Revolt of the Year: The Iranian Women Uprising
Photo credit: A protester holds up a note reading “Woman, Life, Freedom, #MahsaAmini” while marching down a street on October 1 in Tehran, Iran. (Getty Images)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
It takes a special kind of coward to kill a child and steal the body. To execute someone, and only tell their family afterward. To shoot at people chanting the word “freedom,” and shut off the internet in hopes that no one will find out. In the last three months, the Islamic Republic of Iran has done all of this and more.
It is hard to explain to those who have never lived under the Islamic Republic just how many ordinary things are illegal. If you are born a girl, from the age of nine, you must wear a headscarf everywhere you go. Men’s dress is policed too: no shorts, tank tops, or hair that is un-Islamic.
You cannot dance in public, and if you are a woman, you cannot sing either. You cannot hang out with anyone of the opposite gender who you are not directly related to (and under the Islamic Republic, there are only two genders).
Same-sex relationships are illegal, and leaders pretend that gay people do not exist. Music, art, and cinema is illegal if the regime decides it is. Half the internet is filtered by government censors, and virtual private networks, though prevalent, are illegal too.
And of course, do not forget the morality police. On September 16, Iranians were reminded yet again of their bleak reality, when 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, known to her loved ones by her Kurdish name Jina, died in police custody.
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It takes a special kind of coward to kill a child and steal the body. To execute someone, and only tell their family afterward. To shoot at people chanting the word “freedom,” and shut off the internet in hopes that no one will find out. In the last three months, the Islamic Republic of Iran has done all of this and more.
It is hard to explain to those who have never lived under the Islamic Republic just how many ordinary things are illegal.
I get the feeling that there are courts and State legislations in America that are trying to compete with the Iranian government. Abortion. Sexual preferences. Embryos.
If you are born a girl, from the age of nine, you must wear a headscarf everywhere you go. Men’s dress is policed too: no shorts, tank tops, or hair that is un-Islamic.
You cannot dance in public, and if you are a woman, you cannot sing either. You cannot hang out with anyone of the opposite gender who you are not directly related to (and under the Islamic Republic, there are only two genders).
You can put the Afghani Taliban in the same boat.
And you choose a larger boat to include evangelicals in the U.S. !
And send it out to sea hoping for "A Perfect Storm"?
Two hours after her arrest, Amini lost consciousness and was taken to the hospital. After three days in a coma, she died. Iranian authorities tried to blame her death on preexisting conditions, though Amini’s father said she had none. Later reports revealed that she had actually suffered repeated blows to her head, causing bone fracture, hemorrhage, and brain edema.
When Iranians learned of the news, their country changed forever . . .
There was a French Revolution, a Russian Revolution, wasn't there an American revolution against the Brits? - it's up to the people themselves to do something about it because nobody else is going to help them.
Yes. We were originally 13 colonies, ruled by the British. Classic Colonialism! Then there was the American revolution and we gained our independence.
Well, the Americans did it mostly by themselves-- but we had some help from France:
French involvement in the American Revolutionary War of 1775–1783 began in 1776 [1] when the Kingdom of France secretly shipped supplies to the Continental Army of the Thirteen Colonies when it was established in June 1775. France was a long-term historical rival with the Kingdom of Great Britain , from which the Colonies were attempting to separate.
A movie on point - The Patriot.
This is an intergenerational trauma.
This is an intergenerational resistance.
School Kids* chanting Zan, Zendegi, Azadi (Woman, Life, Liberty in Persian) and waving their school scarves in the air.
*Schoolgirls in Iran are forced to cover their hair and bodies head to toe from the age of 7.
----->
I would like to see the American government assist these Iranian revolts any way that we can
however I'm afraid that the discovery of US assistance would only make it worse for the people over there
In any event I don't know what we could do.
So far the protestors have been totally non-violent-- there's no armed conflict, so at least at this point the protestors aren't using-- sand don't want weapons.
The are posting a lot on various social media sites (Unfortunsately many don't know English so its in Farsi)-- but some are in English.
The main thing most of them are asking for now is that we post articles about this on as many online sites as possible -- because many in the West actually don't know what's going on.
Think about it-- how many items about their plight have been posted here on NT? I don't remember seeing any-- or if there were its was maybe only one or two.
For more information I just checked-- found this group on Facebook. It is in English,
There have been a few but there should always be more
Very VERY rare.
Its strange. Especially with people who like to debate current events.
The Persian Spring will blow cold.
Well, whether the Spring is cold or not depends upon what that groundhog does:
On the first day of spring Persians celebrate Nowruz, also known as the New Year. On Sunday at 8:33 a.m. it will be celebration time among thousands of families across San Diego and millions across the world.
"Nowruz" is the first day of Spring for the Persians:
I think the closest I ever got to Persia or Persians was a rug.
I seen a fair number of these sites on Facebook, also on Instagram. Unfortunately, many of then aren't in English but rather in Persian (Farsi).
Over the years I've met 2 people in the U.S. (on different occasions) who were immigrants from "Iran". But they both inssisted on being called "Persians" (not Iranians).
They are very proud of their ancestry-- for some time Persia was a major empire in the ancient world.
Persian is a very different language family from Arabic. But what confuses many westerners is that while Persians ("Iranians") are not Arabs, and their language is not Arabic-- it is written in a type of Arabic script.
And while they are not Arabs, the predominant religion is Islam.