Transcript: Episode #162: Contrasting Iran and Myanmar
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Host 00:09
Welcome to the Insight Myanmar podcast. Before we get into today's show, I wanted to let you know that we have a lot more written and video content on our website. If you haven't visited it yet, we invite you to take a look at WWW dot insight myanmar.org. In addition to complete information about all of our past episodes, there's also a variety of blogs, books and videos to check out. And you can also sign up for our regular newsletter. But for now, enjoy what follows and remember sharing is caring.
00:41
You know, there's so there's that story, but Oh, you didn't have all y'all today?
01:14
Ha ha, ha, ha ha ha, ha, ha ha ha ha ha Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I mean, and it is bizarre.
Brad 01:50
Okay, and welcome back. Today, we're going to be discussing a topic that we've wanted to cover for some time. And that is the ongoing protests in Iran, and the historical and social context that has led to the situation that we see now. And it may be a little bit off topic from the news, you will Myanmar content that we produce, but I think you're gonna find that there are a lot of similarities between the social movements and the uprisings and the very long history of government repression in both countries, and my guest today to discuss this with us, is part of these maccoby. baddies if you could introduce yourself, for our audience, I think they would appreciate that.
Pardis 02:29
Wonderful, thank you so much for having me on the show. My name is parodies Matt. Debbie, I am the Provost and Executive Vice President of the University of Montana, where I'm also a professor of anthropology.
Brad 02:42
Excellent. And you've spoken quite a lot on on different platforms about the Iranian social context and the Iranian history, most of our audience is probably not going to be particularly familiar with it. So although we can see the revolution, how the protest movement happening now, how, how did he run, get to the situation where women are being dragged off the street for not wearing a hijab or or the point at which, you know, youth are willing to go out into the streets and throw firebombs at statues of national heroes? What what led up to this?
Pardis 03:20
You know, it's difficult to know exactly where to start in Iran. So you know, 1000 year history, I think it's perhaps most useful to start at the mesh router or constitutional revolution in 1910. That was one of the, you know, earliest social movements where you had people pouring into the streets, calling for a more democratized Iran. So so this notion of the people being absolute participants in their future and absolute participants in creating a more peaceful, democratic and Representative Iran, this dates back, you know, more than 100 years. So I think that's, that's, that's a really important place to start. You know, Iran has a long history of social movements of street politics. And, and so, you know, in the 1910, you have people doing 10s, you had people agitating for a constitution that was representative of the people. You know, this was followed by again, another period of monarchical rule. In then in 1953, you had a democratically elected leader, a prime minister Mossad, DEC who came to power and of course, forgive me as I'm compressing some of this history, but you know, want to give a brief overview for your listeners, and you should feel free to interrupt me at any time. You know, Mossad def came to power, also under a fabric of returning Iran to Iranians because there was this feeling that the Shah, the monarchy that was in power, and Iran had become overly infatuated with the West or West toxicated. And that the Shah had become a puppet of the West and Mossad that really wanted to enact changes like nationalizing the oil prices, and, you know, working with, with, with farmers and you know, in the agricultural sector, etc. So his his election, however, was short lived. In 1953, there was a, it's now been documented that there was a CIA backed coup that removed and was set up and reinstalled the Shah of Iran into into power. You know, during the shot, you also had people feeling especially after 1953, feeling very much like the government wasn't necessarily aligned with with the people. And so, you know, in the, in the 1970s, you began to have alternative resistance movements, springing up to challenge the monarchy. And, and, you know, you had movements like Marxism, you know, certain feminist movements, and then you had a movement called Islamic Marxism, with people like Abdul Karim Suroosh, at the head. And, you know, really writing about a different form of democracy. And again, bringing Iran for Iranians, one of the loudest voices in the 1970s was a cleric by the name of Ayatollah Khomeini, whomever, you know, most people are familiar with by now, but who was exiled in France and would send his speeches recorded on cassette tapes into Iran, and promised to bring back Iran for Iranians. And, you know, very critical of the opulence and West toxication of the Shah. And, you know, his words gained a lot of traction. And in 1978 1979, Iran had the revolution, which installed the Islamists into power.
Brad 07:00
So let me let me jump in there. Like there's a theme that you've been touching on this this Western influence, like, is it? Because I know this claim is often made? I'm wondering what your stance on this is, would it be fair to say that the installation of, of the Shah, even before 1953, was backed by colonial forces, like, I vaguely remember, from Persepolis that, that the British military was sort of involved in helping pick the person who would become the sharp because they wanted to have someone, you know, controlling Iranian oil, that there was always this colonial let's slice up Iran for ourselves in the background. So this theme that we see today, with with the regime sale, everything is outside influence. Everything is American influences, Israelis influences European influence. There's quite a long history of legitimate exploitative influence of Western powers in Iran, like that, that would be historically defensible statement within Yeah, so
Pardis 08:08
I definitely think that that is that is accurate. But I think it's an interesting tension, you point to right, because, on the one hand, you definitely had this heavy hand of the colonial powers at play. But on the other hand, if you think about it, Iran was one of the few countries in the region to never have been formally colonized. Right. And Iranians are quite proud of that. And so, you know, while yes, there was absolutely the heavy hand of the British and, you know, there's a very popular, you know, long standing popular Iranian comedy called dojo, Napoleon, which is my uncle Napoleon, and the various the most famous line of that film is called kata in the sauce, which is, you know, the whatever sort of mischief or, or, you know, terrible things have happened. It's because of the British. And then that became kind of something that people were were repeating over and over again. So, certainly there has been this heavy hand of colonial powers over the years. What, you know, but but Iranians are still quite proud of the fact that they have resisted that. And that's been a really powerful animating call, I think, for the people of Iran, is this this idea of Iran for Iranians, you know, no outside meddling, right.
