Iranian police have arrested more than 260 people, including three European citizens, on suspicion of spreading satanism, the state-run IRNA news agency reported Friday.

The report said the suspects were arrested on Thursday night in Shahryar County, west of the capital of Tehran, for “spreading the culture of satanism and nudity.” It did not elaborate.

It was not clear how such a large number of arrests were made in one night — if the suspects were in one location, at some gathering or party, or not.

Gatherings where unrelated men and women are seen together are illegal in Iran and considered a sin under Islamic law.

  • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    A nice reminder that we’d all be better off without Iran’s theocracy which supports terrorists for proxy fights. A democratic Republic by and for the Iranian people would be a major step towards lasting peace in the middle east

    • prole@sh.itjust.works
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      4 months ago

      Yeah if only they had their own secular, democratically elected leaders. And maybe those leaders could even decide to nationalize their oil.

      What could possibly go wrong for them?

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        Nassar’s Egypt, Mosaddegh’s Iran, Sankara’s Burkino Faso, Obote’s Uganda, Lumumba’s Congo, Trujillo’s Dominican Republic, Sukarno’s Indonesia (Read the Jakarta Method folks), Goulart’s Brazil, Arbenz’s Guatamala, Guardia’s Costa Rica, Allende’s Chile…

        I don’t know what it is, but democratically elected leaders in countries that pursued an unaligned status just have a habit of getting couped by reactionary members of their militaries for some crazy reason.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      One likely fueling the other. Between the near open war with Israel and a satanic panic, I’m sure Iran was rife with conspiracy theory and QAnon style hysteria before their President pancaked into a mountain.

      I can’t imagine the reactionary elements in the country growing any less paranoid and superstitious in the wake of the crash.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Satanic Panic has a strong 1980s vibe. A country the size and industrial scale of Germany with the politics of the West Texas town of Bomont from the movie Footloose.