The Expression of Self-images Through Prejudices and Persecutions: Shi'ites versus Baha'is of Iran

Description

The study of persecutions of a minority reveal, among other things, self-images and prevailing norms among the persecuting groups of the majority. Typically, the minority is seen to incarnate negative projections of virtues esteemed by the majority, and the perceived violation of majority norms is one of the justifications for persecutions. Negative images of a particular group often prevail also among those who do not in their everyday life have contact with the persecuted group. An illustrative example is that anti-Semitism in Poland prevailed long after the Jewish group in Poland had been eradicated in World War II.

Among Muslims, and in particular among Shi'ites, anti-Baha'i sentiments and reactions constitute an analogy to European anti-Semitism, albeit less widespread and less known. The Baha'i religion arose from a schism in Islam in the 1840s and the Baha'is are considered heretics, both in a Shi'ite and a Sunni perspective. The Baha'is have repeatedly been persecuted in several Muslim countries and persecutions were intensified in Iran after the Iranian revolution of 1979. Popular prejudices against the Baha'is both nourish and are nourished by organised persecutions, and although the most comprehensive persecutions take place in Iran, Baha'is are unpopular and discriminated against in most Middle-East countries with a majority Muslim population.