Tangle - The protests in Iran, explained.

Episode Date: October 12, 2022

We're covering the protests in Iran and what they mean for Iranians and the U.S. Plus, a question about how the Tangle team goes to work every morning.You can read today's podcast here, today’s “Under the Radar” story here, and today’s “Have a nice day” story here.Today’s clickables: Quick hits (00:58), Today’s story (2:04), Right’s take (9:47), Left’s take (6:43), takes from Iran (13:07) Isaac’s take (16:16), Listener question (20:20), Under the Radar (23:23), Numbers (24:12), Have a nice day (24:50)You can subscribe to Tangle by clicking here or drop something in our tip jar by clicking here.Our podcast is written by Isaac Saul and produced by Trevor Eichhorn. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75.Our newsletter is edited by Bailey Saul, Sean Brady, Ari Weitzman, and produced in conjunction with Tangle’s social media manager Magdalena Bokowa, who also created our logo.--- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tanglenews/message Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. Twas the season of chaos, and all through the house, not one person was stressing. Holla differently this year with DoorDash.

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It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages 6 months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at flucellvax.ca. From executive producer Isaac Saul, this is Tangle. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening, and welcome to the Tangle Podcast, the place where you get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking without all that hysterical nonsense you find everywhere else. I'm your host, Isaac Saul, and on today's episode, we are going to be talking about Iran and some of the protests there, what's been happening, what it means for the U.S., some thoughts from Iranians around the world who are writing about this. It's a pretty interesting moment. Before we jump in, though,

as always, we'll start off with some quick hits. First up, President Biden said he plans to re-evaluate the United States' relationship with Saudi Arabia after OPEC's oil production cuts. Number two, John Fetterman, the Democrat, gave his first sit-down one-on-one television interview since suffering a stroke in May. The Pennsylvania Senate candidate used closed captioning during the interview to respond to oral questions. Number three, President Biden called on Nury Martinez, the Democrat, and other Los Angeles City Council members to resign after leaked audio of a year-old conversation, which included racist remarks, were made public this week. Number four, separately in an interview with CNN's Jake Tapper,

Biden said that he did not think Russia would use nuclear weapons in Ukraine. He also said he would make a final decision about running in 2024 after the midterms. Number five, the Labor Department proposed a new rule that will make it more difficult for companies like DoorDash and Uber to classify workers as independent contractors. We want to turn back overseas to Iran, where anti-government protests are now targeting the lifeblood of Iran's economy. That's oil and gas production. In the middle of Tehran, schoolgirls chant, death to Khamenei, the supreme leader of the Republic of Iran.

The Iranian state broadcaster's evening news was suddenly interrupted. Hackers managed to air an image of Iran's supreme leader with a target on his head, along with messages of join us and rise up. The protests now in their fourth week were sparked by the death of 22-year-old Masa Amini in police custody. For the last three weeks, spontaneous protests in Iran have led to chaotic scenes across the country, including deadly clashes between civilians and police, rioting, and attempts by the Iranian government to suppress the resulting outrage. On Monday, social media posts showed workers at two major oil refineries taking part in strikes, a significant escalation of the anti-government demonstrations right in the

heart of Iran's critical oil industry. So, what started it all? Well, in mid-September, a 22-year-old woman named Masa Amini died after being detained by Iran's morality police. Since the election of hardline president Ebrahim Raisi last year, Iran's morality patrols have been more aggressive in the streets, often manhandling young women over their clothes or because they left the house without a mandatory headscarf known as a hijab. Amini, an Iranian Kurdish woman, was detained by those forces and then died in their custody. Iran's government insists she wasn't abused, and state television aired footage of her collapsing at a police station and receiving care.

However, despite Tehran equipping police officers with body cameras five years ago, no footage of her arrest or transportation has emerged. That, paired with the official's insistence on a quick burial, led to an outburst of anti-government anger that began in her hometown. Protests began at Amini's burial site but have since spread across the country and are being described as, quote, spontaneous and leaderless by many news organizations. Largely fueled by Iran's upper and middle class, the protests have been led primarily by university students. So, what's happening now? Well, it's hard to say for sure. On September 24th, state television in