Brad 09:29
And so now, I was actually just looking the other day at some of the history of Iran post revolution with regard to connections with Shia uprisings in in Syria versus Israel and the the weaponization of this narrative of outside influence by by the regime. So it definitely seems to be very pervasive.
Pardis 09:48
Very much. Yes. I think that's exactly right. Yeah.
Brad 09:51
So okay, so let's, let's talk the revolution. So we have the the Islamic Revolution comes in, Ayatollah Khomeini. comes in and and he's greeted by throngs of cheering crowds at the airport. And he sort of steps up and becomes the leader of the revolution. Is there any particular reason why it was this Islamic opposition that became the preeminent movement against the Shah?
Pardis 10:24
I think that that people really resonated with you know, Khomeini's words. And this Islamic movement, this idea of taking Iran back to a time, you know, now, of course, taking Iran back, it can be problematic, right, when you go backwards in time, but this notion of, of bringing back this, this, this Iranian pneus, before it had been tainted, you know, with, with, you know, outside influence, for instance, people talk a lot about, you know, in the early 70s, you know, there's even this very famous quote from the French designer, Esau Hall, who said that, you know, after the runways of Paris, it was the streets of Tehran, where women were, you know, wearing mini skirts, and you saw the Han designs. Right. And, and I think that, you know, the Islamist rhetoric, certainly appealed to a segment of the population, who felt quite, you know, tired of this. I also think it's, it's very true that, you know, there was class stratification, you know, very extreme class stratification. And, you know, the Shah had, you know, his secret police the sidewalk, who, who also had been, you know, you know, committing human rights violations. And so, you know, I think that this notion of, you know, trusting in, in spirituality, right in, in kind of going back to your, the roots with Islam, I think that I think people found that appealing.
Brad 11:53
I mean, this is, I mean, this is something that we've seen, in almost every country, I, my, my sort of theory is that there are three ways to present this narrative, you either say, we're going to return the country to a glorious state that existed before, or we're going to return the country to the glorious state that would have existed if the other people hadn't come in and, and, and ruined it. Or we're going to just, you know, stop the other people from taking us away from the glorious present that we've established. But it always is this harkening back to whatever was before was good. Whatever is now is bad. And I promise to drag us back to that thing that didn't really exist. But I've convinced you that that's what you still exist. And we've seen that make America great again, it's just a rehashing of that same mentality.
Pardis 12:45
That's exactly right. That's exactly right.
Brad 12:47
It's quite, it's quite sad. And so this is, to those who haven't seen these, I strongly recommend jumping on Google checking these out. We have photographs of Iran pre revolution. We have photographs of Afghanistan, pre Taleban. And we see women in the 1960s, with short hair heads uncovered the same types of fashion, the same types of clothes that would be common in the 1960s. In, in the UK, or the United States or continental Europe. Are you saying that there was dissatisfaction with this degree of modernization and freedom? Was it being perceived as as overt Western imperialism?
Pardis 13:29
You know, I think I think people took issue with with the inequality that was rampant, right? Because while yes, you did see, you know, women wearing those designs that we've just been talking about, right? But you also had people who are starving, right, and you had the farmers and you had the merchant class, right. And then I think there was also this idea that, you know, modernity, I don't think people were necessarily opposed to modernity, you know, modernity, qua modernity. But I think there was this, this notion, this idea that, you know, why does modernity have to equal westernization? You know, is there another form of modernity? That's much more, shall we say, homegrown, you know, and that this is what, you know, people like to spit back write about, you know, can the Subaltern Speak Like, is there a subaltern you know, version of modernity? And I think, I think many people, for many people, Islamic Marxism, held that promise of being a modernity rooted in equality. And, and, and, and just being an alternative pathway forward.
Brad 14:36
And I think that that sets us up for a very sad and ironic look at the things that have actually happened and not happened in Iran since then. So let's let's jump forward a little bit in time. Media coverage, people have seen things thrown around like the Revolutionary Guard the message I'm the gash. They are short, the morality police. But I think most people don't really have a concept of really who these people are and what it is that they can do. Like, can you give us an overview of what these groups are and why they exist?
Pardis 15:15
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think it's I think right now probably it's most useful to start with a gash to ishod which is the morality police. Because if you know it, folks have been seeing the headlines since September. Masha Imani, Gina Massa, I mean, young Kurdish Iranian woman was taking a trip to Teheran in September. And when she stepped off the train at the at the train station, you know, her headscarf was slipping back a bit, but not more than many other women. And she was taken in by the morality police, and suffered cruelty and brutality at their hands and died in custody. You know, roughly 24 hours later, this ignited the movement that we're seeing on the ground in Iran today. And so, you know, I think before genome so I mean, he's death, I think very few people even knew about let alone talked about the morality police or the guested shut. People often focused on the Revolutionary Guard, or, you know, they focused on the Council of Guardians, who are the Islamic version of almost a Senate, right, we would say in the United States, the morality police are the the police an arm of law enforcement, excuse me, vested with the following charge, upholding right and forbidding wrong, that is the charge that they are vested with. Now, you can imagine though, that that has quite a lot of room for leeway. Right? So, you know, they are vested with, you know, ensuring that people are wearing proper Islamic dress, which includes the veil, hijab, right. But it also includes other things. And I think it's important to note that it's not just hijab, and it's not just women, the morality, police would take men, young men in for having, you know, eye catching accessories, and faux hawks, or, you know, ripped jeans, you know, tank tops even right. So it's really about, you know, this was the arm of law enforcement, that was policing austerity was policing morality. So for women, it might it might be a job might be lipstick, it might be nail polish, it, you know, it might be holding hands with a member of the opposite sex when you're not married. The morality police were known for raiding parties. So if there were parties where people were drinking, and as a side note, Alcohol Drinking is technically illegal in the Islamic Republic of Iran. And, you know, while the police would break, you know, bust up parties and take folks in who are seeing drinking and dancing, et cetera. So they're really they're the arm of law enforcement that were charged with the operationalization of Islamic values, if that makes sense.
