With the re-election of Hassan Rouhani as the President of Iran, it has rekindled the hope for many liberals in the country. During Rouhani’s first term, many witnessed Iran moving closer towards Western culture, and his position in domestic and international affairs indicated further openness towards its influence.
The issues revolving around Iran include several issues such as their economic and social policies. Although there have been signs of progress of the influence of Western lifestyles becoming a part of Iran, there is still much that has to be done to make further improvements.
Operation Spider
One of the biggest incidents portraying just how troublesome it has been for Iran to adopt Western trends is Operation Spider.
Project Spider or Operation Spider is a surveillance-based program created by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to monitor the Iranian population who use the internet and indulge in activities on social media platforms like Facebook. And once the operation has been publicized in 2015 alongside a statement provided by the IRGCs “The Center for Investigation of Organized Crime”, the program began to expand to other social media such as Instagram, Whatsapp, Viber, and more.
The operation had made many arrests in 2014 to 2016. In 2014, the IRGC had intensified its review of various Facebook pages. Additionally, they also found that more than 340 Facebook pages were being managed by 36 different individuals, and more than 120 of them had been deleted from Facebook. In 2015, 12 Facebook users in Iran had been arrested, and around 24 other Iranians had been confronted to answer some questions about the activities they take part in on their social media platforms.
In the beginning of 2015, the Center For Investigation of Organized Cyber Crimes had published a statement that states that many Facebook users have been arrested through a surveillance project, named by the IRGC as “Operation Spider” which is aimed to identify and root out the Facebook pages and various other virtual activities that can ‘spread the influence and corruption of Western lifestyles.’ The statement has also said that they have “received indirect and covert support from the Western governments and had targeted a remarkable number of Facebook users in the guise of cultural and social pages over a span of two years.”
In 2016, Operation Spider II had taken place, and when they detected Iranian models who were posting their images without a headscarf, they were arrested and charged with promoting Western culture.
It was cases like these that made famous figures like Sam Yari to immigrate to Turkey, where he worked as a professional in advertisement, fine arts, and photography.
As a highly acclaimed Iranian – Turkish fashion photographer and director, he had strong feelings against how many women could not embrace the freedom of doing and wearing what they wanted in extremist religious states that he decided to use his skills to make a difference.
He used his fine art skills, portrait, and fashion photography to portray his protest against restrictions on clothing for women, people in poverty, injustice against not being given proper rights, and much more. Yari uses his artistic skills and knowledge to act as a storyteller, using his pictures to talk about the issues occurring in Iran and how more people should be aware of their struggles and situations.
Moreover, he has also had the opportunity to work with many celebrities like Bahareh Rehnama, Yas, Mohammad Reza Golzar, and more. Additionally, he has also held photography exhibitions in Ukraine, and Kiev, where he focuses on restrictions, imprisonment, and killing of photographers and artists in extremist Islamic countries.