Women, Life, Freedom

Refuse Fascism Episode 130

Sun, Oct 16, 2022 5:15PM • 54:38

Sussan Tahmasebi 00:00

Very central tenet of these fascist movements are control of women’s bodies, women’s roles and sexuality and deciding what constitutes a family.

Jasmin Ramsey 00:09

People have really come out into the streets to call for social and political change at the highest levels of government.

Sussan Tahmasebi 00:15

They have the participation of so many young people, and I think for those young people, even initially, it went far beyond the hijab. It was about bodily rights and control over their own bodies and bodily integrity.

Jasmin Ramsey 00:26

I think we should speak out for human rights everywhere. If we as people throughout the world fail to do this, one day there could be a time that there’s no one there to speak out for our rights.

Sam Goldman 00:57

Welcome to Episode 130 of Refuse Fascism podcast, a podcast brought to you by volunteers with Refuse Fascism. I’m Sam Goldman, one of those volunteers and host of this show. Refuse Fascism exposes, analyzes, and stands against the very real danger and threat of fascism coming to power in the United States. In today’s episode, we’re sharing two interviews regarding the uprising in Iran.

But first, thanks to everyone who goes the extra step, and rates and reviews on Apple podcasts, shares and comments on social media or YouTube. It helps us reach more listeners, and of course, we read everyone. After listening to today’s episode, go help us find more people who want to refuse fascism by rating and reviewing on Apple podcasts and encouraging your friends and family who listen to do the same. Subscribe, follow so you never miss an episode. And of course, continue all that great sharing and commenting on social media.

Sam Goldman 02:07

Before we get to this week’s interviews, we have to talk briefly about the final scheduled public hearing of the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 attack. This hearing took place this past Thursday and ended in the committee unanimously voting to subpoena Trump. For key takeaways, here is Coco Das, a member of the Refuse Fascism editorial board.

Coco Das 02:30

Thursday October 13 was what may be the last January 6 Committee hearing. From the testimonies heard, it was clear that Donald Trump knew that he lost the election, but was determined to remain in the White House by hook or by crook — to declare himself the winner, to spread the big lie among his base, to stoke violence, even against his own Vice President, and to use the violence of that day to further consolidate his brand of 21st century American fascism.

Now, no one on the January 6 Committee presented all this as a fascist coup attempt, preferring the less controversial descriptor of an “attack on our democracy,” but this is in fact what it was — a fascist coup attempt, a dress rehearsal and ongoing spearhead for consolidating fascism. The compelling way that the January 6 Committee compiled and presented the evidence is important, but on its own or left to the will of the voters, it will not be enough.

First, look at recent history. The Mueller report and two impeachments were not enough on their own to remove Trump from office. Instead, they became half-hearted showpieces and dead ends to lull people into thinking there could be an institutional solution to the problem of Donald Trump. But these same institutions will not and cannot correctly diagnose the problem. Trump is a fascist, the leader of a fascist movement decades in the making, forged from the very fires of this so-called democracy, lifted to power through the very mechanisms of the system, and a grotesque but nevertheless consistent representative of the most virulent white supremacy, misogyny and xenophobia deeply rooted in the history of this country.

What the committee does grasp in its limited way is that the reign of Donald Trump is also abnormal, and represents a giant leap of a vicious and revenge filled movement strong enough to galvanize a mass base and seize power, to tear up all the norms and begin to rule in a way that is a significant departure from the normal form of rule since the time of the Civil War. In fact, these fascists are itching for a new civil war to eliminate and subjugate everyone they hate, including liberals and the Democratic Party.

This fascist leap is evident in the way commentators talk about these hearings. There is no expectation of any real accountability. At the end of the hearing, the Committee voted to subpoena Trump. Besides the fact that Trump has made it a sport to defy subpoenas at this late stage, this vote is mainly symbolic. Over and over, you hear commentators saying the best we can hope for is not accountability, but a shift in public opinion that will become apparent in the ballot box, but this does not remotely grasp the reality that this country is full of fascists, almost half of the electorate to whom truth and evidence doesn’t matter.

Truth is what Trump says it is, and the whole point of the big lie is to stay in power despite elections — another art the Republi-fascists are refining. As Kaylee Rogers wrote in the FiveThirtyEight: “While pastcongressional hearings have swayed public opinion, that largely hasn’t been the case for the January 6 Committee. Polling of Americans before, during, and after the hearings this summer showed negligible movement and opinions on the attack and Trump’s role in it.” Rogers also demonstrates the deadly logic that grips the Democratic Party and those aligned with it. She wrote: “

And while today’s hearing might not have changed how people plan to vote, it was a reminder of the ugly reality of what could happen after they do.” So, despite the evidence, there is no will to actually stop fascism, let alone name it, not if it means a society wide upheaval that might bring into question the whole system the Democrats also represent. And too many liberals and progressives are okay with their sights being lowered again and again. Don’t be deluded, stopping fascism is going to require more than lifting one finger to vote. It is going to take real struggle, fierce struggle, blunt truth-telling and nonviolent mass opposition in the public square. We have a fight on our hands, and this fight needs you.

