Shirin Quotes

I believe and support the feminist movement, but I am not generally interested in considering women's rights in relation to equality with men, or in a competition with men, but rather within their own rights and feminine space. ~ Shirin Neshat

Ocean had given me hope. He'd made me believe in people again. His sincerity had rubbed me raw, had peeled back the stubborn layers of anger I'd lived in for so long. Ocean made me want to give the world a second chance. ~ Tahereh Mafi

I find that through the study of women, you get to the heart - the truth - of the culture. ~ Shirin Neshat

I'm really interested in social justice, and if an artist has a certain power of being heard and voicing something important, it's right to do it. It could still be done in such a way that it's not aggressive or overly didactic. I'm trying to find that form. ~ Shirin Neshat

When you vote, vote for those who are not warmongers, and vote for those who respect human rights. When you see a president who doesn't respect human rights, don't vote for that person. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Human rights is a universal standard. It is a component of every religion and every civilization. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Being political is an integral part of being Iranian. Our lives are defined by politics. ~ Shirin Neshat

Contrary to what certain governments say, human rights are universal. Arbitrary detention, torture and discrimination hurt the human dignity of anybody, whatever his or her country of origin, religion, descent, or any other ground. ~ Shirin Ebadi

I often felt like a very old person trapped in a young person's body. ~ Tahereh Mafi

The most important problem in Iran is that the courts have lost their independence, and they are under the influence of the Ministry of Intelligence and their people. This is why we witness a number of journalists and human rights activists, my colleagues, and a number of feminists, in prison. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Art is no crime. It's every artist's responsibility to make art that is meaningful ~ Shirin Neshat

I believe we don't need to widen the divide between the West and Islam. Rather, we need to build dialogue to encourage tolerance and respect. ~ Shirin Neshat

Over 60 percent of the university students in Iran are female. The women in Iran are better educated than men. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Beautiful woman wrapped in chadors, with huge machine guns in their hands. Brilliant, shocking, amazingly contradictory images. They compelled me to deeply investigate these ideas. ~ Shirin Neshat

James Buchan's The Persian Bride combines a moving love story, a political thriller, and a history of modern Iran in a beautiful novel about the relationship of two people caught up in the Iranian revolution: John Pitt, a young man from England who arrives in Isfahan, Iran, in 1974, and seventeen-year-old Shirin, one of John's students, whose father is a general in the shah's army. ~ Nancy Pearl

We must acquaint the youth to the realities of the world ... we must tell them that millions of people around the world have no access to drinking water. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Europe clearly is the only place where people can speak up critically, and this is a unique cultural value. ~ Shirin Ebadi

I have never had a governmental position, and I will never accept such a position. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Sixty-three percent of our university students are female. But you still see violations of women's rights in Iran. A Muslim man can have up to four wives. He can divorce his wife without offering any reason, while it is quite difficult for a woman to get a divorce. ~ Shirin Ebadi

When I was a kid and would tell my mom that people at school were mean to me, she'd pat me on the head and tell me stories about how she'd lived through war and an actual revolution, and when she was fifteen someone cracked open her skull in the middle of the street while her
best friend was gutted like a fish so, hey, why don't you just eat your Cheerios and walk it off, you ungrateful American child. I ate my cheerios. I didn't talk about it. ~ Tahereh Mafi

I know of no civilization that tolerates or justifies violence, terrorism, or injustice. There is no civilization that justifies the killing of innocent people. Those who are invoking cultural relativism are really using that as an excuse for violating human rights and to put a cultural mask on the face of what they're doing. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Be careful with that ," I said, nodding at the paper, "because if you text me too much, you'll have to marry me. It's the rules in my religion. ~ Tahereh Mafi

Every Iranian artist, in one form or another, is political. Politics have defined our lives. ~ Shirin Neshat

The younger generation is essentially idealistic. This applies to the Iranian youth as well. In addition, the youth in Iran face certain difficulties ... the Iranian youth need more freedom. They are struggling for more freedom and democracy. This commands great respect. ~ Shirin Ebadi

I have never agreed with President Bush's argument regarding the axis of evil. Unfortunately, fundamentalists in Iran have used this as an excuse to brand us as allies of Mr. Bush. ~ Shirin Ebadi

I hope the example of Saddam Hussein will give a lesson to leaders of other countries where human rights are not respected. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Every time I am fearful I think to myself, the reason they do this is to discourage me from doing what I do. Hence, if I discontinue my work I will have succumbed to my fears. ~ Shirin Ebadi

