On the first anniversary of the Green Movement, there is a high level of uncertainty regarding the future which could only be evaluated by going towards the past. By now it is almost self-evident what engined this social transitional force.
The Green Movement is a child of a social transformation in Iran which has started long before the rigged election on June 12th, 2009 and mostly initiated and supported by the young generation to reorient the country towards a modernization process. A metamorphosis from traditions to modernism with all its own unavoidable and irreversible tensions and forces after the country was isolated from the rest of the world for almost thirty years and thus the energy accumulated within. The social transition that naturally does happen through generations now has accelerated and become determined to make up for the past decades of a blocked discourse in an international context, started with a civil society big bang after the election. A kind of movement that the bloody street protests were only one side of its reflection.
When Khatami, known as the architect of the Iranian Reform became the President thirteen years ago, this generation felt a small social and political open space. Reformist newspapers opened, new critical movies were made, even foreign up-to-date movies were shown in some theaters in Tehran, more books translated to Farsi and women could then sit down in street coffeeshops wearing sandals in summer with their naked ankle and occasionally smoke, less coed house parties were attacked by the moral police and the list goes on. Iran started to look like what-media-does-not-show.
Khatami also founded an organization called “The Center for Dialogue of Civilizations” which held seminars, classes, workshops, invited speakers and scholars from all across the world creating openings to communicate with the outside in quite an official way. Many young Iranians again thrived and participated in those events.
Additionally, Khatami encouraged civil society NGOs aiming to raise awareness with regards to different social and legal issues, such as women’s rights, minor execution, stoning, capital punishment, etc..
As a result, the new generation’s expectations started to set higher during Khatami’s era who although not fulfilled many of its promises, had a big role in shaping people’s standards and ideals about social and political freedom.
This also aroused a new wave of energetic journalists and civil society activists who got trained and employed in the newly merged reformist newspapers.
Although this generation gradually started to get forced to leave the country after Khatami left the office and due to the high level of repression institutionalized right after Ahmadinejad became the President, yet they became messengers of what actually is going on inside Iran and started to expose and Ahmadinejad’s new policies in critical online newspapers and weblogs.
Moreover, Communism of thoughts and emotions in the virtual world did not only help the uprising after the 2009 election with letting the news out as some might think, but caused it. Way before, when using internet started to become popular among mostly young people some fifteen years back. Through emails, social networking websites and online instant messaging communication was only one click away between the youth inside and outside Iran. Photos, videos and blogs posted online exchanged in real time. Whereas, prior to the internet emergence, Iranians would have to wait until a passenger comes back home for a visit to explain how living outside Iran would feel like.
This also coincided with the same era when many young Iranians left their country mostly educated and deprived of a hope for a prosperous furture both financially and socially, seeking better academic and professional opportunities abroad again using internet to reduce the cost and hassle of applying to mainly top universities abroad. What later said to be “The Brain Drain”. This recent group of immigrants – less than ten years – was somewhat distinct from other Iranian groups in the Diaspora who mostly got out of Iran during and right after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, because of the political reasons or due to war with Iraq in 1981. They kept in touch with the circle of friends and classmates inside the country utilizing all kinds of online tools. And also traveled more frequently back home to visit.
Meanwhile the environment in Iran started to feel more like pre-Reform era as being even more socially unfree while suffering from financial unceratainties in a wealthy oil-driven country dominated by a corrupted and mismanaged economy specially-worsened during Ahmadinejad’s presidency. Again couples could be arrested during their dates in public, women for their insufficient covering or wearing high boots in winter and for a person holding a PhD degree the monthly salary sometimes is not sufficient to cover even a small apartment rent.
Why?
This was the “self-awakening” phase for the generation who reached the “enough is enough” point after the election got stolen and went to the streets to protest even when were beaten and shot.
“We felt like we had nothing to lose, that is why we were so fearless in the streets.” A 33-year-old woman in Tehran says with a Master’s degree in engineering.
A generation who had already seen their parents suffering but staying silent because of the level of repression. Parents, who lost prospect of life for themselves, instead invested and directed most of their time and energy towards their youth so that one day hopefully their children do not live the way they did.
“Awareness and education could throw them a life jacket in an all-time stormed country with no definite future”. That is what they thought to themselves.
Therefore; books and education became a must and a focal point even during the war’s worst days and nights and all other ups and downs of the political, social and economical situation of the country.
At the same time, there were academics and artists who devotedly taught at schools and universities to fight the scientific and social isolation of the country which gave this generation wings with a sense of ambition and confidence, despite of all the governmental deficiencies, obstacles and censorships.
Until during the eventful nights of the televised heated Presidential debates when opponents talked openly about each other’s party financial corruption and cheatings, the most unprecedented incident in the Islamic Republic political space ever.