Speaking of fighting, a clip of Nancy Pelosi went viral in which she says about Trump marching on the Capitol grounds. “I’m going to punch him out. I’ve been waiting for this trespassing on the Capitol grounds. I’m going to punch him out. I’m going to go to jail and I’m going to be happy.” Look, I can relate. Millions can relate. From the moment he hit the campaign trail, there has been righteous hatred of Donald Trump. But this was never channeled into the mass movement against fascism that was needed to stop him in his tracks. In fact, the fury was suppressed and diverted by the very likes of Nancy Pelosi.

You know what would have been better than punching out Trump? Calling people out into the streets to drive him out, repudiating and publicly refusing the fascism of his regime instead of normalizing it. On the other side, the mass fascist movement has hardened in the wake of their January 6th coup attempt, and has won huge victories, including the overturning of Roe v. Wade, which has now reduced millions of women and girls to second class citizens.

To quote from the RF mission statement, “the election of Biden has not eliminated the danger. It has only bought some time”, time that we are quickly losing as we avoid the fierce struggle that is needed. If this fascism continues to gain ground, it is not only the people in this country that will suffer. In the name of humanity, all of humanity, we must make real our pledge to refuse a fascist America.

Sam Goldman 09:04

This week, we’re talking about the historic and earth-shaking events happening in Iran, even as we are dedicated to opposing fascism in the United States. The Islamic Republic of Iran is facing persistent and widespread protests from masses of people from all corners of society, especially young women. We are inspired by their bravery and urge everyone who hates fascism to learn from the example that these courageous young people have set for us. We are also extremely concerned for the lives of the people in the streets, and the prisoners who have been captured by the regime, particularly after the news last night that Evin Prison, which holds hundreds of political prisoners, was on fire with gunshots and explosions. It wouldn’t be the first time that the regime has massacred political prisoners.

As we’ve discussed on previous episodes of the show, the recent and not so recent foreign policy of the US has set the stage for fascism in this country, as well as around the world. We know that the 1979 revolution in Iran started as an anti-imperialist effort to overthrow a brutal and corrupt monarchy which had been propped up by Western powers for decades. The tragedy was that this just struggle was turned into a new form, a brutal rule through theocracy. There are many lessons from that process that people should learn from, including how quickly repression can set in and the importance of women’s fundamental rights.

For now, I just want to emphasize our solidarity with the people of Iran, and our hope that they prevail. We know the demonization of Iran by the US for years, and the possibility that the country would be attacked by the US as part of the global war on terror is real and extremely dangerous. The sanctions that the US has imposed have contributed to the suffering of the people of Iran. People in Iran are not rising up against the Islamic Republic because of the costs of imports, or even unemployment. They are chanting “Women – Life – Freedom,” and are demanding basic rights that every human being deserves. And let’s be clear: the US has no claim to play the role of the emancipator of women after the devastation they wrought in Iraq and Afghanistan. We send our best to the people in the streets of Iran from the streets of the US.

Now, here’s my interview with Jasmin Ramsey, Deputy Director of the Center for Human Rights in Iran. The Islamic Republic of Iran is a theocracy and has been ruled by religious law for decades. There have been periodic outbreaks of significant mass protest, but these moments are usually repressed rather quickly with state violence, but a few weeks ago, the police murder of the 22 year-old woman named Mahsa Jina Amini seems to have tipped the scales. Jasmin, can you tell us what is it about her story that has set off this brave outpouring of protest?

Jasmin Ramsey 12:12

Jina Amina was her Kurdish name. She was from Kurdistan province. She was just a young woman visiting Tehran with her family when she was arrested by the morality police. The morality police have nothing to do with morality and everything to do with repression. They are basically an arm of the state that police’s mainly women, although they can do it to men as well, based on what they wear. They can arrest and harass people, really with impunity. Mahsa died in state custody.

Her family believes that she died because she was beaten and not hospitalized soon enough. The state went hard against that and said that No, you know, she just passed away from natural causes, and there was no discussion of why she was in state custody in the first place. There has been no independent investigation. Her family has been harassed, as all families of victims of state violence are, and told not to speak about the case. So, this speaks to this kind of crisis of impunity that runs rampant in the Iranian government, where the government is interested in its own survival and the people have to exist in a society where there is no rule of law. There’s only the state and what the state says is okay, and you can either do that or you can suffer.