Iran reported that 41 people had been killed in the clashes. That quote-unquote official number has not been updated since. Iran Human Rights estimates that the number is at least 185. Authorities have arrested at least 1,900 people, according to the Associated Press, including 35 reporters and photographers since the demonstration began on September 17th. Iranian authorities deny they have killed anyone and say rioters have killed at least 20 members of the security forces. As they've done in the past, especially among the 10 million Kurds who live in Iran, the Iranian government is attempting to stem the unrest by shutting down the internet, cracking down on protests, and arresting anyone who refuses to comply. Even in normal times, it can be hard to decipher what is happening in Iran, a country of

80 million people. But it's even more difficult now. Most of the images from Iran are coming in seconds-long video clips activists upload to the internet. Since the Islamic Revolution of 1979, demonstrations in Iran have become much more common, including massive student protests in 1999 and economic protests in 2017 and 2018. In 2019, protests broke out when the government eliminated subsidies on gasoline. This time, though, Iranian hardliners control every lever of government, meaning protesters are focused solely on the governing faction. Today, we're going to look at some opinions from the left and the right here in the States,

as well as some thoughts from Iranian writers. First up, we'll start with what the left is saying. The New York Times editorial board wrote about how the U.S. can help support Iranian women who are calling for change. calling for change. The protests since Missamini's death, led by women, have persisted for weeks and have brought Iranians in dozens of cities into the streets to reveal the depth of their anger. Iranians who are sick and tired of living under a tyrannical theocracy deserve the support of the United States and its allies, the board said. Ayatollah Khomeini is 83 and ailing, and he is among the last of the Islamic revolutionaries who overthrew the monarchy. His passing, however, could be no guarantee of a more liberal regime in Tehran. As Karim Sajapur of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace wrote in a recent essay in the Times,

his cohort of true believers have been largely supplanted by opportunists in search of wealth and privilege. Global isolation may be damaging to the regime, but global integration would be dangerous. The moral case is not solely the outrageous behavior of the clerical regime. It is also the fact that so much of the economic suffering of the Iranian people, rents that have been multiplied, goods that have become prohibitively expensive, a currency that has plummeted so low that Iranians need stacks of bills to do everyday shopping, is the result of waves of American sanctions, it added. The U.S. needs to maintain its efforts to prevent Iran from obtaining

nuclear weapons, and this board supports continuing diplomatic efforts that could curtail Iran's nuclear weapons program and open the door for future agreements. But some of the current sanctions have gone too far and fallen mostly on the very activists that the United States would like to help. In the Los Angeles Times, Alex Shams said this protest was different. The protests are unprecedented in scale and unity. Iranians from different ethnic and regional backgrounds, non-religious and religious alike, have taken part, defying government threats that rebellion could lead to chaos, Shams wrote, and they differ dramatically from past protests that have shaken the country's leadership. Authorities have tried to crush the demonstrations rebellion could lead to chaos, Shams wrote, and they differ dramatically from past protests that have shaken the country's leadership. Authorities have tried to crush the demonstrations with

batons, tear gas, and bullets. Dozens and possibly more have been killed and many more arrested, but the movement continues. Small groups of protesters move from place to place, erecting temporary barricades, yelling out death to the dictator, and throwing rocks at cops who try to stop them. Students at many universities have gone on strike, holding sit-ins and walkouts that have been violently dispersed, Sham said. Acts of civil disobedience have even spread to high schools, where thousands of girls have defiantly pulled off their mandatory veils and shouted down administrators trying to stop them, Sham said. Iranians are deciding their own fate, but it is crucial that the international community support them, including by lifting sanctions that have had a corrosive effect on Iranian civil society. The Biden administration wisely relaxed U.S.

sanctions that blocked Iranians' access to communication tools. He must continue to do more in that direction, including easing visa, financial, and educational interchange restrictions that limit Iranians' access to the outside world. Alright, that is it for what the left is saying, which brings us to what the right is saying. In the Washington Examiner, Michael Rubin said the protests have exposed the purported reformists who court the West for approval. Many in the West embraced the idea that regime reformists truly wanted a more progressive future. Think tank analysts and academics attended track two dialogues, never questioning whether those with whom they talked

had real power or were sincere. Journalists traveling to Iran amplified the voices of those who sought a change in regime style, not its substance. It was a quid pro quo for access. Whether out of naivete, ideology, or ambition, many diplomats embraced the notion that reformism was real. This was the case a decade ago when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's aide Jake Sullivan began secret dialogue with Iranian officials in Oman. His logic? Rewarding reformists might tip the balance of Iranian power in their direction. In reality, it did the opposite. Reformism always represented a cynical good cop to the leader and Islamic Revolutionary Guard corpse bad cop, he wrote. Now, as regime thugs

