December 12, 2020

"An Iranian woman who posted heavily distorted images of herself online has been sentenced to 10 years in jail..."

"... her lawyer has said, a year after she was arrested over her social media activities.... She was charged with corruption of young people and disrespect for the Islamic Republic.... The charges against Tabar first included blasphemy, inciting violence, gaining income through inappropriate means and encouraging youths to corruption. She said she had been cleared of two of the four charges against her, but did not want to comment further because she was still hoping for a pardon. Iranian state TV broadcast her confession in late October last year. Her expressions of remorse drew a great deal of sympathy."

From "Iranian teenager who posted distorted pictures of herself is jailed for 10 years/Instagram star Sahar Tabar [Fatemeh Khishvand] says she is still hoping for a pardon after conviction for corrupting young people" (The Guardian).

This beautiful woman made her face up to look shocking (but also strangely, hauntingly beautiful). This is what caused popularity on Instagram and outrage among Iranian authorities:

I hope she gets that pardon, but I understand that fear that images like that corrupt youth. Here's what seems to be an Instagram site preserving her images, which were, I believe, done with makeup and Photoshop and not plastic surgery. See Wikipedia, which adds:

[Iran] has the highest rate of nose surgery in the world. A pointed up nose – or just wearing a nose bandage – is widely seen as fashionable, both among men and women, and among progressives and conservatives. Apart from beauty standards, the motivation for surgery may include expression of social status, marriage chances, self-expression, or simple boredom in a country with otherwise restricted dress code.

For all that repression, why is all that cosmetic plastic surgery allowed? Perhaps because it's generally done in pursuit of a generic look — the idealized beauty standard — and not to deviate from the shared norm. Tabar's images make an implicit argument that looking very different and weird is good. What if all the beautiful young people got it in their head to maximize creepy strangeness? What if instead of seeking traditional married life they wiled away their time in front of the mirror and made their face as weird as possible with the goal of maximizing "likes" on line?

I can only try to approximate the fear and punitiveness that has arisen in the mind of Iranian authorities.

46 comments:

tds said...

I recall thinking this was plastic surgery going extreme

mezzrow said...

On a scale of 0 to 100 the score on how much TPTB hate this is 512. She's a really lovely young woman, and I can't say I don't understand their reaction. Humans have very different interpretations of what needs to be under control. (that sounds like something from Chairman Xi, to be sure...)

Beauty makes people act crazy, even the ones who look at it in a mirror. Yes, it's art too.

If you don't think art comes from some variant of insanity, you know no history.

Lars Porsena said...

Blogger tds said...
I recall thinking this was plastic surgery going extreme

Me too.

rwnutjob said...

"I can only try to approximate the fear and punitiveness that has arisen in the mind of Iranian authorities."

Don't worry. Some of that fear will be assuaged. After Trump's four historic Middle East peace deals further isolated Iran & Russia, and his energy policy gutted their oil & gas market, Joe will come to the rescue, loosen sanctions, & reinstate the Iran deal farce.

#winning

Kate said...

It's hard to see young people delve into horror. All their dewy freshness will be gone soon enough. No need to look like the Crypt Keeper before your time.

Guildofcannonballs said...

Iranian authorities have one mind? If so, what a sloppy bullshit deceptive word.

Ann Althouse said...

"Iranian authorities have one mind? If so, what a sloppy bullshit deceptive word."

I am following a CORRECT rule of grammar that I follow consistenly on this blog. Each person has one mind. We all need to use our head. Not we all need to use our heads. Learn it. See it. Don't criticize it in others. Get it right yourself. Shape up.

Guildofcannonballs said...

In the mind of those with German ancestory, Iran isn't populated by individuals with unique thoughts, but instead only by sloppy blobs of groups easily labeled whatever.

Kai Akker said...

There is a woman who knows her beauty is only skin deep. I wonder what causes her to see such ugliness in her own face? To want to see it?

traditionalguy said...

Tattoos. That’s what the beauty of youth needs to deface it. This is amateur defacement. The face as a social construct has arrived.

Fernandinande said...

The picture on the right shows some photoshop artifacts; the stretched dots on the cloth.

It's strange that something as silly as someone playing with makeup and photoshop became international fakenews.

