Remarks by an Iranian Shia cleric that earthquakes are induced by women not being properly covered have provoked ridicule outside the country including a campaign on Facebook called "Boobquake" but in reality they were nothing new.

Some clerics in Iran as well as other Muslim countries have levelled bizarre charges like this in the past but have never managed to attract such attention.

"Many of the ladies who do not have a proper appearance cause the hearts of the youth to be swayed and they become defiled by sin, and this leads to the spread of adultery in society, which increases earthquakes," said cleric Kazem Sedighi in his April 16 Tehran Friday prayer sermon.

An editorial by Shadi Sadr, a feminist and well-known women's rights activist living in exile, which was published on the Iranian website Mardomak on April 26, drew attention away from earthquakes to the dysfunctional relations between men and women in Iran. That sparked a debate with more than 600 comments on the website.

She saw no difference between Sedighi and the rest of the Iranian male population, including intellectuals and liberals, believing all view women as sex objects.

She wrote, "Iranian women have been victims of sexual and verbal harassment by men as well as male stalkers and molesters on their way to school."

Sadr's view is widely held among Iranian feminists and ordinary women, but they are failing to take account of the diversity of male society in Iran and are making a sweeping generalisation. This diverts us from properly considering the root cause of the conduct of Iranian men which stems from their upbringing in a culture heavily influenced by tradition, religion and force of habit.

Simplifying and belittling these behavioural trends only sends researchers and seekers of knowledge in the wrong direction.

Sadr believes verbal harassment to be part of the growing up process of Iranian men just as for a woman that process is covering up her body and her beauty and suppressing her desires under pressure from family, society and government.

The truth is that Iranian women - especially mothers - are themselves guilty in part of generating this dysfunctional behaviour.

In the majority of Iranian families, boys are pampered by mothers, who take pride in the gender of their sons while hiding that of their daughters.

Young boys are allowed to roam around naked. When they grow up, they are asked which of the girls in the family or neighbourhood they want as their wives. Their sisters are officially subservient from youth and if the girl protests and demands equal rights, she is silenced with the logic, "he is a man after all".

Compared to girls, Iranian boys receive better nourishment as well as educational and recreational opportunities. They have better chances to gain work experience, more pocket money and most importantly social acceptance.

The gender discrimination - which is surprisingly enforced by mothers - is enough to convince boys of their supremacy, absolute sexual power and domination. A man raised in such a conservative, closed and segregated society is himself a victim who suffers from misconceptions and miscommunications and ends up misbehaving.

The roots of sexual harassment in the form of verbal abuse and personal and social restrictions, which have been manifested in the Islamic regime's segregation of men and women over the past 30 years, have caused mental and behavioural damage to relations between men and women.

The segregation of men and women based on gender is not the product of today. On the contrary, it has roots in childhood, when interacting with the opposite sex is forbidden according to the traditional interpretation of Islam. This has resulted in deep-seated fear of interacting with the opposite sex but at the same time a desire to do so.

In the first year of elementary school when girls and boys are seven years of age, they must attend separate schools. They do not become accustomed to one another's voices, laughter, features or physique.

In a society in which the barriers between the sexes grow higher by the day, how can we expect men and women to be chaste? As ye sow, so shall ye reap.