So I think her story sparked something, as many of these events do in Iran. It sparked something in so many people. One of the chants that we hear is “Join Us or You Will Be the Next Mahsa.” And it’s not just women who are very much at the forefront of these protests, but also men that are chanting this. Her story speaks to the experiences of so many people in Iran, whose bodies and ways of living their culture, their language, their religion, is policed in such a violent way. So people have really come out into the streets to call for social and political change at the highest levels of government.Sam Goldman 14:16

Thank you for that, Jasmin. As we’ve been watching and listening and learning from the heroic women and others that have been taking to the streets — reports of 8 million people have been in the streets, more than 100 cities — it’s quite inspiring. The slogan that seems to be uniting all these protests is “Women – Life – Freedom.” I was hoping you could tell us a bit more about what that means to the people in the streets and what do people want to accomplish?

Jasmin Ramsey 14:46

Yes, that really has become the central slogan of this protest movement, and that’s what makes it unique. Because protests in Iran are not new, especially this one. It’s really the result of years and years of a protest movement that’s been evolving — especially since 2017 — that has really been focused on the state. This is interesting because now it’s not just life and freedom, but then there’s the women’s rights element that’s been added. And it’s not just added; it’s leading that slogan. So it’s really fascinating to watch how everything is kind of coalescing around this.

The other slogan is “Death to the Dictator,” or “Death to Khomeini”, who is this unelected supreme leader who’s been at the highest level of power for decades in Iran. And when Iranians chant that, they’re saying that they don’t want to live in a dictatorship anymore. They’re not calling for reform; they’re calling for a new system. And the state really has faced something that it’s never seen before. Because it’s not just in the large liberal cities that typically we’ve seen. It’s also in small towns, conservative places that people are chanting this, even chanting at funerals of people who have been killed in these protests.

Sam Goldman 15:59

That, I think, is really important for us to keep in mind — what is being fought for, and why, as we are holding the people of Iran in our hearts. I wanted to close out by getting your perspective on what people living in the US can do to support. I was reflecting on the fact that the government of Iran sits on the UN Women’s Rights Commission now, which just makes a complete mockery of the idea. What does that say about avenues for pressure on the regime to stop arresting and killing protesters?

I know that many of the people in the streets in the US over this weekend, for instance, raised the demand for justice for the people in Iran while also protesting for the right to abortion and human dignity everywhere. I just wanted to get a sense from you, what can we do to support and learn from the movement in Iran, while also opposing any machinations of the US government in terms of interventions that would not be a benefit to the people living in the country,

Jasmin Ramsey 17:04

What people in the United States can do, certainly, to educate themselves about the issues in Iran, ad of course, also in the Middle East. It’s not just Iran where these kinds of abuses happen, but also to call on their leaders to speak out for the people of Iran. I like to say, because people often say: Well, this is Iran, it’s so far away, there’s nothing that we can do. I think we should speak out for human rights everywhere. If we as people throughout the world fail to do this one day, there could be a time that there’s no one there to speak out for our rights if they ever come to be in danger. So share these stories, read about them on the news, call on your leaders to make statements of support for Iranians, but also work for action at the UN-led level. It’s been really heartening also to see the level of support that’s been expressed internationally for these protests.

Sam Goldman 17:56

Thank you, Jasmin, for coming on, for sharing your expertise, perspective and time with us. If people want to read more from the Center for Human Rights in Iran, where should they go?

Jasmin Ramsey 18:07

Please go to www.iranhumanrights.org. That’s our English website. We also operate in Persian. And Sam, I just wanted to add one thing, because I know that media has been covering this. But I feel like one story that’s really lost is the amount of political prisoners that Evin has. Iran is a country of political prisoners, it has had them for as long as there’s been this government and the government before, but the prisons have really filled up with protesters and people that have been detained on the streets. And that needs to be a focal point for also world leaders to call for the release of political prisoners, in negotiations with Iran, even on the nuclear deal — these should not be two separate issues that we don’t talk about human rights and conduct business as usual — we need to call for these things.

The context of it is if you’re arrested in Iran, they can take you anywhere to a prison detention center, a place that’s completely unmarked, and hold you there without access to a lawyer without access to your family, and your family just has to search for you. So now that focus needs to be on that as well to call for the release of political prisoners in Iran.

Sam Goldman 19:20

Thank you, Jasmin. [JR: Thank you.] Follow Jasmine on Twitter @JasminRamsey.

Sam Goldman 19:27

Now here is my interview with Sussan Tahmasebi. The courageous, defiant, beautiful uprising in Iran has now been going on for about a month. This massive nationwide rebellion was sparked by the heinous murder of one woman, 22 year old Mahsa Amini, maybe it came on September 16th. It came at the hands of Iran’s hated morality police over a supposed violation of the Islamic regime’s compulsory hijab law. Apparently Mahsa had a bit of hair showing, something she paid for with her young life, her entire future.