Bob Boyd said...

In Iran, if you corrupt someone online, they have to be your slave in the afterlife.

Birkel said...

Use of the word "respective" solves the vagueness - rule or no rule.
The rule leaves confusion.

Meanwhile, the techno-fascists will help Iran crack down.
What's a few million more living in state-run prisons?
Ask the Uighurs.

Chris N said...

I know some Armenians, and near the border Iranians come up to buy booze and cigarettes and the girls are easy to spot because they go overboard with the outfits and makeup if ya know what I mean.

It’s baked in to Islam and its centralized rule to lead a holy life (no alcohol, no adultery, no thievery, sometimes ya chop some heads). Some regimes take it further than others, even in Persia, with ancient Persepolis and all.

Fun fact: if you want to hear a wild story about young love in this part of the world, a beautiful pop singer escaping the harem of a tiger-owning tyrant, well, I think I’ve told it on here.

tcrosse said...

Evidently Michael Jackson's plastic surgeon has moved to Iran.

Achilles said...

I can only try to approximate the fear and punitiveness that has arisen in the mind of Iranian authorities.

Just wait until it becomes illegal to mention voter fraud.

stlcdr said...

Trying to evaluate right and wrong in a middle Eastern foreign country is a fruitless exercise from the West. Especially how we are now running upside down right and wrong in the US.

narciso said...

Because living in todays iran is a death sentence.

Wince said...

The charges against Tabar first included blasphemy, inciting violence, gaining income through inappropriate means and encouraging youths to corruption.

Simple advice: Angelina Jolie needs to steer clear of Iran.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

I thought that was angelina jolie after a bad face lift.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Of course that is photoshop or something like it.

Ever use snap chat? the overlays have the power to transform you into someone 20-30 years younger ... or a potato.

Gulistan said...

Hmmm...blasphemy and corrupting the youth. Rings a bell.

mockturtle said...

"but also strangely, hauntingly beautiful"

Haunting? Yes, but beautiful???? It's the stuff of nightmares or horror movies.

mockturtle said...

Simple advice: Angelina Jolie needs to steer clear of Iran.

AJ was the first thing that came to mind, Wince.

Lurker21 said...


Ever use snap chat? the overlays have the power to transform you into someone 20-30 years younger ... or a potato.

Brian Stelter wants to know if there's one that goes the other way.

He's asking for a friend.

I will do you all a favor and spare you my Meg Ryan comment.

President-Mom-Jeans said...

"I hope she gets that pardon, but I understand that fear that images like that corrupt youth." Nothing matters until after the "but." Althouse was a law professor, but I understand that now she is excusing a bunch of pedophile worshipping savages locking up a woman because of the makeup she wears.

Some fucking feminist you are.

h said...

A lot of people (especially young women) are uncomfortable with their natural bodies. When the corrective action is to remove the vagina and ovaries and breasts, the discomfort is celebrated as courageous, and the corrective action is demanded as a right (with public funding). When the corrective action is to remove the nose, or a leg, or arm, the corrective action is condemned, the discomfort is regarded as a mental illness or disorder, and the medical profession regards the corrective actions as unethical.

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

BidenFamilyTaxPayerFundedCrackPipe said...

I thought that was angelina jolie after a bad face lift.

IIRC, that's how it originally went viral. It started out as "This looks like Angelina Jolie with a bad face lift!" to "Look at Angelina Jolie's bad face lift!".

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

Sorry, that should read; '"This looks like Angelina Jolie with a bad face lift!" and quickly went to "Look at Angelina Jolie's bad face lift!".'

Oso Negro said...

"I can only try to approximate the fear and punitiveness that has arisen in the mind of Iranian authorities."

Don't worry, Kamala Harris will be approximating it here soon enough

Jupiter said...

"I can only try to approximate the fear and punitiveness that has arisen in the mind of Iranian authorities."

We're getting a solid dose of it here in Oregon. It starts with the idea that "The _______ is settled!". In Iran, it's Islam. In Oregon, what goes in the blank is "Science". As practiced in Oregon, Science, rather like Islam, is a body of unrelated superstitions and proscriptions, to be applied with zeal but no particular consistency. Unlike Islam, Science was developed by white men, so we can safely rely upon it. Like airplanes. Nobody knows why they stay up there, but they do.

elkh1 said...

