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Wrestling with the Revolution: The Iron Sheik and the American Cultural Response to the 1979 Iranian Revolution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Sina Rahmani
Sina Rahmani*
Affiliation:
University of California at Los Angeles
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Abstract

This paper maps how American popular culture came to terms with the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran through a study of Hussein Khosrow Vaziri. Vaziri, better known by his moniker, “The Iron Sheik,” was active in professional wrestling in the 1980s and remains to this day one of the most well-known Iranians in American cultural memory. Through an analysis of his character and how he has been represented in the popular media, I argue that he was chiefly utilized as a figure through whom Americans could cope with the devastating blow that the Revolution caused to American power. I argue that this reaction continues to this day, albeit focusing not on Iran but on the current political tensions involving the attacks of September 11, 2001.

Type
Research Article
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 40 , Issue 1 , February 2007 , pp. 87 - 108
Copyright
Copyright © 2007 The International Society for Iranian Studies

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Footnotes

1

This paper was written as result of a grant provided by McMaster University's USRA program. I would like to thank the Vice-President (Research) Mamdouh Shoukri, the Experiential Education Office, as well as the faculty of Humanities. Nasrin Rahimieh was kind enough to supervise the project and offered her typically invaluable assistance. I would like to thank Don Dawson, Nader Hashemi, Neil McLauglin, Mehrdad Samadzadeh, and an anonymous reviewer for their assistance. This paper would not have been possible without Erin Aspenlieder, who patiently read early drafts of this paper and offered insightful comments.

References

2 The World Wildlife Fund successfully forced the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) to change its name in early 2002 to World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). Since Vaziri was active only in the WWF, I use WWF throughout this paper during the discussion of his character. In the discussion of the more recent events, I use WWE when appropriate.

3 “No Islands of Stability,” Web Page. Digital History. [Accessed 21 August 2005] Available at http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/database/article_display.cfm?HHID=403

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17 Washington attempted to distance itself from the Shah after his downfall even though he was one of America's most important and loyal allies for more than a quarter century. As the Carter administration witnessed the rage of protesting Iranians calling for his extradition back to Iran, the administration nudged him out of the country soon after his treatment.

18 Two weeks later, in what will go down as one of the strangest examples of cross-cultural empathy in modern history, the women and all but one of the African American hostages were released. Khomeini articulated the reasoning behind the release: women and minorities had already suffered “the oppression of American society.”

19 Roland Barthes, Mythologies, trans. Anette Levers (New York, 1972), 15.

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26 Vaziri was the subject of a three-hour interview produced by the independent wrestling syndicate, Boston Wrestling. The interview is by far the most extensive autobiography of the Iron Sheik, and I refer to it throughout this paper. It should, however, be noted that a lifetime of drugs, physical violence, and fame has left Vaziri a little worse for wear. Many of the claims he makes about his career and life—like his work as a bodyguard for the Shah or his training with populist hero Gholam Reza Takhti—are virtually unverifiable.

27 I was able to find only one article that clarifies Vaziri's involvement with the Olympics. According to Alex Marvez, Vaziri was defeated in the finals of the 1968 Iranian Olympic trials. After his move to America, he helped coach the American Olympic team in 1972 and 1976.

28 Greg Oliver, “Iron Sheik Still in the Game.” Web page. SLAM! Sports. February 1999. [Accessed 12 June 2005] Available at http://slam.canoe.ca/SlamWrestlingArchive/feb18_ironsheik.html.

29 Obsessed with Wrestling (OWW) has compiled an extensive biography of the Iron Sheik that includes matches and career highlights. It is available online at http://www.obsessedwithwrestling.com/profiles/i/iron-sheik.html

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31 Indeed, most professional wrestlers are extremely athletic and must survive the most grueling schedules and perform mind-boggling acrobatics while simultaneously convincing audiences of their character's innate heroism or abject evil.

32 Shaun Assael and Mike Mooneyham, Sex, Lies, and Headlocks: The Real Story of Vince McMahon and World Wrestling Entertainment (New York, 2004), 33.

33 I qualify this because the flag he was carrying was not the flag of the Islamic Republic—but the outdated Monarchist flag. That this irony is lost on the majority of Americans is both poignant and telling. Often, he was seen wearing a flag emblazoned, not with the seal of the Islamic Republic, but with a cartoon drawing of Ayatollah Khomeini with a glowing red haze emanating from his face. Of course, removing Allah from the flag and replacing it with a cartoon depiction of Khomeini is tantamount to blasphemy for many—another irony apparently lost on most wrestling viewers.

34 Ringside commentators, it should be noted, ensure that the narrative unfolds exactly as the producers see fit, interpreting events in such a way as to stay in line with larger narratives. For instance, during the Iron Sheik's de rigueur pre-match showboating, the commentator mentions how fans have “a lot of hate in their hearts for this man.”

35 As is widespread knowledge, professional wrestling is as choreographed as any major opera. Wrestlers are instructed as to the outcome of the match, determined by writers and producers, and behave as told in the ring.

36 Once again, this is a part and parcel of the pre-arranged theatrics that constitute professional wrestling. In this case, wrestlers take blades, hidden on their bodies or at the ringside, and covertly slice themselves open.

37 In professional wrestling, allegiances often shift—with comic effects. While the Iron Sheik became an Iraqi and Sgt. Slaughter an “Iraqi sympathizer,” Nikolai Volkoff, the Soviet heel, would eventually team up with Jim Duggan, a flag waving patriot to defeat Sgt. Slaughter and Adnaan. Later, Sgt. Slaughter would switch sides again, transforming himself back into an American patriot.

38 Sugar, and Napolitano, , The Complete Idiot's Guide to Professional Wrestling, 262–263.Google Scholar

39 Normal Da Costa, “The Iron Sheik Blazing a New Path of Hatred” The Toronto Star, 26 February 1988, sec F, 12.

40 Sugar and Napolitano, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Professional Wrestling, 159, (emphasis in original).

41 Said, Orientalism, 71.

42 “Hall of Fame Induction,” Wrestlemania 21, DVD, directed by Kevin Dunn (2005, Stamford, CT: World Wrestling Entertainment Home Video, 2005).

43 “Hall of Fame Induction,” Wrestlemania 21, DVD, directed by Kevin Dunn (2005, Stamford, CT: World Wrestling Entertainment Home Video, 2005).

44 These quotes, attributed to Hassan and Daivari, were taken from the official website of the WWE. The pages have since been taken down.

45 Brian Argabright, “Hassan Backlash too much to Handle.” Web Page. Del-Rio Herald-News. 25 July 2005. [Accessed 28 August 2005] <http://www.delrionewsherald.com/story.lasso?ewcd=4a19e838b5bf12ca&page=all>

46 Don Kaplan, “Terrorist Wrestles after Bombing.” New York Post, 12 July 2005, 86.

47 A Cornell University study in December 2004 found that twenty-seven percent of Americans think that Muslims should be required to register their location with the Federal government. Roughly, the same number believed that mosques should be closely monitored by U.S. law enforcement agencies. Almost half believed that Muslim-Americans should have curtailed civil liberties. For more, see the Media and Society Research Group, Cornell's Department of Communication. Available online at http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/Dec04/Muslim.Poll.bpf.html

48 William O. Beeman's new book, The “Great Satan” vs. the “Mad Mullahs”: How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other (Greenwood, 2005), expertly maps this cultural conflict.