TEHRAN – Iranians on social media mocked clerical rulers on Monday afterthe hardline judiciary arrested a teenage girl for posting on Instagramvideos of herself dancing in her room.
Critics of the arrest of gymnast Maedeh Hojabri, 18, used the hashtag#Dancingisnotacrime and Iranian women posted videos of themselves dancingin public. “You will be laughed at if you tell people anywhere in the worldthat 17 and 18-year-old girls are arrested for their dance, happiness andbeauty on charges of spreading indecency, while child rapists and othersare free,” wrote Iranian blogger and political dissident HosseinRonaghi-Maleki.
Iranian state TV aired a video in which she apologized for “breaking moralnorms” but said any breach was not her intention. Some Iranian newswebsites reported three other people had been arrested on similar chargesin the past weeks. The reports said they were released on bail.
“I had no bad intentions … I did not want to encourage others to do thesame … I did not work with a network,” a crying Hojabri told TV onFriday. Before her account was blocked by Iranian authorities, Hojabri hadposted around 300 videos on her Instagram account – in which she appearedwithout wearing the compulsory Islamic headscarf. Under Iran’s IslamicSharia law, women are required to wear headscarves and modest clothing inpublic and are banned from dancing in public.
The potential charges against Hojabri were not specified, but she is likelyto be accused of running afoul of Islamic codes of behavior that call formodesty in attire and behavior. “Art is the language of the soul, highestof the hopes, not a crime, said Twitter user @samzglam.
Sharing her own dancing clip, @Marun_1 said :”usually I don’t sharepictures and videos but today is an important day.” Access to many socialmedia sites, including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and the Telegrammessaging app are blocked in Iran. Iranian officials said last week thejudiciary was considering blocking access to Instagram.
But many Iranians evade the filtering through the use of VPN software,which provides encrypted links directly to private networks abroad, and canallow a computer to behave as if it is based in another country.In April,the judiciary arrested a senior Iranian official after a video postedonline that showed young boys and girls dancing in public in thenortheastern holy Shi’ite city of Mashhad for undermining public decency”.
In 2014, a group of Pharrell Williams fans arrested for sharing videos ofthemselves dancing to the song Happy on the rooftops of Tehran and gotsuspended sentences of imprisonment and lashes.WATCH VIDEO here: link