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But this shift also reflected a class divide. Wealthier Iranians were convinced that they stood for progress and development. The urban poor and the rural masses, however, still saw their world through the lens of traditional morality. Religious virtue, established gender norms, and a social order based on Iranian values of generosity, humility, and family honor were unquestioned. These groups were anxious and uncertain about the changes going on around them, and longed for a simpler time in which right and wrong were clearly laid out before them.
These two forces in Iranian society viewed each other with a mixture of fear, contempt, and outright hostility. The urban, wealthy elite saw the traditional classes as being ignorant and backwards. The word for villager—dahati—became synonymous with stupid. Religion and clerical authorities were seen as relics of an bygone era. For their part, the less-educated, conservative elements of society saw the so-called modernizers as immoral, decadent, and arrogant. They were the gharbzadeh—those intoxicated with the West. They had abandoned centuries of tradition – not to mention their Islamic faith – and turned their backs on the values of their grandparents.
The Iranian revolution was a monumental political shift, but it was also a clash between these two cultures. The modernizers were dumbfounded. They could not see – nor did they particularly care to see – the real sense of frustration among the lower classes. The traditionalists felt vindicated by the toppling of the Shah and put their faith in Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, a leader who stood up to the liberal elite in the name of what they believed to be a moral, just society. They marched in the streets by the thousands, voting with their bodies for radical change.
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