murder young women in the street and execute protesters behind bars, what is noticeable is what has not happened. None of the reformist diplomats who for so long cultivated Western scholars, officials, or journalists have defected or denounced the regime's actions. Perhaps it would be too much to expect from some trapped in Tehran, but those serving in Paris, London, or New York have no excuse. If they resign their commission in protest, they could seek political asylum and become a voice for change. In reality, however, their silence and inaction are telling. When push comes to shove, the reformists always supported the Iranian theocracy and were willing to excuse its worst excesses. In National Review, Bobby

Miller said Biden must not squander his Iran moment. This grassroots uprising is reminiscent of the 2009 Green Revolution that was doomed by the Obama administration's strategic silence. Ben-Om-Ben Tellebleu is urging the Biden administration not to make the same mistake, Miller said. A senior fellow and Iranian security and political expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Tellebleu said in an interview with National Review that he hopes the Biden administration avoids squandering an opportunity as its Democratic predecessors did. There are concrete steps the U.S. can take to assist in the protesters' valiant struggle against dystopian theocracy. First, exit the Iranian nuclear deal. Tellebleu believes that resurrecting the Iran nuclear agreement with a regime that is hell-bent on

our demise would be a bigger moral, strategic, and political mistake than ever before, he added. So long as you're entertaining a deal that would ultimately fund the domestic repression we're seeing, you're working backward, not forward, he said. Second, financially punishing the Iranian regime, Miller said. Tellebleu believes that the Biden administration should vigorously enforce the sanctions it inherited. Finally, provide technological help to those protesting the regime. Telugu's preferred method affecting change on the ground from 340 miles above. Elon Musk's extension of Starlink's satellite internet service to Iran to try to counter the

regime's internet blackout is a start, but the Biden administration needs to enable Iranians to connect to the satellite-based network by providing the necessary equipment so they can actually use the uncensored and encrypted broadband. All right, that is it for the lesson the writer sang, which brings us to some comments from Iranians. In Newsweek, Ari Honarvar, the founder of Rumi with a View, said she hopes Americans see the dangers of theocracy. In the aftermath of the Roe v. Wade reversal, I argued that we in the U.S. need to pay attention to the history of women's rights in Iran. With this ruling, religiosity has crept further into the U.S. government and

is threatening to continue stripping women and minorities of their rights, as happened when theocracy came to Iran, she said. But the coverage of the Iranian uprising in the American media has been relatively muted, and there has been a general lack of support from U.S.-based women's rights groups. Out of a dozen prominent feminist groups I've looked at, only a few have even tweeted to express their support for this remarkable feminist movement. I understand that compassion fatigue is real and so much is competing for our attention, but as someone who directly experienced how quickly a society can slide into crushing theocratic rule, I am concerned that many Americans are failing to grasp how our own political trajectory is pointing more closely to that of Iran, she said. The anemic coverage of

these extraordinary acts of bravery tends to mischaracterize what is happening as a leaderless movement. This is perhaps tied to the outdated idea that change requires a single leader. In Iran, communities of young women and their supporters are leading the protests, strikes, and acts of civil disobedience. It might be hard for Americans to relate to the level of repression experienced by Iranian activists. We still have so much more agency than they do. But the U.S. majority who supports a women's right to choose must fight against a religious takeover of the government. In Australian Broadcasting Corporation, former professor Saba Vesefi, who fled Iran in 2010 during a previous protest, wrote about what it's like to be in the spotlight.

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Learn more at FluCellVax.ca. I can't forget the teenage dissidents who chose to end their life rather than buckle beneath the jackboot of the regime, Viseffi said. I can't forget the voices of my students and the classmates that scar the land like shrapnel. I can't forget the sound of kissing was banned, how love, happiness, and dancing were forbidden. Each memory slams into me with physical pain. happiness and dancing were forbidden. Each memory slams into me with physical pain. Worse still, these crimes are being repeated, re-traumatizing Iran and the Iranian diaspora. Many Iranians see no future under the regime except the possibility of more surveillance, disadvantage, discrimination, and poverty. Systems of exclusion have destroyed any sense of belonging, and many believe rebellion

