see a link between the strategy for “cultural invasion” and the strategy the Christians used in Andalusia in the late fifteenth century. In summer 2002, deputy commander of the basij, Brigadier-General Gholam Hossein Kolouli Dezfuli, declared in relation to this:
Christians were consistently defeated in their campaign to avoid the infiltration of Islam into Europe. Later on, they thought of a remedy and concluded that they had to make soldiers forget their beliefs. Therefore, they distributed plenty of alcoholic beverages among the people, free of charge. On the other hand, they had the Muslims entrapped by beautiful Western women to corrupt the combatants of Islam and stop the spread of Islam into Europe. I think our Islamic Revolution was a similar case. Since the triumph of the Revolution in 1979, they have undertaken ceaseless efforts to avoid infiltration of our Revolution but they failed. Now, they are in the process of repeating the Andalusian experience in our country.9
The genealogy of the notion of “cultural invasion” (tahajom-e farhangi) in the Iranian context led to a discourse of authenticity, which dominated the political culture of the 1960s and 1970s and emphasized authenticity and the idea of “returning to our roots.” This discourse was promoted by several influential intellectuals, such as Ahmad Fardid, Ali Shariati, Jalal Al-e Ahmad, Daryush Shayegan, and Ehsan Naraghi. It mobilized an ideology of nativism (see Boroujerdi 1996), a yearning for a “purity,” which supposedly had been demolished by Westernization.
The most prominent and influential work in this tradition was undoubtedly Jalal Al-e Ahmad’s Gharbzadegi. Published in the early 1960s, Gharbzadegi has been praised as a pioneering work in defense of cultural authenticity (esalat-e farhangi), and has deeply affected the cultural debate and politics in Iran. In this polemical essay, Al-e Ahmad rigorously criticized the Shah’s policy of modernization (Westernization) and the tendency for mimicry among Iranians. Gharbzadegi as a notion is still used as a political tool by the Islamic authorities to oppress opposition. Al-e Ahmad borrowed it from another Iranian intellectual, Ahmad Fardid, who had translated the term as dysiplexia (Gheissari 1998: 89). In Greek “dysis” means “West” and “plexia” means to be afflicted, as in “apoplexy.” The concept has been translated into English as “Westoxication,” “Weststruckness,” or being “plagued by the West” (the title used in the English translation). However, Al-e Ahmad defines gharbzadegi as an illness. Gharbzadegi is a metaphor for “cultural disease.”
I speak of being afflicted with “westitis” the way I would speak of being afflicted with cholera. If this is not palatable, let us say it is akin to being stricken by heat or by cold. But it is not that either. It is something more on the order of being attacked by tongue worm. Have you ever seen how wheat rots? From within? . . . In any case we are dealing with a sickness, a disease imported from abroad and developed in an environment receptive to it. (Al-e Ahmad 1982: 3)
The medical aspect of the gharbzadegi discourse is not exceptional. Since the early twentieth century, the state of Westernization has been seen as a syndrome, and addressed with medical terminology, such as “cultural schizophrenia” (Shaygan 1992), “mental confusion” (ashoftegie fekri) (Shadman 1326/1947), or “indigestion” (sou-e hazemeh).10 Such arguments are not necessarily made only by Islamists. Many secular intellectuals—usually educated in the West—use the same approach. For instance, Daryoush Ashuri compares the Westernization of Iran with the historical invasions by Alexander the Great, the Arabs, and the Moguls. He claims that Westernization is the latest invasion of Iran. Unlike previous invasions, which were military, this one has “gradually penetrated our skin” (Ashuri 1376/1997: 145–47). Since the Revolution, the authorities have utilized such medical jargon to legitimate their occidentophobia. Conflating the language of health programs with cultural politics, the Islamic regime has depicted the way the nation’s purity and health are demolished by “cultural microbes” (mikrobha-ye farhangi), which penetrate the nation’s body and cause “cultural injuries” (asibha-ye farhangi). Accordingly, to immunize the nation, the regime emphasizes the necessity of a “cultural vaccination” (vaksan-e farhangi).
Since the youth are all seen as passion (nafs) and particularly vulnerable to “cultural threats,” the focus of the Islamic regime has been on how to “protect” young people from moral hazards and prevent them from becoming the gateways of “cultural invasion.” Uncontrollable mass communication from abroad, through radio, satellite TV channels, videos, and finally the Internet, have been identified as primary threats “broadcasting pollution.” In December 1999, the Valy-e faqih, Ayatollah Khomeini, expressed his anxiety in this way:
Audio and visual waves that are worse than warships and warplanes are being used to disseminate a rogue culture aimed at reasserting the domination of the enemies of Islam. They have paved the way for the imposition of unethical values and Westernized ideas in order to captivate and humiliate Muslims.11
Mohammad Javad Larijani, then director of Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), believes that the influences of these foreign sounds and images will subvert the process of constructing the Muslim subject:
Can we believe that the highly motivated youth of the country will continue to be true patriots, correct in their way of thinking, and observant of religious duties while they are exposed to these destructive programs and watching them incessantly? Will they not dwindle into day-dreaming, humiliated, misled and self-deceived individuals?12
Conducting a war against nondomestic media has been the main task of the regime since the Revolution. Throughout the 1980s video recorders were illicit in Iran. Possessing, renting, selling, or buying them was punishable. In the early 1990s, the Majlis passed a law to legalize “owning and using a video cassette recorder.” While the Iranian authorities were busy discussing whether or not to legalize videos, a more powerful threat arrived, namely satellite television, which has ever since presented the authorities with a problem. They are no longer able to control the flow, and a steady stream of TV programs is entering the country. While the Majlis were still confused about what to do, 500,000 satellite dishes were installed on roofs in Tehran.13 The use of such dishes was the most controversial cultural issue in Iran throughout the 1990s. The conservatives began a rigorous propaganda campaign against satellite TV. The satellites were called an “enemy device for eliminating Islam,”14 and seen as to signifying “hooliganism and social corruption.”15 The director of IRIB used a “purity and danger” discourse in his statements against the satellite:
It infatuates [people] by unhealthy information. . . . The contamination caused by satellites is far more dangerous than the pollution of the living environment. Now that sensitivity to pollution of the environment has reached such a state that smoking is forbidden in public places and even in apartments and large buildings, how can we remain indifferent to broadcasting pollution?16
The moral police conduct sporadic hunts for receiver dishes on roofs or in courtyards. People are encouraged to check if their neighbors have receivers. Helicopter hunts to identify houses with satellite dishes have also been conducted. A wave of attacks on satellite dishes was launched in late October 2001, on the order of the authorities. The police impounded more than 5,000 satellite dishes in Tehran and some 150,000 nationwide in less than two weeks.17
Engineering Goodness
Another modus operandi of the war against cultural crimes has been the reshaping of morals. The “salvation-oriented” mission of the Islamic government has been directed to helping the country achieve an “inner piety” (safa-ye baten). This requires cleansing the nation from “internal impurities” caused by “satanic temptations” and warding off the external threats of “cultural invasion” and “Weststruckness.” This was conducted first through a Cultural Revolution (Enqelab-e Farhangi) and then by establishing the Ministry of Islamic Culture and Guidance in 1986 in order to orchestrate the national culture and control over cultural
