There’s a pit thread relating to a man in Iran who has been/will be executed for the crime of apostasy. In America, the notion that a person can be legally executed for changing religions is unbelievable. It’s not a crime to switch religions!
Is the reverse true? Are there any crimes an American in the USA could be convicted of and suffer considerable punishment for, that an Iranian would say “what the hell? That’s a CRIME in America?”
Killing your daughter for premarital sex?
If that’s a GQ answer, could you provide a cite?
I assume you’re specifically looking for non-political crimes?
So-called “honor killing” of women by family members for perceived “dishonorable” sexual behavior is in fact a crime in Iran, as is any kind of murder.
It’s just that it’s considered a socially acceptable, or even necessary, form of murder and is generally not severely punished, and often simply ignored by the judicial system.
(Note that this kind of “oh well, she needed killing so the killers shouldn’t be punished” attitude isn’t as far removed from American jurisprudence as we’d like to think: a surprisingly recent similar custom is the lenient sentencing accorded by American courts to so-called “crimes of passion” where a husband murdered an adulterous wife.)
As for the OP’s question, I think some US laws against domestic violence probably count as an example of an act that is considered criminal in the US that wouldn’t be so considered in Iran. It’s not that domestic violence against women is completely legal in Iran (although, like honor killing, it is frequently winked at or ignored by the legal system even when it’s technically illegal). But I think that US law generally defines and prohibits domestic violence more strictly than Iranian law does, although I haven’t found examples of specific laws that illustrate that.
One example I did find concerning a different subject involves the legal age of consent. In Iran, a girl as young as 13 and a boy as young as 15 may marry without the consent of their parents, which I think would be illegal anywhere in the US.
Or even more recently, the still-used “gay panic defense” and its relative the “trans panic defense”.
animal abuse
Marrying and then having sex with a 17 year old.
Selling munitions to Iran is a crime in the US, but not in Iran. There was a case some years ago of an Iranian who was buying parts for US munitions (bought by Iran under the Shah). He was lured to a Balkin country, arrested, and brought to the US for trial. If an American was selling the munitions, he would certainly be charged and convicted.
You could go way younger than 17. There’s no “age of consent” in Iran, but they do have to be married in order to legally have sex.
The minimum age of marriage in Iran is 18 for men and 16 for women.
So only one year younger.
The different status of crimes of passion isn’t custom; it’s law. It being a crime of passion is an argument against premeditation, which makes it “only” second-degree murder, not first-degree. On the other hand, if you find out your spouse is cheating on you and go buy some cyanide to slip into his or her food, that’s premeditation and will get you first-degree.
Note also that non-premeditated murder could also apply in situations other than discovering a spouse cheating, and that it works the same way regardless of the gender of the parties involved.
Missed edit window.
However, I should have said “with a 17 year old woman.” It appears that for a woman to have sex with a 17 year old man would be illegal there.
And yes, I know that the age of consent is lower than 18 in many American states. However, there are still many places in America where sex with a 17 year old (of either sex) is illegal.
This is neither accurate nor funny in any way imaginable. Only someone with a very low-brow sense of humour would find this amusing.
Also, I’m sure you must feel high and mighty saying “HURRR HURRR, THEM IS BACKWARDS IRANIAN MUSLIMS LOL!”, but having sex with someone after swearing to be faithful to one person is of extreme importance. Back in old times especially, do you think it’s okay if a man doesn’t know if all of this children are actually someone else’s? I’m not saying I would condone it, I am just saying there’s something to it. Besides, it is completely illegal. Maybe it’s sometimes treated as a “duel” in europe was up until quite recently where it’s illegal but not generally charged.
I laughed.
:rolleyes:
So far I think animal abuse is the answer closest to what I’m looking for. An Iranian wouldn’t necessarily think we’re backward or barbarian for prosecuting domestic violence cases, right? I can buy that they’d be shocked at Michael Vick’s sentencing, though.
Also, pointing to differences in the age of consent isn’t really what I’m looking for, either. Both Iran and America seem to recognize that adults having sex with kids is wrong, they just have slightly different ideas of what “adult” and “kid” means.
Are there any other examples like the animal abuse one? I’m looking for stuff that an Iranian would be absolutely flabbergasted that we bother to criminalize, and react in a way similar to how we react to their apostasy charges.
Prostitution? (becoming more and more legal in Iran, look it up if you must). http://digg.com/news/story/Iran_Legalizes_Prostitution_With_Islamic_Temporary_Marriages_of_One_Hour Torrenting copyright material? (which people have been put in jail for in the west). I saw one case of a man being jailed for four months recently for having one picture of a naked underage girl on his computer (he had previous convictions and evidence he deleted a lot more). Perhaps cases of supposed “harassment” or supposed discrimination against people.
In fairness the justice system is pretty good in the west. You’ll get screwed over in lots of ways in the west, but it’s very unlikely it’ll happen by the justice system (not including beurocratic nonsense supported by the courts).
How about civil rights laws like these?
Sorry Chronos, I misused the technical term “crime of passion”. What I meant to refer to was cases of wife murder in the US where the sentence was lenient (or a sympathetic jury acquitted the defendant) specifically because the wife had been cheating. Not cases where the charge was reduced because the cuckolded husband killed in the heat of rage immediately following his discovery of infidelity.
(Of course, we could also discuss whether the very existence of the official category “crime of passion” for such killings is a sort of covert way to legitimize a Western version of “honor killing”, but that’s another issue. What I’m talking about is social and cultural attitudes that seek to excuse or justify murders of adulterous wives, not the legal status of such murders.)
Clash of the Cites! I scratched my head over this a bit and discovered that njtt’s figures come from this 2010 news article, while mine were based on this 2010 report.
I couldn’t determine how to reconcile this discrepancy. I looked up Article 1041 of the Iranian Civil Code, which is what these statements about legal marriage age seem to be citing, and it says only:
I cannot for the life of me figure out if there is an unambiguous undisputed age of majority for either girls or boys in Iranian law. Article 1201 of the Civil Code states that it is 9 lunar years for girls and 15 for boys, but I think those minimums were raised sometime in the past decade. But I can’t seem to find out the precise history of the changes nor what the most recent figures are.
Anythehellhow, I think we are agreed that for an 18-year-old man to marry a 16-year-old girl without the formal consent of her parents or guardians would be a crime in the US, but not in Iran.
Phew. That was some confusing shit.