution 80% of Iranians described themselves as very devout. That percentage has been slashed in half. But even among those 40%, who identify as Muslims, as we shall see, many are not Believers but only “cultural Muslims.”
In contrast with state propaganda that portrays Iran as a Shia nation, only 32% explicitly identified as such, while 5% said they were Sunni Muslim and 3% Sufi Muslim. Another 9% said they were atheists, along with 7% who prefer the label of spirituality. Among the other selected religions, 8% said they were Zoroastrians – which we interpret as a reflection of Persian nationalism and a desire for an alternative to Islam, rather than strict adherence to the Zoroastrian faith – while 1.5% said they were Christian.
The opinion takers’ observation that Zoroastrianism is adopted not so much because of the contents of the faith, but as a symbol of disaffection with Islam and of a desire to reclaim the quintessential Persian pre-Islamic faith, is convincing. Nationalism, not deep religious belief, surely explains the nearly 10% of Iranians who now identify with Zoroastrianism.
Most Iranians, 78%, believe in God, but only 37% believe in life after death and only 30% believe in heaven and hell.
In Iran, 22% of the people are now atheists. Worse still for the mullahs, while 40% of Iranians claim to be Muslims, only 30% believe in a central tenet of Islam – the existence of paradise and hell, which could be interpreted to mean that only 30% are true Muslims. The 10% who do not believe in heaven and hell, but claim to be Muslims, are not true Believers, but “cultural Muslims,” a category which has more to do with filial piety — the tug of affection for their devout parents, with fond memories of family iftar dinners, and the deep religiosity of other relatives or friends whom they cannot emulate but still respect. If so, then it would make sense to conclude that only 30% of Iranians are Muslim believers.
These numbers demonstrate that a general process of secularisation, known to encourage religious diversity, is taking place in Iran. An overwhelming majority, 90%, described themselves as hailing from believing or practising religious families. Yet 47% reported losing their religion in their lifetime, and 6% said they changed from one religious orientation to another. Younger people reported higher levels of irreligiosity and conversion to Christianity than older respondents….
Almost half of the children of devout parents in Iran report they have lost their religion. It’s not surprising, given how monstrous the theocracy has become. The Iranian clerics have done more to discredit Islam than any Infidel propaganda could possibly accomplish. They hang homosexuals from cranes, execute political dissenters on trumped-up charges (such as the wrestler Navid Afkari), murder inoffensive members of the Iranian emigration who had been opponents of the Shah (such as Shahpur Bakhtiar, killed in Paris by agents of the Islamic Republic), punish anyone who defends opposition figures (Nasrin Soutoudeh, a female lawyer, was sentenced to 38 years in prison).
The venality of the clerics is also well-known, and has contributed further to the disenchantment with Islam. A long investigation by Reuters revealed what many Iranians suspected. Their Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, has amassed a business empire worth $95 billion, far more than the Shah of Iran’s fortune.
80% of Iranians were very devout before the Islamic Revolution, but there has been a drastic decline, with 60% now reporting that they do not perform the required daily prayers, nor observe Ramadan, meaning that 40%, at most, can still be considered devout.
We found that societal secularisation was also linked to a critical view of the religious governance system: 68% agreed that religious prescriptions should be excluded from legislation, even if believers hold a parliamentary majority, and 72% opposed the law mandating all women wear the hijab, the Islamic veil….
In other words, in a regime that is based on the idea of the Muslim jurist as ruler, and Islam as the only basis for legislation, now more than two-thirds of Iranians utterly reject that very idea: 68% say that religious commands (“prescriptions”) should be excluded as a basis for legislation.
Other research on population growth, whose decline has been linked to higher levels of secularisation, also suggests a decline in religiosity in Iran. In 2020, Iran recorded its lowest population growth, below 1%.
Is the steep decline in Iranian fertility rates not an oblique comment on younger Iranians’ disaffection with the clerical regime? Those who choose not to have children, or have fewer than the replacement level (2.1) are making a statement, signaling that they don’t have much faith in the country’s future. They see on the horizon only the continuation of religious despotism, with the mismanagement, corruption, cruelty, venality, and hypocrisy of the clerical rulers.
The Internet makes it almost impossible for the Iranian regime to prevent those they rule over from finding out what is going on in the world, including in Iran itself. The Iranians learn about American sanctions, about successful attacks on Iran’s nuclear project and other targets, find out about the catastrophic economic condition their country is in, discover the staggering net worth of their rulers – in short, the kind of news that once could be kept from being widely known, when the only sources of information were government-controlled newspapers, radio stations, and television networks. The Internet has made all of this information accessible with a few clicks.
When the Iranian regime finally collapses, we will be able see for ourselves what has been reported by the anonymous participants in these surveys. From 80% believers just before the Islamic Revolution, to 40% — or rather, 30% (with another 10% calling themselves only “cultural Muslims”) — today, its been a decline in belief unparalleled in Iranian, or Islamic, history. We have Ayatollahs Khomenei, and Khameini, and their equally cruel epigones, to thank for freeing so many Iranians — though it was hardly intended — from the mind-forged manacles of Islam. By their savage misrule they have accomplished what no collection of proselytizing Infidels could have managed to achieve. For this relief, ayatollahs, much thanks.
Kindergarten Jihad: Who Plays The Beheaded?
In our hilariously stupid American culture wars elementary schools are the battlegrounds of tomorrow’s heroes. Liberals die on Drag Queen Story Hour hill, terrified the “NAZI CIS-FASCISTS!” will steal their stunning and brave unicorn genderwangs or outlaw their rainbow abortions.
Rightards, to form, can see Satan in every fancy gay dance outfit and a pedophile under every pizza. And bless them all.
I grew up before and away from all this, in Australia in the 1970s. We had kangaroo boxing, snake n’ shark attack drills and Fosters beer tasting as kids. Good times. Aussie times.