Brad 18:01
Absolutely. And I think for those who've read, Persepolis, there is that famous scene where where that they're drinking, and they're dancing. And that's, that's another thing that I did not realize how much dancing matters to people until I saw the the Iranian. When I was going to university, I was hanging out with Iranian students. And the value they placed on being able to go to a party and dance males and females all together in the same room was surprising to me. Because I looked at that, like, I mean, you can just go to a club, like I don't, I don't get the point. But until then, it's like, well, no, no one's gonna read us here. No one's going to kick down the door here. And any in person police, there's that scene where they get chased out of the party and somebody dies falling off a roof being chased by by the morality police. So I think I think it's valuable to recognize just how much why wait, these people have how much power they have. Because in other countries, we have, you know, various groups who are there to design and lead to protect standards, but they don't usually kill people.
Pardis 19:07
Right? And they're also it's very opaque, you know, how and why they make the decisions they make. And it changes, right. So you know, there might be a period of a few months where, you know, people can walk around, you know, they could go to parties and dance and drink and no one's going to read them, but then maybe you're coming up, you know, up against an election or you're coming up against a religious quality, and then suddenly, suddenly, now, now, the same thing that you wouldn't have been arrested four weeks ago, now you're arrested for it, you know, it's it's, it's, it's so it's so unpredictable, I should say.
Brad 19:40
Yeah. Because we've seen, you know, is, you know, I mean, they like the way she had her job in certain previous times, would have been common and nobody would have done anything about it. Absolutely. So it's quite arbitrary. And not to sort of try to hone in on what I'm sure must be a very painful experience, but I believe But you yourself were detained by the cash. They're short for delivering a seminar.
Pardis 20:06
Absolutely, yeah. So I Yes. And I should, you know, backup to say that I'm somebody who has been researching young people and gender and sexual politics in Iran for more than two decades now. And I began doing fieldwork in Iran in 1999 2000, focusing on what young people called the anger, love, urgency, or a sexual revolution. And I followed them for a period of six years as they used their bodies to speak back to a regime that they felt was, you know, overly obsessed with with comportment and with bodies. You know, they said, Okay, this is a regime that flexes its muscles, you know, and operates its power through a fabric of morality. So we're going to question the regime by questioning that fabric of morality. And so they engaged in what they were calling a sexual revolution. I was documenting this, you know, in the in the early 2000s. And, and when I began my fieldwork, it was under the rule of roof a reformist President President caught me. And so, you know, I was able to do a fair amount of research, you know, following and learning about sexual behaviors, even though premarital sex is technically illegal. I was learning about how people, you know us and engage in things like partying and sexual behaviors as a way to speak back against a regime with which they did not agree. You know, young people saying we're exactly what you experienced yourself at school and people saying, we're so suffocated. We can't even go to a party and dance that then you know, that they were sort of finding extreme ways to express their frustration. So I was I was I was focusing on this youth movement, and I wrote a book called passionate uprisings, Iran sexual revolution, which came out in 2007. And, you know, I was delivering a lecture that was introducing the concepts of my book, my, many of my interviewees were quite adamant that I, you know, present the results of my fieldwork in Iran first, which, which, which made sense to me, because I had been spending all this time doing research in Iran with and they had opened their hearts and their stories to me. So you know, I went to give a lecture at the University of Tehran 13 minutes into my lecture describing Iran sexual revolution, the auditorium doors burst open. And I can't remember if I saw them, heard them or smelled them first. But you know, the auditorium erupted into pandemonium. You had morality police coming in, people were running every which way. And I should have been shredding my lecture notes. But I was sort of, in a state of suspended animation. I was standing there frozen, gripping the podium with both hands. And it was almost as if it were happening in slow motion. I watched as you know, a few morality policemen climbed the four stairs that I had climbed just moments earlier, came on to the stage where I was standing. And the last thing I remember was looking up as a hand was coming down towards me, and then I and then I blacked out.
Brad 23:22
So I mean, there was was what you were doing actually illegal. Like, were there any laws actually being broken?
Pardis 23:31
Well, you know, I had several charges leveled against me, right. So one of those being, you know, trying to foment a velvet revolution? Of course, right. So that that charge? Say that, again?
Brad 23:45
It's a very charge.
Pardis 23:46
Yes, a vague charge. And of course, it's not like one gets to go to court. Right. and test it. It's a vague charge, one doesn't know where it has come from, who has leveled it to what the evidence is, you know, there it's not. It's not as though there's due process. Right.
Brad 24:03
So this is not actually the police have arrested you on a criminal charge and have filed papers with the court. There's no appeal oversight process.
Pardis 24:11
No, no, and it's not exactly like it's registered in the system that you've got this case against you? Nothing.
Brad 24:20
So you don't exist for a period of time.
Pardis 24:24
Yeah, and you're completely at their mercy, right.
Brad 24:28
I mean, that's insane. Like we would view this is a lesser branch of law enforcement. And yet they seem to have significantly more power than actual criminal enforcement police.
