Taboo

Today in the class, instead of listening to the boring lecture of my professor which by the way is a really good man, I was thinking about what to write here. Because I had one week of vacation and by surprise almost didn't do anything useful. Suddenly I realized that I have done plenty of things, I just don't know what to write about them. Well! I went to Paris for two days and had a really good time. And then right after arriving at Toulouse from the train station went to see an Iranian film with my Iranian friends. It was called "Taboo", made by a girl who interestingly was an old classmate and friend of one of my Iranian friends in here. The film was a documentary on prostitution in Iran which is in fact a real "Taboo"! There are so many things to say about the film. About the structure which is weak and the story too! But the subject is so new and powerful that it can keep you thirsty even after the film finishes. But I think the interesting thing is the huge gap and distance between two major and important groups in Iran. First group is the ones who have participated in 8 years of Iran-Iraq war. Although this group is not very big in number but it sure is powerful.

In the war it was necessary to make the soldiers believe in the cause of the war. It is necessary for every country to have brave soldiers to defend the country. So they were somehow "institutionalized". Their minds were made ready for the war. They had believed that it was a war for "holly defense"- the official name for 8-year war!-but when it finished and they came back they saw a completely different society which was rushing through modernization with the huge tall buildings in Tehran as a sign of it. Some of them were able to accept the changes. Some preferred to isolate themselves from the society around them. But there was this third group who decided to fight against the changes which they believed were against the "Goals of the Revolution".

The second group which I am talking about, on the other hand was the huge number of young people which were searching new ways to overcome the limitations and wanted the opportunity to go their own way. Their parents made a revolution against the Shah and they were able to choose, although many of these parents might feel sorry for what they did. But now their children see themselves doomed to accept whatever is offered to them. They are nearly half of the population but without any power to change anything. So they live in a society which they can't participate in any part of it. 25 years ago when people established the new regime, all the members of the government were under 40 and the prime minister was only 27 years old. But now we are witnessing the very same people ruling still!

Enough for now! This was just an excuse to write these lines and these were only my thoughts when watching the movie. But I will write about the other side of this movie soon.