He said he promised he wouldn't try to kiss me again and I wanted to say don't you dare promise not to kiss me again but I didn't. ~ Tahereh Mafi

was a female Palestinian suicide bomber clutching a rifle in one hand and her little son in the other. This, it seemed, was the state's only vision of gender equality. Ahmadinejad instituted separate elevators for men and women in government buildings, and he fired swaths of municipal workers who were not religious or devoted enough to his ideology. Tehran ~ Shirin Ebadi

I'm an artist, I'm not an activist. ~ Shirin Neshat

Fort somehow turned the symbol of nerdiness into a visual aphrodisiac - Spanish fly in the form of solid black frames. ~ Shirin Dubbin

North Americans do not understand that you do not throw down human rights like bombs on the Iraqis. ~ Shirin Ebadi

In my experience as a director, I think there is obviously something of the way men - maybe that's a common point with Shirin - the way men see women in the film, and the way these two characters see each other. ~ Abbas Kiarostami

Terrorism is based on two major pillars: One is injustice, and the other is a certainty of attitude, the notion that their version of the story is the correct one. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Everyone's condition is different, and the way that each person lives his or her life is different. ~ Shirin Ebadi

The condition of women in Islamic societies as a whole is also far from desirable. However, we should acknowledge that there are differences. In certain countries, the conditions are much better and in others much worse. ~ Shirin Ebadi

I have never been convinced throughout my life that one needs to be imitating others. I even tell my daughters not to look at me as a model. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Under the Iranian code, the worth of a woman's life equals half of a man's, a point that often leads to grotesque legal judgments that effectively punish the victims. In this instance, the judge ruled that the 'blood money' for the two men was worth more than the life of the murdered nine-year-old girl, and he demanded that her family come up with thousands of dollars to finance their executions. ~ Shirin Ebadi

How can you defy fear? Fear is a human instinct, just like hunger. Whether you like it or not, you become hungry. Similarly with fear. But I have learned to train myself to live with this fear. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Those who don't understand any language other than the language of force and violence don't respect human dignity. They seek violence because they will be irrelevant without it. We should not go their way. ~ Shirin Ebadi

In my memoir, I wanted to introduce American women to Iranian women and our lives. I'm not from the highest echelons of society, nor the lowest. I'm a women who is a lawyer, who is a professor at a university, who won the Nobel Peace Prize. At the same time, I cook. And even when I'm about to go to prison, one of the first things I do is to make enough food and put it in the fridge for my family. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Any person who pursues human rights in Iran must live with fear from birth to death, but I have learned to overcome my fear. ~ Shirin Ebadi

My aim is to show that those governments that violate the rights of people by invoking the name of Islam have been misusing Islam. ~ Shirin Ebadi

You are a girl, Shirin. Girls don't run around naked.'Why?'They just don't. ~ Renita D'Silva

Democracy doesn't recognize east or west; democracy is simply people's will. Therefore, I do not acknowledge that there are various models of democracy; there is just democracy itself. ~ Shirin Ebadi

No government can make me wear a veil, no government can force me not to wear it either ~ Shirin Ebadi

While living in exile I have become the loudspeaker for the people of Iran. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Art is our weapon. Culture is a form of resistance. ~ Shirin Neshat

I want to take my American friends back to the end of World War II, when the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was formulated. A group of thinkers met to come up with ways and means to prevent yet another war. Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt played a crucial role in assembling this group of people. And that is why the name of the United States is synonymous with the cause of human rights around the world. ~ Shirin Ebadi

It is not important whether what he is chanting is true or not, whether you believe in it or not. Your decision to chant along with him is no measure of your commitment to justice or freedom or whatever lofty principle is at hand. Sometimes, radical slogans are a trap. They are shouted by infiltrators so that a group of students protesting a press crackdown can be depicted as seeking to overthrow the regime. Sometimes they are not traps at all but the frustrated stand of a brave person. But how are you to know? Your objective is to avoid being a pawn, to avoid getting dragged into trouble because you are curious, or believe you are seeing history being made." They ~ Shirin Ebadi