Pardis 24:44
I mean, in some ways, yes. Right. I think in some ways, yes. And yet, like it changes, right, it changes depending on who's president. It depends. It changes depending on you know, like I said, what the season is, you know, sometimes they have an enormous amount of power. And sometimes, you know, you have a president who wants to, perhaps disempower them, right. It's it's constantly in flux. And the challenge with it being so vague is that one never knows where one stands. And one never knows the degree to which they have power. It's difficult because they're charged being upholding right and forbidding wrong could be interpreted in a myriad number of ways. Yes. And so that that, I think, is what makes it even more challenging. Right. So here in the United States, we have a sense for what the police are vested with what, you know what authority they have, we have an idea of what a criminal court, you know, has authority to do what a divorce court has authority to do, right, we have a sense of process of authority of you know, how things might transpire. Right? And I think it's, it's challenging, because here you have an instance where that target is constantly shifting
Brad 25:58
is ridiculous. And so instead, is that general support for groups like this? I know that, for example, in in Saudi, there are some people who do support them with Darlene, who are the Saudi equivalent to the morality police. And when people view them, as you I spoke with to Saudi women who say, Well, if a man harasses me on the street, if I go to the police, there's going to be a police report, I'm going to have to appear I'm going to have to give evidence a can tarnish my reputation. If I go to the mattala. In will they can take care of that problem for me quietly, it doesn't hurt my reputation. It doesn't put me in a painful position of having to give evidence. So some people support that is their support in Iran for the gash their shot, or does it just everyone hate them?
Pardis 26:40
I think that over time, it has changed. I think initially, there were a lot of people who were grateful for them for, you know, similar to Saudi Arabia, there were also people who, you know, who I interviewed, who were glad that there was such an arm of law enforcement, because they said, Well, it's good, you know, they're keeping they're keeping the kids in line. Right. You know, they're making sure we're you don't have people knocking in the park or whatnot. Right. And I but I think over time, I think people started to see just, you know, how challenging this this group was, and also like that sort of that willy nilly Enos of it like, today, you're arrested for wearing red lipstick tomorrow, you're not you know, that I think that inconsistency really made it such that they didn't have as much respect or teeth, right. And so it became like, just another way for for the regime, they became an extension of the regime. And when the regime started putting, you know, the more of their attention, energy and emphasis on things like what people are wearing, and who's who's at a party with whom, then in solving things like the unemployment crisis, or, you know, issues around traffic, or, you know, the issues facing farmers or the bizarre when it became clear that the government was more vested in things like, you know, sexual behaviors than an unemployment, that I think when things really changed.
Brad 28:03
And so let's, so let's move forward into those, the concerns the manifestation. So she now she's taken by the police, she's brutalized. We have camera footage of her collapsing, and she subsequently dies of her injuries. This triggered something that we haven't seen before. So we, you've spoken previously about things like the green movement, and, you know, street protests in 2018. And myself the freedom on an online movement. This that we're seeing now is on another level. Yes. That would like criminally, criminally, this cannot just be mesalamine that she's not the only victim of the SDF showed. She's not what like, how did this come about what's actually happening right now?
Pardis 29:09
So I think what what we have seen happen has been a gret. It's gone from a gradual simmer to a boiling point. Right. I think that, you know, after the rebel, you know, we stopped kind of our history, you know, conversation that the revolution, I think initially, everyone's excited about how many comes on. And then I think when you know, when Khomeini takes power, and he creates the gash to Ashad. And he creates the Revolutionary Guard, and he creates the Council of Guardians and a role for himself as a supreme leader. And they start to operationalize their power through this fabric of morality. I think that that is when people start to say, Hang on a second. You know, this isn't exactly a better than the time of the Shah that they're not trying to solve our hunger issues or our unemployment issue. They're not doing what, you know, they're not bringing back Iran for Iranians. They're taking Iran for, you know, this interpretation of Islam. And people started to have this this disenchantment, which, which absolutely grooved in so the 1980s were marked by the Iran Iraq War, you know, a decade long war. And, you know, people started to have this with questioning of the regime like, Okay, well, now we're in this war. And you know, how many casualties and during this time the regime enacted pronatalist policies, they enacted policies that encourage families to have as many children as possible. So for example, any family that had more than two children got a tax break, and any family that had five children, or more got a free plot of land. This resulted in a population boom, population explosion almost, in the 80s and early 90s. Right, you had just, you know, a very high fertility rate, somewhere in the 90s, there was this realization that, wow, our population levels are, you know, we're, we're kind of getting skewed here. And I don't know, we don't know if the if the government can sustain this. And so they did a complete one ad. And they enacted mandatory family planning policies, where every couple had to take a family planning class to get married families that had more than three children were taxed. And you had all these messages going out that said, you know, fewer children, better life, etc. And so what happened was that Iran fertility rate dropped from, you know, nearly four per woman to to, you know, 1.3 per per woman, which, interestingly enough, earned Iran the award, the family planning award from the United Nations in the 1990s. Now, but that's significant, because what you have is this huge population boom of young people, young people born between, you know, 1979 7879, and 1995, let's say. So when I started doing my fieldwork, in 9990 99 70%, of Iran's population was under the age of 25. I mean, that is a massive, right, and most of them are kind of within, you know, 10 years of each other. It's sort of, you know, it resembles a bulge like, like, you know, a snake swallowing a rabbit. Imagine that, right? You have, like, huge balls of people, you know, as of a certain age, who were not around during the time of the Shah. So they don't necessarily believe the rhetoric of the regime about oh, the Shah was so awful, and it was things were that, you know, it's like, well, at least people could wear what they wanted. And people could, you know, do dance and listen to music and etc, and have fun. And, you know, there's this very famous Khomeini quote, that, you know, I would often see young people spray painting over and the Khomeini quote was, you know, the Islamic Revolution is not about fun. There's no fun to be had in the Islamic Republic. He was the people spray painting around that, right. Yeah. You know, and so these are people, these are young people who, like I said, they don't they don't remember the show. They weren't, they weren't all they know, is the world that they were that Iran, they were born into, wasn't Iran marked by war revolution, you know, this sort of austerity. And, and as you know, as young people grew up and got more and more educated, you had eventually, you know, by 2,060%, of university graduates were women. But women faced a 45% unemployment rate. So you