Revisiting the Iranian Hostage Crisis

And this episode of Death in Numbers, we revisit the Iranian hostage crisis of 1974
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and the graphic novel perceptively by Iranian born Marjan Satrapy,
which was translated into English in 2003. Perceptively weaves the narrative of her
life from the years nineteen eighty to nineteen ninety four. Volume two
begins with Margin’s father reading the newspaper headlines aloud as his wife prepares food
in their kitchen. They’ve occupied the US embassy. Who’s
they? Who do you think the fundamentalist students have taken the Americans hostage?
Really? They call it a den of spies. Ha ha. You’d think it was a James
Bond movie. You’re not interested? I couldn’t care less anyway.
The Americans are dummies. Maybe. But now no one can go to the United States.
Why is that? Think about it. No embassy, no visa.
On November 4th, 1979, Iranian revolutionary stormed the United
States embassy in Tehran following President Carter’s decision to allow the deposed Shah into
America. While Carter granted the Shah in to receive cancer treatment, protesters
saw it as the U.S. plotting the Shah’s return to power. That day,
the Iranians took 66 people hostage. Meanwhile, six Americans successfully
fled and were later sheltered at the Canadian embassy before being rescued during the operation.
Canadian caper. With the exception of 13 people who were deemed subjects
of the oppression of American society, that is the hostages who were women, African-Americans
and non-U.S. citizens and one man who needed medical treatment. The remaining
News. Now day one, day one of Ronald Reagan’s presidency and day
one of freedom for 52 Americans, thousands of miles apart. These two historic
events moved almost on parallel tracks today. The new president had not been in office an hour
when the former hostages became free men and women again. And they are well along now on their trip
to West Germany and eventually to home. Although the hostages all survived, many
were tortured, beaten and subjected to mock executions for well over a year.
However, the hostages stories are often the only ones told by Western media,
as Satrapi’s perceptively points out, we often neglect to discuss the impact of the hostage crisis
on Iran. As a student fanatics, we’re not representative of all Iranians.
Satrapy opens perceptibly with a preface to explain her motivations for telling her story.
Iran is an old and great civilization that has been discussed mostly in connection
with fundamentalism, fanaticism and terrorism. As an Iranian who has lived more
than half my life in Iran, I know that this image is far from the truth.
This is why writing perceptively was so important to me. I believe that an entire nation
should not be judged by the wrongdoings of a few extremists. Born in nineteen sixty
nine, ten years before the Islamic Revolution, Satrapi grew up in an upper class
Iranian family. Her parents were Marxists, oppose the Western supported Shah,
the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and the subsequent establishment of an Islamic
state under the Ayatollah. For satrapy, it was imperative that she
create perceptively not only because of Western attitudes towards Iran and a pre
and post 9/11 world, but because of her personal experiences with Western
ignorance regarding her culture. When she was in her 20s, she immigrated to France
from Iran, an interview she tells the anecdote of how Europeans would frequently profile
her assuming she spoke Arabic. However, like most Iranians, Satrapy
grew up speaking Persian by teaching Western readers about Iran. She reminds us how easy
it is to perpetuate stereotypes while making sure to not shield readers from the realities of the revolution.
The Satrapi’s, like many Iranians, suffered as a result of the hostage crisis
several days after the embassy was occupied. The Ministry of Education decreed that all universities
and schools would close so that the curriculum could be restructured to educate future imperialists.
For two years, all the Iranian schools were closed. These types of governmental
restrictions oppressed Iranians like satrapy and perceptively. She recalls
her mother worrying about these initial decrees being a slippery slope. You’ll see soon they’re
actually going to force us to wear the veil. You’ll have to trade your car for a camel cart
with a backward policy. This leads Marjan to reflect on how her dream of wanting
to be an educated, liberated woman would no longer be a possibility under the Islamic State.
And indeed, her mother was correct. It is still compulsory for Iranian women to wear a veil in
public. In a 2004 interview with Andy Toleave of book [INAUDIBLE] Satrapy
explains how she wants perceptively to foster understanding and her case for people to
read her graphic novel and realize that there are Iranians just like them till
he follows up by asking are you so determined to foster understanding between people? Because
you see, particularly in the last three years, that we’re getting further away from that to which
satrapy responded. I think the question is between the people, the politics
of the world has created that. When I come to the United States, I’m supposed to be
the axis of evil. They are supposed to be the nest of Satan. That is the way the two
countries call each other, which is really bad when George Bush uses the same kind of words
to use the same words as a completely fanatic theological regime. When I come and see people
here, everything is fine. In an era of Islamophobia prompted by ongoing
conflicts in the Middle East as well as ISIS and other terrorist organizations, works by artists such
as Satrapy Encourages Tolerance, which begins with individuals by revisiting
events such as the Iranian hostage crisis and attempting to recognize the impacts behind
our own nation, we can start to create conversations based on understanding rather than difference.
Today, the U.S. embassy remains closed. The 1970s interior is frozen
in time. Still referred to as the den of spies by Iranians. The building
has turned into a quasi museum and now includes anti-American murals, cases showing
supposed surveillance equipment collected by the CIA. Photographs of the revolution
and stage rooms featuring mannequins recreate in suspected secret meetings. A
visit to the embassy will remind you of the radical nature of the student revolution that once occupied
the building. After the end of the hostage crisis, the Islamic republic was
firmly cemented under the leadership of the radical ayatollah. Even today,
with the election of moderate Hassan Rouhani in 2013, the Iranian government has
continued to oppress its people. A 2007 article, Man of Principle
by The Economist’s notes how? According to Human Rights Watch, an international
lobbying group, Iranian detainees are routinely tortured in clandestine prisons operated
by the judiciary, the Information Ministry and the Revolutionary Guards. The rate
of executions appears to have speeded up to Iran, now executes more people
than any other country except China, often without giving defendants
a fair trial. In the year following the return of the U.S. embassy, hostages,
an estimated two thousand nine hundred and forty six Iranians were executed
within two years. That number rose to seven thousand seven hundred and forty six people.
The revolution also incited Iraq’s invasion in 1980 and led to the death of an estimated
years. While some Iranians certainly supported and participated in
the hostage crisis and subsequent revolution, as Satrapi reminds us, they are not
representative of the majority in the future. Perhaps we should try to remember that
an entire nation should not be judged by the wrongdoings of a few.
This has been Death A Numbers, a podcast created and produced by the Humanities Media
Project in the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Texas at Austin and Liberal Arts Instructional
Technology Services player Amy Vidar and Caroline Baarda notes for the show, including
links and photos can be found on our website. Humanity’s Media Project Dawg. Our
theme music is enthusiast by Tourre’s. Thank you for listening.