Iran's Bloggers

Last week international media was united in condemning the Iranian government for sentencing Sakineh Mohammadi Astiani to death for adultery. Correctly the execution to be carried out by stoning was loudly criticized and under international pressure was halted. Fears are now growing for the safety of her son who was integral in starting the campaign to free his mother from the shackles of a regime that day-by-day is isolating Iran from the international community in a manner unprecedented since the darkest days of the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s.

Whilst it is easy for the Western media to portray Iran as a soon to be nuclear pariah, care must be taken to remember that the regime is not always representative of the people. Some samplings of recent Iranian blogs testify powerfully to this:


Fariborz Shamshiri on Rotten Gods today writes:

Ayatollah Paul the octopus

Paul the octopus had eight correct predictions in 2010 FIFA World Cup so if there is anyone or anything deserve to be called Ayatollah, it is the octopus.

Blogger Bingala:

Tuesday, June 01, 2010

Election School

June, the cheating season.

DR02 on sweethallucinations:
While these useless summits are held around the planet, Iran has become the only country in the world to go totally Green & we are proud of it.

Yet these comments are rare. I decided to do this blog on humour amongst Iranian bloggers. The website where Iranian bloggers write in English is pooled on http://www.iranianbloggers.com/.

However, whilst I found these three comments what is clear is that many of the blogs have simply ceased to be updated. Whilst many bloggers lose interest, many of the blogs on the website were critical and then just stopped being updated. Such developments could be innocuous, yet it must be the case that at the very least, a climate of fear has enveloped some would-be Iranian bloggers who are critical of their government.

A rough survey of the English blogs on the above mentioned website show that:

· There are 67 Iranian blogs writing in English.

· Of them only 15 have been updated in 2010.

· Five of them are writing on non-political topics - for example, technology and tourism.

· Two are writing from a pro-government stance.

· Only eight are active and critical of the government.Therefore, only eleven per cent of the blogs are active and simultaneously critical of the government.

No doubt this is not definitive analysis, the reasons to stop blogging are numerous. Nevertheless, combined with endless reports documenting the tightening of the media in Iran - this statistic seems to confirm these trends.