is the only way to get recognition as human beings in a system that has lost the trust of religious as well as secular people in Iran. With a heart full of thrill and hope, we participated in the protests, and in each defeat, it looked like it had atrophied and in our veins only silence ran. That's why I think hope is political, she said. Often the unknown frightens us, but for Iranian people, state violence is infused in their daily life and is not an unfamiliar component. Their courage is the antidote to the dreadful desperation to survive. Many people have come to realize that for more than 43 years, they have been living on death row, on a gradual death, where the imagination of any prosperity and freedom was impossible. All right, that is it for the left and the

right's take and some opinions from Iran, which brings us to my take. Power to the protesters, man. I mean, I am often blown away by the bravery of demonstrators in other countries, especially in places where the government has so much unchecked power. In the last few years, we've seen uprisings like this in Hong Kong and Colombia and Iraq and Kazakhstan and Venezuela and Belarus and even public anti-war movements in Russia. These protests, though, they strike a different chord. And I think that's partly because they're easier to understand through our Western lens. The core of it isn't about some nuanced nationalistic beliefs or gas prices or some kind of governmental change that has enraged citizens. It's about freedom.

It's about an Iranian population who doesn't want their every action to be policed, especially not by a government who has failed to provide them with even the most basic living standards. The contours of the story, that police arrested a woman for her choice of clothing and then she mysteriously died in their custody, are offensive and terrifying to anyone who has lived in a free society. Some stories are powerful in their simplicity, and I think this story is one of them. In a country that is so dysfunctional at the top, led by religious hardliners

whose views do not align with huge segments of the population and who demand obedience from the population not by earning their love and trust but with batons and guns and isolations, change should take place. And so, for the protesters' sake, I hope they can imagine their energy and see results. I hope they can feel the support from global citizens like me who are watching. When it comes to what we should do here in the U.S., and this is an American-centric newsletter after all, the issue is a bit more complicated. Iranian civil rights activists like Nagaseh Mohammadi have called on the United States to make democracy and human rights a priority in any diplomatic negotiations with Iran about sanctions or nuclear programs. I think this call should be heeded.

One of the refrains from conflict-weary Americans is that we should avoid the politics of regime change and that it has to be up to the people who live in a country to determine their own leaders, even in places like Russia and Iran. I agree with this refrain, and here we have a group of citizens risking their lives to do just that. The state of play is odd, of course. On the one hand, every branch of Iran's government has coalesced around the most repressive leaders. On the other hand, the democratic movement Mohammadi has long said she wanted is as strong as ever because decades of empowerment of women through education and outreach to communities to modernize Iran have begun to succeed.

Hence, the clashes we see now. Mohammadi's argument is, in part, to relieve Iran of Western sanctions. She's made the case that these sanctions weaken Iran's middle class more than they weaken the regime, because they give the regime more power and more ammunition to point the finger at the West. Rather than isolate Iran with travel bans or do everything possible to grind its economy to a halt, Mohammadi argues we should engage Iran's civil society, do what we can to connect to it, and try our best to keep it connected to us, including by supplying internet connections.

Meanwhile, we'd allow the middle class to function without the handicap of sanctions. I think these are all strong points, and the potential upside is huge. Isolating Iranians and leaving them to suffer from the one-two punch of our sanctions and their own repressive regime seems the definition of counterproductive. Regardless of the currently defunct nuclear negotiations, the least we could do for the people in Iran is allow money to flow through the country and make it clear we support their fight for freedom after all. Ending some of our sanctions satisfies both many Americans' desire to remove ourselves from every global conflict and our common desire

to see global citizens benefit from increased freedom and rights. It's not as much about our support in terms of financial or military aid, more so removing our own thumbs from the scale and stating plainly that we side with the protesters in the streets. If our government just stays the course, it's unlikely that the protesters stand a chance. just stays the course, it's unlikely that the protesters stand a chance. All right, that is it for my take, which brings us to your questions answered. This one's from Chloe in Kansas. Chloe asked, how is your team involved in the process of writing the newsletter? What are you handling yourself and what gets delegated? This is a great question. So on normal days for the typical Monday through Thursday newsletter and podcast, I actually write the entire first draft

