Shakhsari, Sima. 2012. From Homoerotics of Exile to Homopolitics of Diaspora: CYBERSPACE, THE WAR ON TERROR, AND THE HYPERVISIBLE IRANIAN QUEER.” Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies 8 (3, Fall): 14-40.
Iranian president claims there were no gays in Iran - in an effort to prove their intolerance, American media made the Iranian gays hypervisible - thereby highlighting their own tolerance
The Iranian diaspora began operationalising the homosexuals by putting them on a pedestal as the minority that needed to be defended from the Iranian government
"An Iranian queer woman in Germany, who initially signed this statement, later questioned its sincerity and critiqued its patriarchal language after noticing that several signatories were homophobic individuals who used this petition as a political tool." p.16
The author asks why are Iranian gays so popular in the diasporic sentiment: the internet is used as a tool of democratisation in the wake of 9/11, and that it has become popular both in Iran and in the diaspora. As a result of this, the second reason is that through the Internet, the Iranian diaspora, which was recently labelled as those in exile, have become more connected to the Iranian's still in Iran.
"While the celebrations of movement and borderless frontiers in cyberspace yield to the increased deployment of diaspora as an emblem of unrestricted mobility, glorifications of the liberatory potentials of the Internet construct cyberspace as a haven for Iranian queers awaiting rescue within the liberatory and civilizational discourses of the war on terror." p.16-17
The question remains, which gays are marketable gays, and the ones that should be protected? The fat ones, the criminal ones, the dark-skinned ones, the sexually liberal ones, the homeless ones, the drug-taking ones? In reality, it is the homonationalist gays that are the ones that are easiest to market and therefore protect.
"While representations of Iran as a grand prison for queers are not new or particular to the Internet, ... the broad reach and the fast circulation of images and ideas in cyberspace accelerate and enable mobilizations of identity and politics in a larger scale." p.20
#instagay Iran
"While former groups used cautionary methods in “outing” gay life in Iran, Parsi does not hesitate to produce and publicize exaggerated accounts of gay persecution in Iran." p.21
The author argues that sensationalist queer diasporic figures such as Parsi appropriate so called 'gay-hangings' in Iran for the cause, when other human rights organisations disagree with his assessment, instead saying that the cases "merely speculative and lack hard evidence leading to the conclusion that Marhouni and Asgari were gay" p.22
Link to Puar's understanding of diaspora: "The idealized and romanticized qorbat (exile) often connotes a painful separation from the homeland, the loss of which is often accompanied by the restoration of an original home, mourned and fetishized in nostalgic remembrances. In the Iranian exilic discourse, “homeland” is constructed as highly heterosexual through deployments of nuclear families, while home as a lived space in “exile” flirts with queerness.35 While these gay flirtations construct an image of the perverted “West,” they also create an innocent heterosexual homeland, disavowing any possibility of homoerotic desire in Iran." p.24
"in imagining a coherent heterosexual nation and a fixed home." p.24
"The Iranian diaspora’s increased exchange of information in cyberspace has culminated in feelings of mobility, multilocationality, and border crossing." p.25
"Often, the shift from exile to diaspora in new frontiers such as cyberspace reflects a mere desire for innovation that reifies the exilic norms rather than changing them. Like exile, diaspora conjures up an idealized image of homeland as fixed and imagines a homogeneous heteronormative Iranian community" p.32
Why do some people get to be called migrants, and others are expats? It's the same as when some people are in exile, and others belong to a diaspora: "While a large group of Iranians in the United States and Europe have access to the Internet or enjoy mobility, many Iranian immigrants who live under dire conditions and often illegally in Turkey and other locations are not as mobile and may not have easy access to computers while waiting for the UNHCR to recognize them as true refugees." p.25
Does the author think that Parsi is a traitor to the Iranian queers? "While being subjected to hate crimes and anti-immigrant laws, some diasporic Iranians take advantage of the opportunities provided during the war on terror." p.26
"In a competition over imagining the most democratic future for Iran, defending the rights of women and queers have become quite chic, insofar as defending gay rights and women’s rights reflects the modernity and democratic tendencies of those who provide expertise and testimonials to think tanks, non-governmental organizations, and propaganda media outlets funded by the liberating states." p.26
"While it is no longer necessary to quarantine the homosexual for as diseased, the population as a whole needs to be managed because of the hovering danger of homosexuality (which lies in the body of the homosexual) and the risk of developing an inauthentic desire (which lies in the body of the “normal” members of society). Within this form of cybergovernmentality, the Iranian citizen is asked to put aside her or his traditional and superstitious beliefs on homosexuality, tolerate homosexuals and defend the rights of the homosexual minority, while practicing self-control and preventing other citizens from the dangers of becoming inauthentic homosexuals" p.30
"homophobic bloggers such as Khaledian and Iranian queer organizations such as Homan and IRQR continually draw a distinction between what they see as traditional Iran and the modern West, thus overlooking the role of the colonial regimes of knowledge in normalization of heterosexuality in Iran." p.31
"the increased use of the Internet and the discursive shift to a more inclusive diaspora have done little to change the heteronormative and nationalist imaginations of Iranian-ness among the Iranian opposition groups and individuals" p.32
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