Since Mahsa’s death, not one day has gone by without the streets flooding with Iranian people, in particular women, especially young women, demonstrating with extraordinary daring. And not a day has gone by without the Islamic Republic demonstrating their absolute cruelty in the face of those taking the streets. To get into this more, I am so happy to welcome Sussan Tahmasebi, the Director of FEMENA, an organization with the important mission to work to promote women’s rights, support feminist movements and women’s human rights defenders in the Middle East, North Africa and Asia. Welcome, Sussan.

Sussan Tahmasebi 20:50

Thank you very much for inviting me and for paying attention to the important developments in Iran.

Sam Goldman 20:58

Absolutely. I wanted to start by asking you: This is not the first time the Iranian people have taken to the streets for human rights, but there is something different about this outpouring, and I was wondering, what is it about Mahsa Amini’s story that has set off this spray of outpouring of protests?

Sussan Tahmasebi 21:17

Well, these protests are very different than previous protests for a number of reasons, and I’ll recount them later — the reasons why they’re so different — but let me just give you a little history of what happened with Mahsa Jina Amini, Jina is her Kurdish name. This young, beautiful woman in the prime of her life had come with her family to Tehran from Saqqez, a small city in Kurdistan Province, on a family vacation. As she was exiting the metro with her brother, she was stopped for improperly observing the hijab and taken into custody, and, of course, a few days later, she died. She was taken to hospital in a coma and died shortly afterwards.

Her story really resonated with people on multiple levels. First of all, the experience of being stopped by the morality police is either something that a lot of women have in common or a fear that pretty much every woman shares. Men could also relate to this because they also are fearful of something like this happening to their sisters or their mothers or their wives or daughters. Really, in that sense, it resonated. The morality police has had sort of a violent past, and especially in recent years that violence has made it into social media and into the public sphere, and people have paid more attention to it. Collectively, they’ve condemned it. Collectively, they’ve become angry about it.

There are a few cases, I think, a few years ago, where morality police accosted a woman in a park. Another story that broke was the morality police got in a sort of conflict with a family and ended up shooting the husband in the park, again. And then, more recently, the case of Sipideh Reshnoo, who was a young woman on a bus where a hijab enforcer — not necessarily a morality police, because individuals can also enforce hijab and give you notices about the way that you’re dressed. She got in an argument with a hijab enforcer, and there was also physical altercation, but people got very angry and kicked the hijab enforcer off the bus. But Sipideh there was identified through video footage that this woman took and, I don’t know, we assume also probably videos outside the bus station and public, and was arrested — basically forcibly abducted because no one knew where she was and who had taken her. Then she appeared on Iranian state TV with a bruised eye. Clearly she had been beaten, everybody could tell, and tortured. and there were also reports about her having been tortured and taken to the hospital prior to that.

So people were extremely angry about that episode as well. So Mahsa’s case follows this long history of people just generally feeling very frustrated and angry and humiliated, because of the enforcement, the violent enforcement, of the dress code by the morality police, but specifically because in recent months, there had been several cases similar to that. Then I think also people really read this story of Mahsa, really resonated with people on another level, as well, is that she was so innocent, and people could identify with her, especially people in the provinces, could really identify with her because she kept saying: “Please don’t arrest me, please don’t arrest me. I’m a stranger to the city. I don’t have anyone.” And she was arrested anyway.

So I think that innocence and her senseless death, and again another senseless death with impunity. This also really angered people across the country. Her family was critical in this story going nationwide because they faced a lot of pressure, and from what we hear, they’re still facing a lot of threats, but they refuse to succumb to that pressure and insisted that Mahsa’s body be taken back home to Saqqez and be buried, not at night as the security forces wanted, but during the day when a lot of people actually participated in the burial. And at that burial, there were protests. Women took off their hijab and they chanted a slogan that said “A death for hijab, how long will we endure this humiliation?” And that also really resonated, I think, broadly, nationally. On her grave they wrote that: Jina, you haven’t died, but your name will become a code word for resistance. That’s really happened, and I think that’s also something that resonated.

At the same time, the student movement and the women’s movement announced protests. Protests happened spontaneously at the burial and Saqqez and other parts of Kurdistan, but then also the women’s movement and the student movement also announced protests, Students held protests in universities. The Kurdish political parties are largely outside of Iran. They called for a general strike and it was observed in many Kurdish cities.

So I think this combination, but generally, I think it’s just that people are fed up, especially younger women, are fed up with the control of their bodies and the violent enforcement of hijab. There are also many other grievances that have emerged after the first week that we see very loudly being pronounced in the protests. These are some of the main reasons why these protests became national, and why so many people engaged in them. They have the participation of so many young people. I think for those young people, even initially, it went far beyond the hijab. It was about bodily rights and control over their own bodies and bodily integrity.

Sam Goldman 26:24

One thing that has stood out as well is the oppression of women has not been ancillary, but has been integral to the outpouring in the streets, including men taking to the streets in support of women’s rights, and the slogan Women Life Freedom has come out as a major unifying slogan. I was hoping that you could tell us a little bit more about what this means to the people in the streets.