A blogger wrote in his blog one morning after that “All the candidates won. The ones who really lost are the people of Iran.” These were not the facts that people did not mostly know about, but the very fact that they were told so shamelessly and openly fierced people. Just like a woman seeing her husband cheat on National TV.
The Iranian government created some small openings right before the election for encouraging people to participate on the Election Day, being very confident that those holes will soon be blocked. But the cat was already out of the bag.
People in Iran and living all across the world mobilized all their efforts to vote. It was like Nike’s ad: “Just Do It.”. Just vote to get rid of Ahmadinejad and at least go back to Khatami days, which were not remotely close to being golden, but good enough for people to feel a change and a sense of improvement in their life styles. The vote was for another reformist candidate backed by Khatami after he changed his mind as to re-nominate himself for presidency.
Mousavi was the war-time Prime Minister who had stayed away from politics for the last twenty years, returned to architecture and teaching and became President of the Iranian Academy of Arts. To many he was a choice better than Ahmadinejad for a country that could not get any worse both domestically and also as far as its international image.
Still there is another area of the spectrum not yet under the pro-Green umbrella and neither ready to pick up or adapt to the cultural and social transitions. This is an angle obviously seen after each propaganda-oriented event the Islamic Regime organzies. There is still a mass taking part for many diverse reasons ranging from social and financial bonuses to simply not being able to decipher the Green Movement objectives and suspecting they come from foreign governments and superpowers.
In order to overcome this, the movement has to continue to fundamentally invest into some enlightenment capacity building within all the walks of the society and secure a confirmation that the fundamental party would be still able to maintain its ideological and social life style within its own domain even after change occurs only without having an authoritarian political power.
The fact of the matter is that besides all the dictatorship exercised by the Iranian government to hold its power for the last thirty years, the gravity center of the public collective consciousness had been kept close to the point where the government had been standing. This equilibrium is what had been keeping the government afloat for all these years without facing an internal serious challenge. Now, due to all the transitions, this gravity center is starting to move away from its original point and building a social momentum which is a threat to the current regime.
Future is now held in how much of a distance this gradually moving gravity center moves away to challenge the equilibrium. The farther it gets, the more momentum will be built towards democratization of the system. The more the Green Movement works on its social, cultural and political vectors towards its departure from the concepts already accepted within the regime, the chances are fatter of being able to get a hold of the country’s governance and get rid of its authoritarian power one day as well.
And that covers a very vast area of social activism including advocating women’s, ethnic and minority rights and interests. Increasing transparency and tolerance as to give proportionate social space to each group although being fundamentally different is another determining factor.
During the year passed, this social activism although faced with murder, imprisonment and torture has spread from only certain activist and social campaigners to ordinary people from all walks of life both domestically and globally in an epidemic way. The expression of these demands is what is keeping this movement way above a political reform and takes it to a level where it becomes a matter of common humanity and everybody feels a sense of ownership towards, even non-Iranians.
Last December, 22 Bahman protests in Iran evoked different reactions throughout the diverse spectrum of the Green Movement. Among them, despair, disappointment and wondering what happened to the movement they thought is only on the brink of its victory, some even fearful that it could have died for ever specially among supporters outside the country anticipating to see scenes perceivable through computer monitor screens.
What happened is that the Green Movement supporters did go out to the streets but were faced by a huge and extensive presence of the merciless security guards. Their different paths to the final destination were blocked and every little reaction could end up in being at least arrested.
Since then the movement has become more cautious as far as the type of expense it has to pay for achieving its goals. For any movement, the number of casualties is a determining factor on the amount of total expense paid for its victory and the one which can never be reimbursed. Minimizing this factor raises the efficiency factor of the movement throughout time specially that the movement just had at least seven people killed last December on the bloody Day of Ashura. The one circumstance could be the society getting used to witnessing certain level of violence and bloodshed which is not healthy over a long term and that by its own nature could create a seriously fundamental hurdle towards a democratic and free society.
The fact is that street protests are only one way out of many to fight for civil rights and protest. Whereas, one hundred years ago the only possible way that people could communicate/protest in masses was by going to the street. In many ways and in today’s world the virtual streets and squares of the internet has become a much opener and more public space for people to express their ideas and ask for their demands and also distribute them among the outside world. Although in Iran even that will have very serious circumstances and even faced with designed technical obstacles. As inside-Iranians Google email accounts stopped to function right before the anniversary day of 22 Bahman. But still would cause less bloodshed.
These are the facets that are hard for the media to cover and get a grasp of as it happens at the underlying layers of the society. Still going effective and strong and yet hard to measure.
Street protests, blood and violence are definitely orgasmic moments for the media and for the people getting addicted to them after a while watching them raising expectations up to seeing a reality thriller show but the reality is something else.
The winning card here is that awareness could be paused, but not reversed. And as long as this young generation continues its soul-searching and pushing the boundaries to find a newly defined place in the traditional and religious Iranian society while compliant with international civil and human rights standards this movement shall go on.
