Iran’s Election Boycott Casts a Vote for Reform

Re “Iran Hard-Liners Win More Seats With Fewer Voters,” Feb. 22: As the Iranian people successfully boycotted the sham elections last week, this victory begins a new chapter in their history.

What is happening in Iran today is a post-Islamic renaissance signifying the end of an era consumed with the notion of “political Islam” and “Islamic democracy” and the dawn of an era defined by individual liberties, social freedoms and secular democracy, with the spread of these ideals in the region as its logical consequence.

For over two decades, academics, reformist theologians and liberal clerics have tried to create “Islamic democracy” but have failed because Islamic democracy is, in philosophical terms, nonsense. Either the people and their legitimate representatives are in charge of setting policies and writing laws or a self-appointed few, claiming that they have been chosen by God, will dictate how people should lead their lives.

Reza Torkzadeh

Northridge