If she was in America, as a Muslim from a Middle East country, would she be categorized as white or colored?

Narr said...

"Blasphemy" is a concept from the childhood of mankind. No regime that prosecutes a human for such an imaginary infraction is worthy of anything but derision and destruction.

Youth are made to be corrupted.

Narr
Especially Muzzie youth

Anonymous said...

An extraordinarily beautiful young woman sees many obstacles removed from her path in life, especially if she has flexible standards in men and morals. But I've read interviews and memoirs of women who were extraordinarily beautiful when they were young. They do have to cross a whole new set of obstacles that others do not.

It's tempting to laugh derisively at a pretty girl's pity party, but surely it must weigh heavily on the psyche to know you are hated and mistrusted by most of the woman you meet. Most of the men you run across can't take their eyes off your tits and ass, but are too intimidated to ask you out or even speak to you like a fellow human being. The brass-necked rogues who do approach you tend to be worthless, amoral, entitled men. Their only interest in you is to offer you shiny pretty baubles in exchange for the use of your body, sexually or otherwise, for their own purposes. You feel judged by almost everyone for using your looks instead of your other gifts to get ahead in life.

I can see how this lovely girl's deliberate self-defacing ghoulishness might be a form of psychological compensation for that emotional burden.

Joe Smith said...

Their culture, their rules.

Iranian women can be crazy hot...I've met a few...

Gospace said...


I hope she gets that pardon, but I understand that fear that images like that corrupt youth. Here's what seems to be an Instagram site preserving her images, which were, I believe, done with makeup and Photoshop and not plastic surgery. See Wikipedia, which adds:


And there is the problem. You see the fear that images like that corrupt youth.

When that fear is in Iran.

But pro-LBGT(etc,etc,etc) propaganda doesn't corrupt youth and indeed, should be widespread so they are accepted as normal if not actually celebrated and emulated.

So in your humble opinion, is Emma (Elliot) Page someone to be emulated or pitied? Is she a confused pitiable girl or a brave outstanding young man? Is she a role model for young girls? Or is that young men? Or are they really interchangeable in the United States- but not Iran? Where you can understand the fear?

Joe Smith said...

"If she was in America, as a Muslim from a Middle East country, would she be categorized as white or colored?"

Iranians are not Arabs, and they would be the first to tell you that.

They are Persian. Historically they are Aryans.

Most that I knew could have been Southern Italian by looking at them.

Joe Smith said...

"So in your humble opinion, is Emma (Elliot) Page someone to be emulated or pitied? Is she a confused pitiable girl or a brave outstanding young man? Is she a role model for young girls? Or is that young men?"

I will call Page a 'man' or 'sir' or whatever out of courtesy and good manners.

But 'she' will never be a 'man.'

'She' is a weak-minded individual swayed by the fad of the day, and certainly (as an actor) and attention-seeker.

Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...

Chrissy Hynde-ish in pic #1

Narr said...

"Chrissy Hynde-ish" says I_ARM.

Not many faces are flattered by bangs, IMO.

She looks capable of bearing healthy young.

Narr
And isn't that all that matters?

Anonymous said...

Not many faces are flattered by bangs, IMO.

Long bangs are usually fine. Short bangs depend a lot on the underlying facial structure. Very short bangs are distractingly ugly on everyone.

Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...

Vintage Chrissy-- we rest our case

wildswan said...

What that girl did to her face is its own punishment. I can imagine future Moms saying: If you don't stop spending so much time on the internet, your face will start to look like Sahar Tabar's.

bagoh20 said...

" We all need to use our head. Not we all need to use our heads. Learn it. See it. Don't criticize it in others. Get it right yourself. Shape up."

"I can only try to approximate the fear and punitiveness that has arisen in the mind of Iranian authorities."

Sounds like you've got it down pretty well.

Narr said...

Hey, I'm fine with the bangs on those two, don't get me wrong. Zooey Deschanel--the pretty sister--also can pull it off.

Narr
Just sayin'

PM said...

Reminds me, Jocelyn Wildenstein turned 80 this year.