It's not just about hope and ideas. It's about action. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Usually, in any revolution people are focused on who wants to have the most power. But the most important thing is the laws that are written during that time. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Sadly the job security of lawyers has been ruined, so they are less willing to defend political defendants. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Ocean, azizam," she said, "please tell Shirin she should stop swearing so much. It's always asshole this, bullshit that. I say to her, Shirin joon, why are you so obsessed with shit? Why everything is shit? ~ Tahereh Mafi

I got lost in the feel of him, in the heat of his skin, in the way his body shook when he broke away and I felt like I was dreaming, like I'd forgotten how to think.
(...) We broke apart, fighting to breathe, holding on to each other like we were drowning, like we'd been lost, left for dead in a very large expanse of sea. ~ Tahereh Mafi

I maintain that nothing useful and lasting can emerge from violence. ~ Shirin Ebadi

The day passed.
People had butchered my name, teachers hadn't known what the hell to do with me, my math teacher looked at my face and gave a five-minute speech to the class about how people who don't love this country should just go back to where they came from and I stared at my textbook so hard it was days before I could get the quadratic equation out of my head.
Not one of my classmates spoke to me, no one but the kid who accidentally assaulted my shoulder with his bio book.
I wished I didn't care. ~ Tahereh Mafi

I am the voice of the people in Iran whose voices are silent and whose demands cannot be heard by the rest of the world. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Magical realism allows an artist like myself to inject layers of meaning without being obvious. In American culture, where there is freedom of expression, this approach may seem forced, unnecessary and misunderstood. But this system of communication has become very Iranian. ~ Shirin Neshat

When the gravity of death first touched me, I'd found preoccupation with the minutiae of daily life meaningless. If we ultimately die, and turn to dust in the ground, should it ever truly upset us if the floor hasn't been swept quite recently enough. ~ Shirin Ebadi

The lover I am; it befits me to burn;
but what is the reason for your weeping and burning?
The candle replied: 'Oh my ill-fated lover,
a honey-sweet [shirin] friend went away from me.
Someone like Shirin has deserted me;
there is fire on my head, as it was on Farhad's.'
The candle continued, while a painful flood
each moment gushed down on his yellow cheeks:
'Pretender, this love is not your game,
as you have no patience, no strength to stand.
Untouched you shrink from a single flame,
whereas I stand still until I am consumed.
If the fire of love has scorched your wings,
look at me: it burned me from head to foot. ~ Saadi

No American soldier should be allowed to set foot on Iranian soil, regardless of the criticism we have of the Iranian government. ~ Shirin Ebadi

The role of Iran has been very destructive. As an Iranian, I apologize to the civilian people of Syria who have been killed as a result of the useless intervention of Iran in Syria. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Every Iranian artist dreams of the black market. We don't care about making money. ~ Shirin Neshat

There is a verse [in the Koran] that says God swears by time. Anything you gain in life, you pay for with your time. Time is the most important thing that has been given to man. ~ Shirin Ebadi

There is no "true Islam," just different interpretations. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Whenever women protest and ask for their rights, they are silenced with the argument that the laws are justified under Islam. It is an unfounded argument. It is not Islam at fault, but rather the patriarchal culture that uses its own interpretations to justify whatever it wants. ~ Shirin Ebadi

How can you say that?" he said, and I heard his voice break. "How can you even think that? I want this more than I've ever wanted anything. I want everything with you," he said. "I want all of it with you. I want you. I want this forever. ~ Tahereh Mafi

Women are the victims of this patriarchal culture, but they are also its carriers. Let us keep in mind that every oppressive man was raised in the confines of his mother's home. ~ Shirin Ebadi

We shouldn't just consider the desire of government to do what it wants to do. We should always consider the resistance of people. The culture of Iranian people doesn't let the government drag people into deep trouble or backlash. Maybe government wants it, but the culture doesn't let it go on. ~ Shirin Ebadi

My father was a doctor, but he was what I would call an intellectual - very well-read and very interested in knowledge. He insisted that I get as much education as my brothers. ~ Shirin Neshat

It is totally unacceptable for a government to interfere in the internal affairs of another government and send aid, money, and weapons, to the people who are against a certain regime in another country. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Democracy is not an incident that happens overnight, nor a gift that America can give to the world. It is a culture which needs peace to evolve. ~ Shirin Ebadi

Some criticize me, thinking I'm too tolerant of the clerical regime in Iran. In response, I have to say, I have served time in prison, I have lost my position [as a judge]. Do I need to prove that I am brave? Do I need to be killed? ~ Shirin Ebadi