Shout Out to Zahra Rahnavard

A big Fringe shout out to bad-a** mother-feminist Zahra Rahnavard, wife to Mir Hossein Mousavi, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's main competition in Friday's Iranian election.

After Ahmadinejad questioned Dr. Rahnavard's credentials during a televised debate with her husband, the spunky academe called a 90-minute press conference where she proceeded to excoriate Ahmadinejad for lying, humiliating women, and debasing the revolution.

"Those who made up this case against me wanted to say it is a crime for women to study, to get two graduate degrees, to become an intellectual or an artist," she said.

In addition, she threatened to sue Ahmadinejad for slandering her academic qualifications if he did not publicly apologize to her within 24 hours.

Dr. Rahnavard put on her feminist hat to woo young and female voters promising that, if elected, her husband will do away with the morality police, end discrimination, ensure that women are treated like humans, not second class citizens, and appoint women to cabinet posts.

For a woman in Iran (or anyone in Iran), this is ballsy busty styff, but because she's a woman, Rahnavard's been able to indict Ahmadinejad more strongly than any of his male competitors.

You can read more about her at the London Times, the AP, The New York Times, The New Internationalist Blog, and Wikipedia.