had a highly educated, young population with a high unemployment rate, and they are very disenchanted. So what do you think they're going to do? Right, they're going to find ways to express themselves at you. So this was the generation who very much was leading that movement that I was talking about that sexual revolution, which, you know, it kind of birthed the green movement of 2009, where people were saying, you know, this is not my vote, they were they were criticizing what they saw as the fraudulent re election of a hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. And so what you saw with the Green Movement is, you know, more than just young people coming out, you know, so it was more than just in the sexual revolution, it was larger than that. You had, you know, led by women, the very iconic image of NEDA was so tiny young woman who was, you know, gunned down by Revolutionary Guards, and the protest was a very iconic image of that time. And that but then after 2009, the subsequent movements that you that you mentioned, you had my stealthy freedom want the 1 million signatures, campaign, et cetera. Each subsequent movement was larger than the previous one. With each subsequent passing year, this disinfo disenchanted disenchantment with the regime grew. And it grew because people started to see that this was not a regime that was invested in making Iran better for Iranians that people were suffering, you know, the real the realities of sanctions that people were suffering from unemployment, that traffic was getting worse that travel was getting impossible that Iran was being shut out from the rest of the world. And as you know, as we as the world became more and more connected, and you know, social media, and you know, that sort of that internet that force, the fourth way, the fourth world, right, that that sort of the internet superhighway, people started to see what they were missing and where their government was falling short. And as gas prices went through the roof, and the government still did nothing. Suddenly, you had people of all different classes and all different backgrounds saying, wait a second, this is not a regime that's looking out for us. And and so like I said, each subsequent movement, you had more people, right? So you know, my stealthy freedom reached more people then then the green movement. And then you had a series of protests that, you know, outpouring in 2017 2018 2019, where people were protesting gas prices, they were protesting the government. And so what was really the catalyzing moment of 2022? I think it was, you know, masa, I mean, he's death. And it because it was captured on film. I mean, you know, we think a lot about, you know, the movement for black lives. And, you know, George Floyd, and Emmett Till and, you know, and sort of the power of an innocent dying. I think that was a catalyzing call to everyone that Oh, my goodness, if this is a regime that can enact such cruelty to an innocent young woman, how could this regime be representative of the people?
Brad 36:50
And I think you're touching on so many different topics. And there is the, the song that became very famous and hopefully will, will play a part of it in this interview as well. Battle Yeah, by Sheikh Haji port, and what's very telling about the signs of any beautiful song, If anyone hasn't listened to it yet, I strongly recommend that you do. But what's really telling about the song is that very quickly, it moves away from talking about women's liberation. And it starts talking about have lawyer all day, right? So he talked about, you know, the polluted air, it talks about this, this famous scene with the dumpster diving boy, who's asked what his dreams are, and he doesn't understand the meaning of the word dream. It talks about the trees dying, it talks about, you know, the dogs, he talks about the economy failing, it talks about so many different issues, it's evident that these angers that are being manifested on the street, like we might be focusing on the images of women burning their hijab, and dancing in the street and cutting their hair short. But a lot of the people throwing firebombs are equally concerned about the fact that they see no future for themselves that they can't afford to live, they can't pay their rent, they can't pay for petrol. And this is a long standing like Iranian subversive, let's say Iranian music has for a very long time spoken about these harsh, harsh realities and, and the division between rich and poor. And the sort of harkens back to what you were saying before with with the the Islamic Revolution, and Khomeini and people's dissatisfaction under the Shah with the stratification of society. But today, in Iran, you seem to still have people who live by scrounging through rubbish, for scraps of food to eat. And it at least the way it's presented through subversive media. This does not appear to be a small and isolated problem. This appears to be a just genuine fact of reality for huge, huge, huge numbers of people within the country. Has there actually been improvement? Or are people now just saying, you know, what they like to us?
Pardis 39:14
I think it's the latter. I think it's exactly that. I think people are saying, You know what, they lied to us. This regime was supposed to fix that, right? It was supposed to fix, you know, those the hungry people who are as you said, you know, dumpster diving that the hungry dogs, right, the hungry, everybody, everybody is hungry, and and in this regime came to power under this platform of equality. Right? And yet, and yet, the stratifications exist, the pain and the suffering exists and it is so very visible. And so very palpable in people's lives today.
Brad 39:55
I mean, it's horrifying. So so this being the case I mean, what are we looking at right now? So we've seen horrific crackdowns and and again, this was the same thing that we saw in Myanmar, like, the protest movement starts right after the coup. And people think, yeah, like we can we can express ourselves. And then a week and a half into it. Mean after the current, she gets shot in the head by a soldier disguised in police uniform. And she dies of injuries A few days later. And then by the end of that month, we have teenagers get away in tune, he was shot in the head by a sniper rifle. He was 16 or 17 years old. And they had to take his body away on his on his own vegetable cart, because they didn't have any other way to get him out of there. This was within the first month of the coup by the beginning of March. They were coordinated crackdowns by the middle of March, martial law was imposed in six districts of Yangon, with with shoot on side orders. You know, we saw the protests in hindsight where the factories were being burned by factory workers who, whose main concern was not democracy, their main concern was, we fought tooth and nail to have some semblance of a labor union and some semblance of worker protections over the last couple of years, and we're afraid that all of those are going to be taken away, and we're effectively going to be turned in slave labor until the military came in and shot about 70 or 80 of them. In one one afternoon, saying this, yeah, like, absolutely, you know, the curtain fell off after a week and a half of thinking while the protests will blow over, it's fine. And then the protest didn't blow up above just kill the people if they're protesting. And then eventually, they'll either be nobody left to protest, or they'll go home and get back to work. And Iran seems to be following the exact same playbook. It's like, oh, people people are protesting. Well, that's, that's annoying. And then they're still protesting. So let's do mass incarcerations. Let's kill people on the street. Let's use live ammunition, let's order Speights of of executions, Iran being the second most prolific user of death penalty in the world today off to China. Is this actually slowing people down? Like, is there legitimate concern now and they're going whoa, maybe I don't want to protest because maybe I don't want to be arbitrarily murdered on the street, or dragged off by by someone and then executed for it on false charges? Is it? Is it actually terrorizing the people? Or are they pressing on?