But in other regions, now and continuously since before the 1970s, they operate in a less fraught educational environment. Palestinian and education generally in the Islamosphere is much less conflicted. It is deeply rooted in various 1,300 year old certainties and modern obsessions.
With such moral certainty one can instill a terrifying determination only children can attain and when imprinted is almost impossible to argue out of later in life. Brainwashing at an early age is permanent, stable and almost irreversible as any child psychologist will attest.
The certainty comes from religion in general and Islam in particular. In this case direct from the wild, shameless anti-Semitism of the Koran and Hadith which is well documented in the book The Legacy of Islamic Anti-Semitism.
And if you mix that with totally failed Third World Socialism – which, curiously, some still take seriously (Hello Nasser fans, Castro, Lumumba and many assorted Husseins! – I could list more…), and throw in an apocalyptic hard-on for murder Jihad you get the flex of modern Palestinian nationalism.
The evidence for this we can see on youtube collated from Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI.org), a translatory service which brings us the worst but also the average ideology of Islamic media. They report a subset of videos depicting school plays down to kindergarten level which exist on a surreal moral plain.
Let’s Explore, Kids!
Here… we see Gaza Kindergarten ceremony. Includes hostage taking! (5 minutes)
Here’s another – kids with a nerdy mascot chatting about various insane conspiracies. (1 minute)
Techo-beat, weapons, Jew-kill, this video has it all. A must see for religious maniacs or Palestinian kids everywhere! (West Bank, 4 min.)
These are a small selection of what goes on every school year, particularly in Gaza/West Bank informed by the larger Arab world’s fundamental ideology.
Of course with technology now the teachers have help in the form of internet ditties like this Yemeni Houthi one to help the kiddies’ learning process.
But let’s leave this surreal horror show aside and zoom in on the main question of this article:
If you were a kindergarten teacher there what would be the challenges of putting on such a play?
You’ve got the fake swords and guns, easy to buy. The Jerusalem burning sets were built before you were born, though some in the videos are new and snazzy.
Military marching and maneuvers aren’t hard to teach kids – just put the more coordinated ones, the soccer stars probably, at the front. They can practice shouting their cute little genocidey, fundamentalist chants and slogans after class.
The problems of putting on the play isn’t the sets, nor the pre-written script but rather picking the players in this mini-kiddy-spectacular. A conundrum for any teacher.
How do you decide which kids play the head banded heroes and which kids play the enemy?
Perhaps the top students get the prestige roles: as liberators, as hero killers of the cursed (see Quran) Jews. They’ll surely grow up to be the most celebrated terrorist paragliders, subsidized by US/EU money via UNRWA and the Palestinian Authority. They’ll be the suicide bombers of tomorrow and will bring celebrity, towering social power and pay-for-slay pensions for their families and the school.
In the MEMRI.org videos they pan to the audience who are beaming: proud as parents at school plays everywhere. They’re familiar with the sturm und drang, the wild emotionalism of the plays, probably remembering the sets and the (maybe) fake Kalashnikovs because as children they were in the same plays! “My little guy, playing Yasser Arafat just like I did as a tyke.” It brings a proud tear to Dad’s eye. Mom, peeping out behind her chador, is surely ecstatic though we can’t see – nor should we of course as she is a woman.
There’s our Walid folks, see him grin as little Wally beheads the “Jew”…oh and Abdul is giving that gun all he’s worth too.
Pan to the grandparents! Grandkids are life’s little rewards for the trials of parenthood aren’t they? And grandad and grandma were in the same play in the 1960s – though the headbands possibly had a touch of paisley then. All this was in the same UNRWA schools, the same Islamic genocide factories and martyr academies western democracies paid for half a century ago and still do.
It is the beautiful circle of life, the wholesomeness of Jew slaughter and the holy promise of a perfect Caliphate built on Jew bones smack dab on the Dome of the Rock.
Here’s a really sticky question though: Who plays the cursed Jews in Palestinian kindergarten plays?
The slow kids? Troublemakers?
Imagine in class: teacher to little Tariq whose behavior and grades aren’t excellent: “TARIQ! – Damn it child – if you don’t lift your game you’ll be playing Shlomo’s decapitated corpse at the end of year play! Because half the kids in this class are gonna have to play Israeli usurpers and hostages and Tariq you’re headed -hehehe – be-headed! – right that way my little friend!”
“And YOU, Ahmed, if you don’t buck up you’ll play the Jew corpse that all the other kids spit on. Want that? Now sit down and memorize our holiest text: “Do not take the Jews and Christians as friends” (Quran, Sura 5.51) or from Sura 4.46: “Allah has cursed the Jews on account of their unbelief.”
While we in the US are fretting about genderwang and back in my country of birth the koala verses emu football matches are proceeding apace no doubt, other parts of the world are teaching tomorrow’s generation very different lessons.
Built on the Quran’s virulent, crazy antisemitism the above plays and the “in the air” ethno-chauvinism are probably why there is no “Palestinian Co-Exist” or peace movement at all and there will not be for our – and little Ahmeds and Tariqs’ – entire lifetimes.
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IMAGINARY POSTCRIPT: In 2035 Ahmed became the most famous suicide bomber from Khan Yunis. Dead Jew Count: 3 at a Tel Aviv taxi stand. Ahmed’s martyrdom pays $5,430 annually for life to his proud parents thanks to the American taxpayer.
Tariq lifted his game and reached great heights of Instagram fame by repurposing footage of Syrian atrocities as Zionist. His “Starving Babies” Pallywood tick-toc reel won him an Emmy from elite Hollywood in 2030. Susan Sarandon voted him “Most Inspiring.”
ADDENDUM: All claims about the Australian education system are parody. Sadly.
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