Iran's Woody Allen Moment, Bad or Worse?

The mere thought of a parent marrying his or her adopted child seems reprehensible, an act that most people would consider on the fringe of, if not on par with, pedophilia. When the film director Woody Allen married the adopted child of his ex-wife, actress Mia Farrow, over 20 years ago, the world shrank from his act, and it has arguably tainted his biography since that day. In the West, the process of adopting a child concludes with the child being considered a biological part of that family or guardian, hence the lingering outrage towards Allen.

Iran, where Islamic rules for child fostering and adoption differ significantly, is now having a national Woody Allen moment. This past Sunday the Islamic Republic’s Parliament passed a bill designed to protect the rights of children which includes an article that allows individuals to marry their adopted sons or daughters. 

The additional article added to the law stipulates that in order for an individual in a family to marry his or her adopted child, a judge would have to rule that the marriage was in the best interest of the child. Currently in Iran the legal age for marriage is 15 for boys and 13 for girls.

The final decision as to whether this law is permissible under Iran’s constitution and Islamic law now rests with Iran's Guardian Council, a body of unelected clerics and jurists that are handpicked by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

Human rights lawyers and children’s rights activists have protested the passing of the law, calling it a form of legalized pedophilia, while others have questioned the legal ramifications of man or woman having a spouse who is also their child. Shiva Dolatabadi, the head of Iran's society for protecting children's rights warns, of the mental effects that the law will have on the family unit and the effects for future adoption. “For a mother who has adopted a young girl and accepted her as her own child, she could never imagine that her daughter could take her place as mother.”

The outrage is understandable, some are arguing that the law is being misrepresented by activists, and that it actually seeks to limit such marriages by bringing them under judicial oversight. Iranians have been recoiling against the bill all week on social networks, but the blog Roohsavar.com said there it was important to “[present] a different part of the picture.”

The comment in full considers Islamic legal foundations for adoption and rules of modesty: “This law has existed long before, meaning in the eyes of the law, the guardian, without any limitations could marry his adopted child in the past. In Islam there is no rule against this. The Parliament this time around is trying to limit this practice. If the marriage court thinks that it’s ok or beneficial for the child, they can get married.  Since Sharia law has allows open interpretations, this law has come forward to tighten the loophole which only can be opened by a judge. I’m hoping these judges will be knowledgeable of the emotional issues involved and not allow such marriages to happen. The person who does this, I’m talking about the individual who marries their adopted child, doesn’t understand the relationship between parents/guardians and children.”

The blogger also included another take. A classmate of the blogger who is a “radical-feminist,” gave her opinion on the matter: “Besides the fact that I am totally against government regulation of marriage, if there is an age limit, it’s a good law...Of course we are assuming that the now grown up adopted individual should not be forced to do something that he or she doesn’t want to do. Since an adopted boy would be able to marry an unwed guardian mother, within this specific context, men and women would be equal.” 

But a progressive law, children's rights lawyers say, would abolish the practice altogether, not lend an official veneer of acceptability by making it permissible by judicial authorisation. Similar to the legalization of multiple wives, the modern implementation of such laws seems admirable, since they are supposed to protect widowed women and orphaned children, but in reality, such practices have been rife with abuse. Who can assure, for example, that the judge in question isn't a friend of the male guardian, or even bribable for that matter.

Turan Valimorad, a women’s rights activist and secretary of Islamic Coalition of Women, considers this law as a flagrant violation of the rights of women and children. "The person who wants to have a sexual relationship is the man, the judge is also a man (There have been no female judges after the Iranian revolution). If such an article was able to be passed by members of parliament, then surely there will be judges who will legally approve of such marriages,” warned Valimorad.