I have no doubt that the revolt taking place in Iran will remain as one of the country’s defining moments of this generation. It is a uniquely influential generation, with more than 70% of all Iranians under the age of 30, and an ever-increasing accessibility to technologies that Iran’s leadership dictators would rather they not have access to (e.g. cell phones and Twitter). Never the less, Iran is a complicated mess, and like Tom Friedman, I believe only time will tell how this shapes out.
What excites me is where this is all originating from. To this point, Andrew Sullivan has made several wise observations about the revolt:
“…it has not been imposed or instigated from outside, and has been launched ostensibly to restore the hopes of the original revolution, rather than destroy it.”
He’s dead-on about the power of this revolt coming from within, not from meddling outside interests. We’ll see how it escalates, but in the mean it would seem only the Revolutionary Guard could be used to reign in the mass protests. And that would mount a whole separate problem for an Iranian regime that has deeply clouded the separation of military and politics for years.
Revolutionary Guard or not, the seeds have been sown for this generation and future Iranians to recognize this revolt as a pivotal turning point. The massive, wide-scale discontent with Iran’s regime isn’t limited to frustrated Westerners fearful of a nuclear theocracy. The discontent is deeply rooted in–and collapsing at–Iran’s own clerical foundation. The cries for legitimate democracy and new elections aren’t being spoken by just the Twittering twentysomethings that make up a notable number of Iranian citizens. They are being spoken by a former Iranian prime minister of eight years, a former president, a former speaker of parliament, and numerous other ranking officials. In other words, it is no longer a movement of youthful dreams, but of serious and wide-spread civil disobedience.
It’s a beautiful thing, protests. In places where they are very common they may not seem like much. But their ability to unify or advance an idea with grace and diplomacy and a vocal outcry invariably leaves an indelible mark on those who govern. It’s hard to ignore thousands of people and keep your credibility intact. Never mind that such outcries are so strongly unified into a single voice by technologies that truly live in the moment–the Twittering of updates as protests run rampant; the text messages to friends and family anywhere they may be; the emailed updates from hospitals overrun with incoming dead bodies then confiscated by the regime without so much as an identification of who they were.
Rasht. Orumiyeh. Zanjan. Zahedan. Tabriz. Mashhad. The voices are spreading to numerous cities and are heard around the world. Say what you will about Mousavi and Ahmadinejad, and how their foreign policies would be different. In point of fact, a change of regime may or may not even moderate Iran’s policies. But that’s not the point. This is bigger than just Mousavi. The suppression of discontent is failing and voices are being heard. The cries for legitimacy and change seem to be at a crescendo. Irrespective of how this revolt ends, the pillars propping up Iran’s intense grip have cracked and are splitting at the seams–largely driven by the people.