Pardis 42:36
No. And in fact, I think that's what's that's what's so I think, inspiring to so many people is that, even with these, all of these odds, you know, against them, right? I remember there was this, you know, in October, when the government was sorry, the Rev guard was, you know, using tear gas on protesters, and everyone thought, Okay, well, that's, that's definitely going to make them think twice about going outside, right, we saw all these images circulating, and it just increased their results, right? It just increased the number of people going out there. And so you know, what's interesting, now, what you hear what I hear all the time is people say, you know, I say, you know, you see the executions, aren't you afraid, etc. And they say, you know, I'd rather die than live like this. And that's sort of calling
Brad 43:19
the Revolutionary Guard. So the Revolutionary Guards, against all that is to defend the Islamic State, specifically, the entire system. They're there to protect it. Is it symbolic of the government panicking, that they've invoked the Revolutionary Guard in this? Or is it normal for them to just get called into put down protests?
Pardis 43:45
I think that in pass that they've been able to bring in, in the morality police and the morality police have been able to bring in, you know, allies, particularly from the kind of more religious parts of the country to help maintain the order, but not this time. And so I think that I think it's exactly what you just said, the fact that they've had to, you know, bring in so many different types of law enforcement to contain and to, you know, terrorize, essentially, that speaks volumes.
Brad 44:17
And so now, we've now we've moved into the, the classic sort of, you know, Nazi Stalinist communist era of, you know, getting a bang on the door in the middle of the night and people sort of just being abducted on the cover of darkness. Is that, is that something that's just been perpetually the case? Or is that a more new tactic?
Pardis 44:43
I think that that is a tactic that has come and gone before, you know, in the past, right. So I think that you saw some of that around the green movement. You certainly saw some of that around the Green Movement, right? People did speak about that happening, you know, even around the revolution time, which predates me of course but people did speak about that happening then you definitely saw in the Green Movement, you definitely saw it around my stealthy freedom. So when things start to heat up, that tactic becomes more employed, but it's certainly more employed now than ever before, at least in recent in recent time.
Brad 45:17
So about this is this nothing like when we talk about myself or freedom when we're talking about these these abductions in middle of the night that the whole purpose of the abductions is the keeper of the box is to keep it quiet, is to stop us from getting these these loud scenes and journalists in Iran are facing a lot of threat and a lot of pressure. And so we've seen organizations outside of Iran collecting information from Iranian citizen journalists and then telling them like Okay, now that you've sent it to us, like deleted, deleted divvied scrub your phone so that they can't find anything on it. And so in response, yet again, exactly the same as a Myanmar the government have cut off Internet access sporadically. Is there at succeeding in in quelling the the information flow? Is it stopping people from knowing what's happening?
Pardis 46:08
I think it's not actually, I think is absolutely not, I think people are finding ways around it, right. I mean, people are sending things through through phones, I mean, of course, they're scrubbing, but people are, remember, as I mentioned that generation, right, that that these are people who've grown up under this sort of repression, and so they are masters at finding loopholes, I should also have that it's that this particular movement we're seeing right now, is absolutely intergenerational. And it's led not by, you know, my generation, so my generation, they call us children of the revolution, right? You know, I was born in 1978, you know, my generation, people born in 70s 79, even through the 80s, were all called the children of the revolution, right. And so I think my generation was really key in that sort of the sexual revolution, the Green Movement, all of that. Now, you actually have this moment is being led by what I call the children of the resistance. Those are our people, like my daughter's age, right, my daughter is 12, you know, but a lot of our kids are, you know, teenagers and, and, and it's being led by these brave school girls who are out there putting their lives on the line they grew up in, in revolution, they grew up in resistance, because they're the children of the they are the children of the children of the revolution. And so they have grown up in this very heightened time where they know how to, you know, jump the highest firewalls, if you will.
Brad 47:39
And I just find those, the parallels are getting so strong, like the the generation that were born in the late 60s and the early 70s, in Myanmar, will be referred to as the ADA generation, because they participated in the student protests of 1988. And the generation that's currently leading the protests is referred to as Gen Z. That for obvious reasons, and there is there is actually this very interesting, intergenerational thing where like, everyone supports the movement, but you had people who lived through the ADHS revolution, who now have become older, who have children that they don't want to see murdered, who have been preaching, like, let's let's calm down a little bit, let's try to find a middle way. You know, let's let's not get murdered over this. And then you've got, you know, the young generation who is saying like, no, no, it's gone too far. Like, I don't care anymore, they can shoot me, they can shoot me, it's gone too far, we're not, we're not taking this. And it's fascinating to see that because they are leading it online, they're using all these different technologies. And about a third of the people who have been murdered by the military have been under age, a little bit more than a third actually the 79% with the statistics most recently got. So these these, again, these parallels are fascinating. And I know this is a very sensitive topic, and I don't mean to put you in an unpleasant situation. But again, the fact that that Gina, is from a Kurdish minority, who have been maligned historically, we're also seeing this sort of unification across ethnic lines, which again, in the Myanmar context is happening because the military have used ethnic division as a way to divide and conquer, you know, convinced one ethnic group that the other ethnic group is their real enemy. And then those two ethnic groups are not going to stand side by side and notice that hang on, we're both starving, because the military took all that money, keep them at each other's throats and keep them suppressed. And so it seems to be again, the same thing happening in Iran, like the different ethnic groups. I know there's a large Kurdish minority in the northwest. I know there's a large as a minority in the northwest. I think there's an Arab minority in the southwest. Although no
Pardis 49:51
yes, there are. Yep. And then there's, you know, then there's different religious minorities right as well. Right. You have Zoroastrians, you have you have highs who have And, you know, persecuted for a very long time, and they're still behind them. I mean, you know, they live in very, very few, but you know, and having to be very careful. But you also have Armenians, right? You've got Iranian Jews, you know, there are different groups of minorities. But But I think you're right about these parallels that you are also seeing these groups, these groups, excuse me, coming together, and really in a really powerful way.