Sussan Tahmasebi 26:51

Initially, these protests took shape in demand for justice for Mahsa Jina Amini, a woman who was killed in custody. And they also had, it’s sort of a central part of the demand was a demand that had to do about women’s rights. So I think in that sense, they’re incredibly unique. Initially, the protesters went out, calling for justice for Mahsa, an end to all hijab laws, and then also an end to the violent enforcement as well. But, of course, we know that those demands have now expanded greatly, and have really called for broad-based freedoms and democracy and serious political change at the highest levels. But initially, they really were centrally focused on women’s rights and justice for Mahsa.

In that sense, it’s very unique that we would have national protests in support of women’s rights and, you know, demanding justice for the killing of a woman, because we’ve never had national protests like that for women before. We’ve had smaller protests in different cities, but they’ve never been able to garner this level of support. I think these protests, in a sense really are unique, because they are so dispersed. They’re so decentralized. They don’t have one particular leader or even a group of leaders, but they’re organized locally. I think every person who participates in them is a leader in their own right. They are national. They have the support of a lot of young people.

Women are central to these protests, even five weeks on, they’re still very central. Women have participated in the protests in the past, and people have paid attention to women’s roles, but we’ve never seen this level of participation for women. Also, these protests are intersectional. They have men, they have people of different ages, different socio economic backgrounds, different ethnicities, different religions. So they’re very unique in that sense. And also the protests are creative. So if the university is cracked down upon which we saw, especially Sharif University where a lot of violence was used, then somebody else pops up.

The high school students began protesting right after that. So it’s creative and multifaceted in terms of the strategies that people are using to express their dissent. And it’s creative in terms of the creativity that has been born of this protest. We see a lot of art, a lot of music that’s emerged from the protests. So they are very, very different than protests that we’ve experienced in the past. I think both the presence of women and the presence of so many young people truly set it aside and make it an extremely unique development in Iranian society. We see high school students participating very actively in these protests very peacefully, and they’re demanding freedom. They want freedom. That’s what they want.

I should say, because you also mentioned the slogan, the slogan that emerged at this protest, which has now become international, is a slogan that actually has its history in the Kurdish women’s Freedom Movement, Zhen Jian Azadi, that was initially used in the Kurdish areas of Iran but then quickly translated and went national and now we see that it’s international. So I think a lot of people can identify with this, and a lot of people around the world can identify with this. It is about ending oppression, oppression of women, but also political oppression as well. So it’s taken on different dimensions.

A lot of women around the world have identified with these protests because it’s very central to them as a demand for women’s rights and ending oppression against women. And they see themselves in it, that women are dealing with patriarchy, growing fascism that tries to control women’s bodies all over the world, whether it’s Islamic religious fascism or Christian fascism or nationalism, nationalist fascism, we see this emergence of these movements around the world. And very central to all of them is the control of women’s bodies, whether it’s Latin America or the Middle East or Europe. [A] very central tenet of these fascist movements [is] control of women’s bodies, women’s roles and sexuality and deciding what constitutes a family. So I think that struck a chord with a lot of people because they’re experiencing similar threats against their rights.

Sam Goldman 30:49

I think that is a really essential point. I was wondering, for our listeners who are looking at this, and it has resonated with, I was hoping that you could give them a little more history on the forced hijab. How did it come into being, and how did it become accepted? What was that process like? And what does the forced hijab represent for women and all people of Iran?

Sussan Tahmasebi 31:13

I think we have to go back many decades when we talk about hijab and Iran. I think the first attempt to politicize women’s dress, in hijab in particular, happened in 1936, during the rule of Reza Shah, who ruled Iran between 1925 and 1941. He passed a law that would force all women to take off the hijab, their veil, because he thought that the veil was a symbol of backwardness. So this is the first time that women’s dress became so politicized or became politicized in this way inside of Iran. And it’s kind of that, that has kind of continued.

My grandmother was one of the women who had to take off her veil. I think many women back then had a veil. I asked my father, what did she do? And he said she would wear a hat. So a lot of women wore hats. In Farsi we have this saying, that if you put a hat on somebody’s head, you’ve cheated them. So it literally, this law cheated women. It has cheated women for decades to come, because the political fight, the ideological fight, has been carried out on women’s bodies ever since. So after Reza Shah, during his son’s reign, during Mohammad Reza Shah, up until the time of the revolution, women had the choice whether they should wear the hijab or not, but there was a lot of social stigma still attached to the hijab during that time as well, because it had been seen as a sign of backwardness.

