A Kurdish man in Iran was recently sentenced to wearing a woman’s dress as a way of humiliating him publically. Women in the area objected to the insult to their gender and to their traditions. They were met by security forces. Soon Kurdish men began dressing in traditional Kurdish dresses as a show of solidarity. They call themselves “Kurd Men for Equality”
They have started a Facebook page, featuring Kurd men in dresses expressing a message of solidarity:
“This is what we look like, this is our culture and they cannot insult our culture, our mothers and sisters. We cannot accept that.”
“Kurd Men for Equality.”
“This is what we look like, this is our culture and they cannot insult our culture, our mothers and sisters. We cannot accept that.”
http://www.commondreams.org/further/2013/05/08
I had an Iranian friend who grew up in Tehran during the time of the Shah. She said that if you were female and in need of help in public, you turned to Kurdish men. They were easily identified by their traditional Kurdish clothes and could be depended on to treat a woman or child with the utmost respect.
Thanks Donna. I wonder what makes them more sensitive to that issue?
I was wondering that myself… Wondering about the which-came-first-chicken-or-egg question. Kurds are an oppressed or at the least marginalized minority in the countries in which they live, such as Iran, Iraq, and Turkey. Are they looked down upon, even abused, because of their culture which includes this kind of sensitivity and solidarity or does the fact that they have been mistreated and marginalized make them more sensitive and supportive when others are treated badly?
Not wearing women’s clothing, because dresses and skirts do not monopolistically belong to women. Men wore all manner of such garments for 1,000s of years. Stop reasoning by association. They also are not in “drag” because I see they’re presenting as men and wearing facial hair. For a grasp of sex typing apparel, the psychiatric cult is the LAST place to seek facts. The Greek army today has men in skirts, so do the Fijians, Tongans and Scots, British Beefeaters wear shoes frillier than any worn by women, the Romans exiled men in pants in AD393. Unless a man has on a bra, he is NOT “dressed like a woman.” Clothing styles must be grasped as “individual differences,” not “sex differences.” But we already understand that, don’t we, as concerns this matter of women wearing all possible styles? Horseback riding caused pants on men. Can a man be masculine though he doesn’t go about on a horse? Social forces not sex chromosomes caused people’s clothing habits. A skirt is a garment with no “crotch” and face it, this benefits men more than women. Don’t forget Joan of Arc was burned alive in 1431 AD for wearing “men’s clothes” (pants), which she wore to better ride a horse, not to present as a man!
Charles,
These men took on the traditional garb of women in their culture as an act of solidarity with women who were being persecuted. They weren’t making a statement about clothing and gender roles generically.
Jim