By Jessica Pretorius
For the past five weeks, Iran has been experiencing nationwide protests and violent clashes with police following the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini (her real and Kurdish name is Jina). She was arrested and detained on Friday, 16 September for not complying with Iran’s rules on women’s dress, specifically for wearing her hijab too loosely. She died in a hospital three days later.
Protests broke out across the country soon after demanding justice for Mahsa’s death. However, they quickly morphed into protests about the treatment of women under Iran’s oppressive regime. Women have been seen burning their headscarves and cutting their hair in public, and chanting slogans such as “Women, Life, Freedom.”
Iranian authorities are responding brutally to the protests using shotguns, assault rifles, and handguns against protesters even in peaceful settings. As of Monday 17 October, 233 people have been killed. The government has largely shut down mobile internet, too, in an attempt to not only control the unrest in Iran, but also to shut the country off from the rest of the world.
Decolonising LSE, a collective dedicated to raising awareness of historic violence and encouraging decolonisation, published a statement to Sharif University of Technology in Iran on 3 October. The statement expressed that they were “inspired by the courage and power of the students and academics” and that they “stand with the student movement and progressive forces fighting against state abuses.”
Decolonising LSE also called on “our academic community to amplify and add their voices to those of students, academics, unions, activists, and people who oppose this suppression and demand freedom.” LSE has not yet issued any statement on the ongoing developments in Iran.
The Beaver spoke to Ava*, a British-Iranian student in her third year, who said that she was surprised and also a bit disappointed by the lack of response at LSE, “I’ve only really seen Iranians talking about the protests. Maybe it’s because people feel they cannot or should not form an opinion, but in fact we need non-Iranians to speak out and help us spread the word, particularly when people in Iran are unable to reach the international community.”
*Names in this article were changed to preserve anonymity.
