I was seven years old when I got sacred for the first time. I was getting back from school when my friend told\u00a0me: \u201cDid you know that if you reveal your hair out of your scarf, God will punish you by hanging you from it?\u201d\u00a0One day my husband locked me up in the house to stop me from reading books, going to the university, seeing\u00a0my family, and getting involved with society. It was the same day when an earthquake hit our city and I was\u00a0locked up in a house on the 10th floor. The thing that I was most worried about was finding the safest place to\u00a0stand on but at once I felt an empty space beneath my feet and now that is how I am afraid of people and\u00a0events like quakes. I had not paid attention to the rules and traditions before my marriage, which ended up in\u00a0a tragic divorce, shortly after. I was living in a swamp, alive but unaware with no roots and identity. My whole\u00a0identity was defined by my father\u2019s name, my husband\u2019s name, and my future unborn son. The focus in my\u00a0story and photos is on the rules and the traditions that are stemmed from religions, and the religious\u00a0principles. Some of these religious teachings have established the inequality between men and women. These\u00a0religious principles have been implemented to the constitution by the Islamic Republic of Iran. For example,\u00a0based on the inequality between men and women, men inherit twice the women, and also are entitled to the\u00a0blood money twice the women. Unquestionably, these unjust laws have contributed tremendously toward\u00a0violence and discrimination against women. Many women are in the government prison as guilty of showing\u00a0their hair. All they wanted was to let the breeze dance with their hair. Singing is forbidden for girls and women.\u00a0Some girls dream of going to college, but found themselves in the bridal gowns being forced to arranged\u00a0marriages. In this swamp, freedom is suffocated in the womb. There is no space to develop and grow. The\u00a0tyrant governments always use the religion as the best and strongest lever to control the people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sima Choubdarzadeh<\/strong>\u00a0is a master of art in philosophy. She has been working with photography since 2014. She has a photography certificate from provincial society artistic photography. Sima took part in 3 group exhibitions. She took first place of reward from Meshgin Shahr festival 2016 and Sheed award in Iran 2017. She was among honorable mention during the 15th Julia Margaret Cameron Award\u00a0 in the open theme category in 2020. She was the member of the VII academy as a scholarship in No man\u2019s land 2020. Her project \u201cMy name is fear\u201d has also been exhibited at Format Festival in Derby in March 2021.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I was seven years old when I got sacred for the first time. I was getting back from school when […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":463,"parent":572,"menu_order":3,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"templates\/opencall-wpis.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-722","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\n\n\t\n