-OpEd-
The revolutionary uprising of Iranians against the clerical regime of the Islamic Republic did not end with the last days of 2022.
Two of the movement’s defining traits have been its nature and essence, as shown in protesters’ slogans and initiatives, as well as the support of the international community — something the world, watching protesters’ courage and resilience, couldn’t refuse.
But one of the demands made by the Iranian defenders of democracy still hasn’t received meaningful support from Western governments: their call to investigate the residency rights given to families of Islamic Republic officials in Western countries.
Some Democratic and Republican legislators in the U.S. have echoed this call. Taking action on this would confront not just the regime in general, but the individuals who make it work, by sanctioning their loved ones. These loved ones belong to parents and families who have no qualms about shooting and hanging the beloved children, spouses and parents of other Iranians, all in a bid to hold onto power at all costs.
This initiative could become a precedent not just for Islamic Iran, but for other dictatorial countries — sending a message that those who kill and maim cannot expect to find refuge or protect their families in a democratic country. The more these figures in the regime pressure Iranians today, the more pressures they will face in time, both in Iran and abroad.
The Iran revolt is built on unity
The other point of historical significance is the revolt’s essential gravitation toward unity. Those who focus on identity politics and insist on dividing societies based on sectoral, political, gender or social demands — or into antagonistic groups — and whose divisiveness has even begun to shake Western societies, have been extending their zeal for labels to the Iranian revolt.
They forget that in open and democratic societies, sectoral demands are either already met or will be met, through the legal guarantees given to individuals as citizens. Human societies naturally tend toward unity, or at least convergence, and that is certainly the case with Iran, whose society needn’t be divided into men and women, Kurds, Azeris and Persians, or religious and secular. Labels harm the social unity that ultimately serves every member of society.
The Islamic Republic loves its labels — the better to divide and rule.
That makes this revolt also a rejection of state-sponsored segmentation and separatism. So while the revolution of 1979 fomented disunity and was left unfinished and untenable, the results of the revolution of 2022, will, like the fruits of the Enlightenment, prove lasting and irreversible.