Brad 50:29
And that's, I think that's one of those really big triggering things where you can't keep the people separated based on social class, or religion, as is so divisive in so many cases, and is divisive in Myanmar as well, an ethnic group. And once you lose that divide and conquer ability, your days are really numbered. And so let's focus on what the future is of this Iranian movement. And I think we all fervently fervently hope for regime change. But ultimately, I do think that's even on the cards.
Pardis 51:04
You know, I actually think it is, I do, you know, people are talking about this moment as another revolution. And, you know, people are, like I said, they are demonstrating extraordinary bravery, extraordinary courage, and they're willing to, like I said, they're willing to die for their cause. Right? I mean, how many people around the world can say that, right? They're willing to go out there and put their life on the line, day after day after day, willing to die, rather than live under this regime. That's a pretty powerful statement. And it's it's a groundswell, it's intergenerational. It's not just women, it's not just about the hijab. It's so much bigger than that. It's so much broader than that. And it's so it goes down all the way down into people's like, very essence of who they are, that they're out there in the streets, fighting for their rights, fighting for what they believe is right, and fighting for the Iran that they would like to see. And so I think that, you know, one of my colleagues early on, sorry, has said this, and to quote him, he said, I think it's far more likely that the people outside of Iran will lose patience with the protests far earlier than the people inside of Iran. And so I think we're likely to see these folks continuing to push for change.
Brad 52:25
I think this is a very important and crucial question, because I know that the the Myanmar protests, for example, are dependent on international support the National Unity government is not read the the revolutionary government is not recognized by most international stakeholders, and Myanmar. I've always described it as a wealthy country with phenomenally poor people, because years and years of military exploitation have ripped, like, unimaginable amounts of wealth that should be theirs, out of their hands and out of their mouths. And so the people starve while the generals live in Golden palaces, quite literally. And so aid, food, medicine, you know, COVID-19 malaria, vaccinations, these are all deeply needed. Is the Iranian movement dependent on on international support and international awareness. Is it important to keep up that pressure? Or is the Iranian movement moving forward, no matter what the international community thinks?
Pardis 53:19
I think the international community is always going to be a vital component of any such movement. Right? I mean, especially when people are up against a government that is as strong and as good at keeping themselves in power as this particular regime is right. I mean, I think so I think that, you know, I think it is actually important that the international community continue to elevate the visibility of the cause continue to, you know, to to articulate their support for the Iranian people continue to, you know, pressure their, you know, their countries to to support the people of Iran, I think that's vital.
Brad 53:56
And so on, as well, there's, there's a very important question, and I've no idea how it can be answered. But historically, when we look at revolutionary movements, and I mean, this, this is something that stretches back hundreds and hundreds of years and across continents, the big, big factor seems to be can you get ordinary rank and file military on side, because we live in a world where legitimacy is enforced by brute force. You can either accept laws as they exist, or you can challenge them and get beaten. The end result is the same. If you lose control over the mechanism of the application of that force, which in any country is always ultimately the military. You have lost control of the country, just as a fact. Is there any chance of not the Revolutionary Guard because they obviously handpick to be pathologically loyal to the regime but of the rank and file military, turning around and saying I don't particularly want to open fire on civilians from my village, I would rather not do that. And I would rather shoot the guy who's been, you know, pinching my wages for the last 20 years. Who lives in opulence, while I'm barely getting by? Then, you know, killing people who could be my, you know, friends and co workers and cousins and and family? Is that going to happen?
Pardis 55:23
You know, I think that's a possibility. And I'll tell you why, you know, Iran has mandatory service component, right, mandatory, you know, draft fuel. And one of the things that I observed, even just in the time that I was doing fieldwork in Iran, you know, through 2007, is that, that, that, that, you know, population bulge that I spoke to you about, you started to see those young people getting into positions of power, including, you know, ending up in, you know, the mortality police the guy shot or, you know, ending up in different types of law enforcement or military and, and, you know, they, of course, are quite sympathetic to the cause having grown up in it. And so even in the short time that I was doing my fieldwork, I saw a huge change in attitudes of law enforcement. So I do think it's a very real possibility. And, and, and I think that, you know, that's something that we can watch for.
Brad 56:18
I think it's possible, I think that's something that needs to be investigated. Definitely, in the Myanmar context, you know, we talk about the numbers of soldiers who get killed in, in skirmishes, we talk about armed insurrection. I mean, there are many armed groups in Myanmar that have existed for decades, who are focusing on the military. But the information that I get from outside sources tells me the most successful campaign of the revolution in Myanmar has not been military engagements against soldiers. It has been propaganda, campaigning campaign's, which have convinced soldiers to pick up and defect from the military, take their wives, take their children out of the military bases, and simply walk into a revolutionary base, put their gun down and say, Screw it, I'm out. And then they get welcomed into the fold, and they get food and they get, you know, shelter and their families are, you know, given assistance to flee the country and things like that, that seems to be bleeding the military dry faster than actual military conflict is. So if there's a possibility for it, I think that that should be examined. And so that requires centralization that requires coordination. And that leads on to the bigger question, is there that right now, in this movement? Is it a whole bunch of different people doing their own thing, side by side against the government? Or is there actually becoming a centralization of movement? Are we possibly going to see a secondary revolutionary government forming?
Pardis 57:47
I mean, that is certainly being discussed, a transitional government is certainly being discussed. It's certainly being discussed, you know, what that government might look like? Would there be a transitional government? What would the transitional government beyond the route to who would be some of the leaders? That is certainly something that that is being discussed? So I would say that, that it's, you know, it's yes, there isn't one single figurehead, you know, at, you know, that you might point to, but I think that it certainly is, is organized, and those conversations are definitely happening.