of the whole thing myself. Obviously, this takes a tremendous amount of work, often with a big time crunch. So that first draft isn't always particularly strong, I would say, but it is the basis for the newsletter, with much tinkering to come, and I do pretty much do it alone. Usually I let the team know a day or two before the newsletter goes out what topic we'll be covering. This gives everyone time to do their own research, send me opinion pieces they think should be included, or suggest potential angles for the piece. Our intern Audrey in particular is responsible for sending five to six pieces she finds every day with explanations of why she thinks they should be included in the piece. Our intern, Audrey, in particular, is responsible for sending five to six pieces she finds every day with explanations of why she thinks they should be included in the newsletter. When the first draft is done, I put it in a Google Doc and share it with the entire team. This is

when a kind of organized chaos begins. Along with Audrey, three editors, Ari, Sean, and Bailey, run through the entire piece with corrections, suggestions, cuts, links to information not included, fact-checking, etc. We debate a lot in the comments section of the Google documents, and our social media manager Magdalena and our social media intern Watkins often participate in this process as well, with everyone sort of trying to pick up every last little error and vouch for their preferred changes. This process typically takes a couple of hours, and as the newsletter comes to a finish, I begin recording the podcast, usually while edits are still happening in real time. Then our podcast editor Trevor listens to my recording of the podcast while reading the

newsletter and sends over any issues with pronunciations or inconsistencies or anything else that kind of just seems wrong. At about 11.30, I send a test version of the newsletter to myself. I read it once all the way through, making final changes to my language or ideas. And this is typically when Sean, who actually works professionally as a proofreader for the Texas State Legislature, gives the newsletter one last run and always seems to find an incredible number of small mistakes the rest of us somehow missed. Then I copy and paste the newsletter into our email provider and hit send. This is often also where our mistakes happen, my last second changes, or a screw-up copying and pasting that can lead to a corrected typo or error being published. There's some occasional variation in all of this. Like, for instance,

sometimes if we're covering a topic really unfamiliar to everyone on staff, we'll invite someone else for content proofing. Or if I'm doing a lot of interviews with experts as part of our background research, I'll ask sources to actually take a look at the newsletter and see if they see any glaring errors or anything like that. But that's the general process. Friday editions are a little different as sometimes a staff member or intern writes something or we spend weeks on a topic,

but they often follow a pretty similar process. All right, that is it for your reader-listener question for the day, which brings us to our under-the-radar section. The death of telephone polling is near, and the impact it is having on what we understand about public opinion is unclear. In a fresh new piece up in the New York Times, resident pollster Nate Cohn talks about how polls are conducted and what can and can't be gleaned from them. In the poll we have in the field right now, Cohn says, only 0.4% of dials have yielded a completed interview. If you were employed as one of our interviewers at a call center, you would have had to dial numbers for two hours to get a single completed interview. You can read the full piece on this polling.

You can read a full piece on the state of polling that's up in the New York Times, and there is a link to it in today's episode description. All right, next up is our numbers section. 27 is the number of days until election day. The estimated number of people who have been killed during protests in Iran is 185, and the number of those who were children is 19. Brian Kemp, the Republican candidate for governor in Georgia's current lead over Stacey Abrams, the Democrat, is 51 to 41 in a most recent poll. Raphael Warnack, the Democrat running for Senate

in Georgia, is currently leading Republican Herschel Walker in the same race, 46 to 43. All right, that is it for our numbers section. Last but not least, our have a nice day story. This is our first, I think our first Have a Nice Day kind of update story. NASA has confirmed that its Double Asteroid Redirection Test, aka DART mission, successfully changed the trajectory of an asteroid it intentionally struck two weeks ago. The mission was carried out by NASA to see if, in the event an asteroid were on a path to strike Earth, the space agency could successfully redirect it away from our planet. All of us have a responsibility to protect our home planet. After all, it's the only one we have, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said.

This mission shows that NASA is trying to be ready for whatever the universe throws at us. NASA has proven that we are serious as a defender of the planet. This is a watershed moment for our planetary defense and all of humanity, demonstrating commitment from NASA's exceptional team and partners from around the world. You can read more about this mission on nasa.com, and there's a link to it in today's episode description. All right, everybody, that is it for the podcast. As always, we'll be right back here same time tomorrow have a good one peace our podcast is written by me isaac saul and edited and produced by trevor eichhorn our script is edited by ari weitzman sean brady and bailey saul shout out to our interns audrey

moorhead and watkins kelly and our social media manager, Magdalena Bokova, who designed our logo. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75. For more from Tangle, subscribe to our newsletter or check out our website at www.readtangle.com. Thanks for watching! follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 cases. Thank you. for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed.

Learn more at flucellvax.ca.