As details of the death toll for January’s protests continue to emerge, three students explain why they are resisting a return to normality

As details of the death toll for January’s protests continue to emerge, three students explain why they are resisting a return to normality

More than 45 days after a brutal January crackdown that left thousands of Iranian protesters dead, students across several universities are protesting again. As Iran’s new academic term began on Saturday, students in Tehran gathered on campus, chanting anti-government slogans, despite a heavy security presence and plainclothes officers stationed outside university gates.

The Guardian spoke to protesting students about why they were rallying despite the fact that thousands had been killed and tens of thousands arrested in the January demonstrations.

“Our classrooms are empty because the graveyards are full,” said Hossein*, 21, a student at the University of Tehran. “It’s for them – our friends, classmates and compatriots, who were gunned down in front of our eyes, that we decided to boycott the classes.”

    • 7101334@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      4 hours ago

      You’re not wrong about the Guardian but also like… the Iranian government is fucked. Yes, this is probably propaganda to manufacture consent, but that doesn’t mean it’s not also a real story of real students fighting a real struggle. It’s a tough line to walk.

      • Riverside@reddthat.comEnglish
        12·
        50 minutes ago

        Not a tough line to walk, really. I see no constant stream of news on Lemmy about Qatar being an apartheid state with 80% of migrants without rights, or Saudi Arabia’s similar policy. No constant stream of posts about mass incarceration of black people in the US, of Nazis roaming the streets of Madrid and Paris…

        Deciding what news to publish is itself extremely political, and focusing on atrocity propaganda in Iran, a heavily sanctioned country against which there’s an ongoing US military buildup on the verge of invasion, is willing and a form of atrocity propaganda. It’s designed specifically to make progressive people less critical of the upcoming strikes, and judging by the number of upvotes these posts get, it’s working.

        5 years ago there wasn’t this constant stream of anti-Iranian propaganda, it was Venezuela, and we’ve seen the results. Learning to distinguish the workings of propaganda is critical to any progressive, and it allows us both to be more resistant to propaganda and to use it better (for example by relentlessly posting about Palestine or the ICE, we can similarly engage in what I consider good atrocity propaganda).