As we come closer to the time of the revolution, and an emerging Islamist movement in Iran, a lot of people who were dissatisfied with Mohammed Reza Shah’s reign started to wear the hijab as a political sign that they believed in political change. They identified with Islamic principles that they felt Mohammed Reza Shah was undermining. They also identified with Khomeini, who was the leader of the Islamic political movement and others, you know, like Shariati, etc. So, it became a form of political expression as well.

But then in 1979, the revolution happened, and I should mention that this wasn’t a revolution that happened only by Islamist forces, but it was a revolution of all different political groups, including leftist groups. But the Islamists emerged as the victors. There was, I guess, a lot of chatter at the time about forcing women to wear the veil, and women held a march on March 8th, which was International Women’s Day in 1979, opposing the hijab becoming mandatory. They had, of course, other demands as well, but this one major demand that has resonated and people have gone back to for many years. It was the first march by women, and this was the central demand of women that we will not go back, that we do not want to have mandatory hijab laws, that you should not control our bodies in this way.

Even though at the time the religious leaders and political leaders seemed to back off a little bit, ultimately, the hijab became obligatory for all women in 1983, a few years later. Initially, it was just in government buildings, but then laws were passed to make it obligatory everywhere. And it was enforced very violently. For the first eight years, between 1980 and 1988, Iran was embroiled in a war with Iraq. So the notion of the country’s honor and people dying, fighting the war and dying in the war was very much tied to women’s honor, women’s chastity, women’s dress, and women’s bodies and their dress were controlled by these armed committees, these armed militia groups. So it was a very violent enforcement, and I think the first years of the revolution were also extremely violent with a lot of people being executed for their political beliefs, for their previous political affiliations.

Then we had in the late 1980s, we also had mass executions of political prisoners. This was an extrajudicial event. These are prisoners that were sentenced to serve a period of time in prison and then be released, but they were executed. So there was a lot of fear and a lot of violence generally in society, but a lot of it was directed at women and the way that they dressed because they became the visible symbol of the Islamic Republic.

So that’s how it took hold in a society and among women that rejected it. One of the first major political acts that they had was rejecting this, but this is how the Islamist rulers were able to take forward their laws and their decrees. And we see, like all other fascist and extremist movements, that a lot of the initial ideology was also centered around women’s rights and women’s issues, including the hijab. So I think it’s important to keep this in mind.

But also at the same time, it’s really important to note that Iranian women, although they faced great discrimination and great oppression, and they’ve often also been victimized by law and custom and politics, but they’re not victims. I don’t want people to look at them as victims. Iranian women are amazing, and they have fought every step of the way. They have never ever succumbed to how the state wants them to dress. The state would like women to be fully covered with very loose clothing, their hair fully covering their neck, and very loose clothing up until the wrists. But they’ve never done that, or be dressed in the chador, which is the black cloak that I think people see. And women have rejected that from the very start. Even when they were forced to observe the hijab, they took liberties with their dress.

As the years have come along, they’ve taken more and more liberties, even though the state has tried to enforce women’s dress in different ways. They fight. Whenever there is an opening, they take it. Iranian women are well educated. More than half of the people graduating from university are women. So they’re more educated than their male counterparts. They’re lawyers, they’re MPs, they’re doctors, they’re even bus drivers or truck drivers. So they take on whatever opportunity they have to break the gender stereotypes. And the younger generation, I think, is unique in the sense that they’re also very well connected to the international community, to their peers around the world through social media. And they have many of the same aspirations that kids their own age have in different parts of the world. And they’re also probably the second, if not the third generation of women who have had to deal with this humiliation, who’s fought this humiliation. So we can understand why they’re much more angry and much more determined to end the control over their bodies.

Sam Goldman 37:31

This is very important. I wanted to underscore the acts of resistance that the world is seeing now, and the decades of struggle that has predated that as well, is something that we should all be learning from — including people in this country, what it means to resist theocracy, what it means to resist patriarchy in the different ways that it manifests.

Sussan Tahmasebi 37:57

I think maybe many of your listeners don’t know that the Iranian women’s movement dates over 100 years to the time of the Constitutional Revolution, when women were very active in bringing about the constitutional revolution. They made demands on their education and being able to organize and in organizations and charities and educational institutions. So these are some of the initial demands of the women’s movement. That women’s movement has had ebbs and flows, it has ups and downs, but it’s existed all these years. Even though we took huge steps backwards in terms of our legal status, nevertheless, the women’s movement has consistently been pushing for change and it has also accomplished a lot. Even if we’ve lost maybe some of our rights, women have made great social gains. So I think it’s important to keep that history in mind.

I should say, Iranian women got the right to vote in the 1970s — before Switzerland, for example. If nothing else, I think people should break some of their stereotypes. And certainly, I think looking at the protests in Iran, whatever stereotypes you had about Iranian women being passive and enduring hardships that are imposed upon them, I think those stereotypes have been eliminated now. But I think it’s important to put it in context that we’ve had a strong and vibrant women’s movement throughout all these years and this is not something that’s coming out of the blue. It is really something that’s emerging through years of resistance, but also activism of the women’s movement and women’s movement activists that are trying to create change.

