Azadeh Moaveni

I always considered Ahmad Bourghani one of the very few gentlemen produced by the Islamic Republic. The former reformist MP died this past Saturday, February 5, of a heart attack in Tehran, a fact I only learned moments ago and relate with great sadness. Back when there was such thing as a reform movement, Bourghani was one of its most distinguished, talented, and dedicated members. Now that he has passed away, there seems no harm in revealing that he is the unnamed ‘reformist legislator’ in my book Lipstick Jihad (pp. 76-78, if you feel like looking). He taught me a great deal about Iran, especially about how the government’s gender segregation policies had only served to hypersexualize young people. He managed to share such thoughts with the detachment and poise of a Western gender studies scholar, which for an Iranian man of traditional background is no small thing. I write in my book about how both of us were trying to quit smoking, and I wonder now if he ever did. Farsi Readers may be interested in Mohammad Ali Abtahi’s account of his funeral proceedings. Apparently most of the country’s leading press and reformist figures attended.