Since the first day when Europeans developed new industries- in the early 19th century when western capitalists established major factories and needed cheap labor force who have the least expectations, they started talking about “women’s freedom”. This was because they wanted to persuade women to get out of their family environment and come into the factories so that they could use women as underpaid workers, fill their own pockets, downgrade women and move them down from the status they had. What is today discussed in the west as the issue of “women’s freedom” is a continuation of the same story and the same experience.
Thus, the way women were oppressed in the western culture and the misconception formed against women- which exists in western culture and literature- has been unprecedented throughout history. Women have been oppressed everywhere in the past, but this type of oppression is general, prevailing and inclusive, particularly in the recent era and it stems from the western civilization. They have introduced woman as a tool for men to seek pleasure and they called it “women's freedom”! While this was in fact giving licentious men the freedom to seek pleasure through women rather than giving freedom to women.
They oppressed women not only at work and industrial fields and the like but also in arts and literature. Today, look at stories, novels, paintings and various artworks; how are women looked at? Is it about the elevated, lofty values and traits of women which are paid attention to? Is it about the positive aspects and lofty values of women which are paid attention to? Is this attention brought about the tender emotions, the mercifulness and the loving temper that God has bestowed upon women- the motherly instinct, the spirit to look after and educate children- or is it focused on the sexual aspects and what they wrongly describe as love? (This is a false description, this is lust not love!) They sought to nurture and accustom women into a consumer being; an extravagant consumer and a cheap, little-seeking worker with little expectations.
Ayatollah Khamenei, December 16, 1992
Comments