Sam Goldman 39:25

I appreciate that. I wanted to shift gears slightly and talk about what has been on your mind this past week. New developments have unfolded regarding both the protests and the courage that we’re seeing in the streets and the repression and whether there was anything that you wanted to highlight that you want to make sure people are paying attention to.

Sussan Tahmasebi 39:47

I keep looking at these young teenagers, and some of them are being beaten and they’re being arrested and getting killed. These are just these young women who are engaging in very peaceful acts of civil disobedience. They’re demanding their bodily rights. They’re demanding social and political freedoms. And they’re paying a huge, huge price for it. I just keep thinking that it didn’t have to be like this; that many of these young women were born at the time when 17 years ago, we started a campaign that sought to change discriminatory laws about women. We were collecting signatures to take the Parliament, and we were crushed. It wasn’t as violent as this, but basically we were rendered inactive. We were surveilled, interrogated, threatened, harassed, arrested, detained, and ultimately we couldn’t continue with our work.

Then, just about every other effort that has been born since that tries to convey the dissent and demands of the Iranian public to the decision makers has met a similar fate. And as we move along, the responses become more and more violent. The rulers of Iran have a vision of where the country should go that doesn’t really fit with the aspirations of the Iranian people, and especially the aspirations of this younger generation, and they’ve had no other way to express that and to reach change.

So I just think it’s such a hopeful time. I don’t want to say it’s hopeful, but as a human rights activist, I’m also very concerned and fearful, because we see a lot of violence and I keep thinking: What’s going to happen? What’s the toll that we have to pay? How high is it going to be? Because these protests initially started out as very centered on women, because the slogan is very women’s centered, there’s also been serious targeting of women’s rights defenders from the very start — actually, I should say all human rights defenders, but — targeting of women and the rest of women’s rights defenders at this level has been unprecedented. In places like Kurdistan, that targeting has been disproportionate.

Pretty much everybody we know has been arrested, and it’s a pre-emptive approach to arresting them. So these are not people — maybe initially there were people who were participating in protests or writing or conducting news interviews, but very shortly thereafter, people who were deemed as people who could potentially play a role in these protests, in continuing the protests, or igniting it, fueling them, were arrested. So pretty much every human rights defender that we know has been arrested.

All the women human rights defenders that we know have been arrested. The prison conditions, from what we hear are terrible, not just for human rights defenders but for ordinary prisoners. Many of these ordinary prisoners are very young, which is extremely concerning, because they’re not equipped for these incredibly harsh and violent situations. There’s a lot of violence that’s being used at the time of arrest, a lot of violence inside prisons. Some people are being transferred already injured, some with pellet gun wounds in their bodies, and prison authorities have no interest or desire or even maybe capability of addressing the needs of those who are wounded. People are being housed in makeshift prisons, which are very unsafe. So these are the things that are occupying my mind.

We had the fire in Evin Prison yesterday, which I think we still don’t have full answers on. We don’t know exactly how many people were killed. We know several people had died as a result of the fire. A lot of people are suffering injuries because of the violence that the security guards used against them. We still don’t have full transparency on what happened. These are scary and frightening times if you are a human rights defender, and people who are close to you, who are dear to you, some of the best people in Iran, who truly care about the country who’ve had to pay high high prices are now in prison. Their lives are in danger, so this is what concerns me.

Sam Goldman 40:09

I wanted to give you an opportunity to share a little bit more about the significance of the fire at Evin prison, because not all of our listeners know the significance of that prison. Any prison being on fire at any moment, especially when there’s an oppressive regime is something to pay attention to. There’s also a legacy behind that, and who is in this prison matters.

Sussan Tahmasebi 43:58

Evin Prison is one of the main prisons in Iran. It’s also one of the main prisons that houses political prisoners — that includes human rights defenders, women, human rights defenders and other political prisoners — but also ordinary prisoners. A lot of the people who were arrested in the protests have also been taken to Evin Prison. Of course, probably, Evin Prison doesn’t have a lot of room anymore. They’re being taken to other prisons. So the prison is pretty full, and so when we see videos of heavy black smoke coming out of Evin Prison with very little information, it becomes very concerning and very frightening.

The family members of the prisoners were gathered outside, but you know, instead of getting answers, they were met with attack of security guards and tear gas. The roads leading up to the prison yesterday were shut down so people couldn’t go to the prison, and there was no sort of communication from prison officials. They finally came out and said: Oh, you know, this happened in the ward of the petty criminals, and they set a storage room on fire. But it was hard for people to really believe that, because the authorities have not been very transparent and they have not been very truthful in their accounts of things that have happened in recent months, and perhaps the years even. Communication was cut off with prisoners inside the prison, so there was a lot of fear about what was happening. We were hearing gunshots, we were hearing explosions.

