September 01, 2017
Hairy women and those with skin rashes are banned from teaching in Iran’s schools, according to Education Ministry guidelines publicized last month by the Fars news agency. But the government says those rules are outdated and a new set of guidelines will be published “soon,” the perennial indefinite future used by the regime.
Fars carried a report on the guidelines August 23, which set off criticism even from many hardliners. The guidelines listed all sorts of ailments that critics noted are not communicable and do not impact a person’s ability to teach, such as gallstones and kidney disease.
Esfandiar Chaharband of the Education Ministry told the Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA) that the list was old and had been revised. But he did not produce a new list or say that hairy women could now get jobs as teachers.
He insisted that no one had ever been banned from teaching on the basis of any of the diseases listed and said they were only recorded in the records of the individual teacher.
Shahindokht Molaverdi, newly named as presidential aide for civil rights, said on her twitter account August 24 that the guidelines had been re-written and the new ones would be revealed ”soon.”
“Soon” is a standard government ploy that usually means “never” but is designed to get passed a public uproar.
According to the list, a “thick accent,” getting “migraines and cluster headaches,” cancers that affect the head, face or neck or, in the case of women, breast or ovarian cancer, are all taboo for would-be teachers.
Smokers, people who enjoy a hookah, drug users, and alcoholics are also blacklisted, according to the document published by Fars.
The regulation also prevents people suffering from sexual dysfunction or venereal and sexual diseases, including AIDS and syphilis, from teaching.
And those with mental problems, including psychosis, depression, and sexual deviation are also banned.
Journalist Omid Memarian noted that under the new conditions, world-famous physicist, cosmologist and author Stephen Hawking—who suffers from a form of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)—wouldn’t be barred from teaching in Iran.
