Iranians aren’t nearly as fundamentalist as they are portrayed in the West, according to a new survey:
According to a new poll, four decades after the establishment of the Islamic regime, only 32% of the population consider themselves Shia Muslims.
The new poll by the Group for Analyzing and Measuring Attitudes in Iran (GAMAAN), a non-profit institute in the Netherlands, asked Iranians about their “attitude toward religion”.
90 percent of the 50,000 Iranian participants in the survey reside in Iran. GAMAAN claims the results of the survey to be 95% accurate and generalizable to the entire Iranian society.
According to the results, 78% of Iranians believe in God, but only 26% of them believe in "the coming of the Messiah (Imam Mahdi)", which is one of the main beliefs of the Twelver Shiites.
While only 32% of Iranians consider themselves Shia Muslims, 9% have claimed to be atheists and 22% do not align with any religion. Half of the population used to believe but does not anymore and 6% have converted to a new religion.
Out of 61% of the people born into religious families, 60% do not say their daily prayers. 68% of the participants believe that religion must not be the basis of legislation, 71% believe that religious institutions must be self-funded, and 42% believe that promoting any kind of religion must be banned from the public sphere.
The results also indicate that 73% of the population disagree with the compulsory hijab while 58% do not believe in hijab.
37% of Iranian drink alcohol regularly or occasionally, despite its prohibition after the revolution. Prohibition and price have deterred only 8% of Iranians from consuming alcohol.
This is very encouraging. It indicates that the majority of Iranians do not agree with living in a theocracy, meaning the regime is far less stable than it portrays.
(h/t Yoel)