So now things have settled a little bit and we’ve heard from a few of the wards where political prisoners are being held. Ward 4 is okay; the women’s ward, people have contacted their family members to say that it’s very chaotic and disruptive, but that people are okay. They started objecting to the fire and they could hear the violence in the wards, the adjoining wards, so they started chanting slogans, and they were met with tear gas in the women’s ward. Specifics are unclear so they may change in the days to come, but actually the fire did break out in Ward 7 as a result of riots. There was a lot of live ammunition that was used against the prisoners, a lot of tear gas, and then in other prison wards, when people objected, similar approaches were used.

But we’re not going to have a full account of what happened until these prisoners are allowed to contact their families. Many of the prisoners will now be moved to other prisons, which have worse conditions than Evin Prison, so that’s also a source of concern for them, and for us, as well. But there’s a lot of lack of clarity, so in the days to come, perhaps there’ll be more clarity on exactly what happened and how many injured and how many dead and the fate of the prisoners that are being held in Evin Prison, we’ll have better understanding of that.

Sam Goldman 46:29

And we’ll be continuing on the show to be following that situation. Our heart is with the families of all the prisoners. As we close this conversation, I wanted to ask: What else can we do as people living in this country to support the people of Iran taking to the streets to respond to the repression that our siblings in Iran are facing and learn from this movement in Iran?

Sussan Tahmasebi 46:59

I think that there are a lot of protests that are being organized, so people can participate in protest. Keeping the focus on what’s happening in social media, and if you have access to news. Keeping the focus on what’s happening inside the country, elevating those voices, and trying to hold the Iranian government accountable for the violence that it’s using, and pressuring it to ensure the safety of those that have been taken prisoner.

Sam Goldman 47:26

I want to thank you so much, Sussan, for coming on and sharing your expertise, your insight, your perspective, and your time with us. And I wanted to ask for people that want to hear more from you, read more from you, where should they go?

Sussan Tahmasebi 47:44

They can go onto our website, FEMENA.net. We work regionally — we’re very focused on Iran these days, but — we have several reports, documenting the cases of women, human rights defenders, and then young female student activists who have been arrested since the start of the protests. We also have a statement where we’ve also made certain demands of the international community with respect to these protests. This statement has been signed by over 160 organizations worldwide in 37 countries. We’ll be updating our site with more information. And then also we have social media accounts that they can follow on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. They’re all FEMENAnet. So do follow us, and thanks for your attention.

We welcome your solidarity, not only on Iran, but the entire region. I think there are a lot of similarities between the fights that people have in the West and also in the East. The solidarity is not one way. Yeah, it’s mutual. I live in the US, we’re dealing with very similar issues, with people trying to control women’s bodies and women’s rights to abortion and their reproductive health rights. So I think a lot of people can identify with the struggle, and so hopefully we’ll see this act of solidarity is something that’s mutual, and it’s both ways. It’s not just people feeling sympathetic or having sympathy towards us in the East, but it really is a mutual act of solidarity that’s so critical in these times.

Sam Goldman 49:10

I wholeheartedly agree, and the streets in this country, in the United States, should be filled with women refusing to accept the theocrats in this country. So I think that there’s some following the lead of the Iranian women in that regard that needs to take place.

Sussan Tahmasebi 49:28

I definitely agree. Thank you very much for hosting me.

Sam Goldman 49:33

Of course. Thank you.

Sam Goldman 49:35

We’re going to play an English translation of the song Baraye by Shervin Hajipour, an Iranian artist who composed it from tweets that protesters had sent explaining why they were in the streets. Rana Mansour translated and sang the song and we’re sharing it with permission.

Rana Mansour (singing) 49:53

For dancing in the alleys and the streets – For the thrill and the fear of getting caught kissing – For my sister, my brother in unity – For all the times who tried to change their minds and stale beliefs – For the loss of pride – For poverty – For the dream of just a normal life – For you and me – For all the children who was starving for a loaf of bread – For the greed of politics and all the lies they spread – For all the mass polluted air we breathe – For all the litter in the streets and all the dying trees – For all the animals who suffer from elimination – For all the cats and dogs who love us without no conditions – For all the tears that seem to never end – For all the images that keep on turning heads – For a simple smile to less than a little while – For the future generations fighting for thei time – For empty promises that happen in the afterlife – For all imprisonments and beautiful minds – For all the babies who are born and for the ones who died – For all the times he told the truth and all the times you lied – For all the speeches that we heard about a million times – For all the shacks and shelters that was sold to make a dime. For just a glimpse of a peaceful life – For the rising of the sun after an endless night – For all the pills we pop just to get some sleep – For all mankind and our country – For all the boys and girls never knew equality – For one month – For Life, Liberty (repeats)

Sam Goldman 49:53

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