Brad 58:19
And so can we can we talk in terms of time timescale? Like, is there any concept of how long this might take the regime does not appear to be on the brink of collapse? They threw out to the protesters, this phony offer of undermining the dash dash or eliminating the ash data showed which thank God, nobody, nobody fell for? Because he was clearly a lie. Yes. Although that risk of, you know, I don't know what compliance is like in Iran. But I think one of the big telling things is going to be well, if there are state owned enterprises, if electricity comes from the state, are people going to start not paying electricity bills to state? Are they going to not pay taxes to the state? Are there ways that people are going to say, You know what, I no longer recognize the legitimacy of the government? And I'm not going to continue supporting it and funding it and allowing it to operate the way that it has. Is there any like dates coming up at which there'll be these testing points? Or does it not work that way over there?
Pardis 59:20
I think I think it's not exactly that way. But in terms of timeline, you know, I think that the Iranian New Year is coming up. No ruse is coming up. It's always celebrated on the winter Equinox, excuse me, the spring equinox. So March 20, or 21st. That can sometimes be a catalyzing time or period. Some people talk a lot about summer because that tends to be when the regime likes to crack down and so there's there's more outpouring of protest. So I think that if we're looking at time I'm lines we might think a little more seasonally, rather than infrastructurally. As you just mentioned,
Brad 1:00:05
it's interesting you raised in the ruse. Is it not the custom in Iran that if you have lost someone in the last year, you're still in mourning. You're not meant to participate in all those.
Pardis 1:00:19
You I think you're not meant to participate in all of the rituals. But But certainly, you know, Nowruz is something that I think speaks to to Persians around the world.
Brad 1:00:30
So we're just wondering whether this might lead to a protest movement of the nation as a whole saying, Well, we're all collectively mourning.
Pardis 1:00:39
Yeah. So I mean, I've I've definitely heard that discussed, although that that is already on the cards. I've heard it mentioned.
Brad 1:00:46
Yes. Okay. That would be that would be very interesting to see. So ultimately, we're in a position now where everything is in, everything's on the table. And nothing is sort of like there's no way to sort of sense what will happen and what could happen where it is that ultimately what what we're looking at, we just have to wait and see, or is there anything that we can do? Are there any predictions that we can make?
Pardis 1:01:11
I think that, you know, predictions with Iran are always are always tricky, should be watched and want me to have a crystal ball. And I say with one of the things I've learned with Iran is to not do that. But what I can say is we don't have to just sit and wait silently, I think we can continue to do things like we're doing right now is having the conversation, elevating the visibility, making sure that the international community continues to have this attention. And then sharing strategies. I mean, what you just talked about in terms of that campaign that had military defect, I hadn't heard that before. I think sharing strategies like that, these are all ways that we can continue to build up, keep the momentum going, and build towards change.
Brad 1:01:52
Excellent. So I'm mindful of your time, so I don't want to, to keep you longer than than we need to. By convention, at the end of the interview, we always invite the guests to leave us with their thoughts and just plant plant a seed in the minds of the listeners, something that they can walk away contemplating and meditating on. So I'd like to invite you to share anything you'd like our listeners to mull over as the day goes on.
Pardis 1:02:22
Well, thank you for that invitation. I guess I what I would want to invite our listeners to think about is, you know, what kind of a situation must people be facing to be willing to die for their cause? And how can we help them? How can those of us who are not facing those same challenges on not just a daily but on an hourly basis? What is it that we can do to support them, and to bring about meaningful and lasting social change that is rooted in justice, and human rights for all.
Host 1:03:08
Many of you know that in addition to running the insight, Myanmar podcast platform, we also formed a nonprofit, better Burma to respond to the terror that the Burmese military has been inflicting on the country and its people. We encourage listeners to check out our blog to see what work better Burma has been carrying out, along with the upcoming projects we hope to support. Right now, as I'm sure you all know, and today's interview only reinforced that the ongoing need is overwhelming. A donation of any amount goes towards those vulnerable communities who need to post and it will be so greatly appreciated. If you would like to join in our mission to support those in Myanmar who are being impacted by the military coup, we welcome your contribution in any form, currency or transfer method. Your donation will go on to support a wide range of humanitarian and media missions, aiding those local communities who need to post donations are directed to such causes as the Civil Disobedience movement CDM families of deceased victims, internally displaced person IDP camps, food for impoverished communities, military defection campaigns, undercover journalists, refugee camps, monasteries and nunneries education initiatives, the purchasing of protective equipment and medical supplies COVID relief and more. We also make sure that our donation Fund supports a diverse range of religious and ethnic groups across the country. We invite you to visit our website to learn more about past projects as well as upcoming needs. You can give a general donation or earmark your contribution to a specific activity or project you would like to support. Perhaps even something you heard about in this very episode. All of this humanitarian work is carried out by our nonprofit mission better Burma. And the donation you give on our insight Myanmar website is directed towards this fun. Alternatively, you can also visit the better Burma website better burma.org and donate directly there. In either case, your donation goes to the same cause in both websites except credit card. You can also give via PayPal by going to paypal.me/better Burma. Additionally, we can take donations through Patreon Venmo, GoFundMe and Cash App. Simply search better Burma on each platform and you'll find our account. You can also visit either website for specific links to these respective accounts or email us at info at better burma.org. That's better Burma. One word, spelled b e t t e r b u r m a.org. If you'd like to give it another way, please contact us. We also invite you to check out our range of handicrafts that are sourced from vulnerable artists and communities across Myanmar, available at a local crafts.com. Any purchase will not only support these artists and communities, but also our nonprofits wider mission. That's a local crafts, spelled ALOKCRA FTS one word a local crafts.com Thank you so much for your kind consideration and support
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