Ever since demonstrations erupted across Iran, schoolgirls have been at the forefront of growing outrage. They’ve been protesting in their schools and the streets, chanting “Woman, Life, Freedom,” and removing, waving, and burning their head coverings.
That girls and young women would form the kernel of dissent makes sense, of course. After all, what set everything off in the first place was the death of 22-year-old Mahsa (Jina) Amini on September 16, following her arrest on a headscarf “violation” by the ludicrously named and bitterly detested “morality police.”
Crowds have grown over the past weeks, as have their grievances – and the dangers people face.
Nika Shakarami was 16 when she burned her headscarf at a Tehran protest. She was last seen alive on September 20 being followed by security forces.
The government claims she fell from a building, the same fate of another protester, Sarina Esmailzadeh, also 16, who allegedly fell to her death in Karaj, west of the capital on September 24.
According to media reports, both families were pressured not to contradict the official story.
As of October 11, the Iran-based Society to Support Children claims that 28 children have been killed during the protests, most in Sistan and Baluchistan provinces. Nine children have been named by rights groups and media outlets as having been killed by security forces.
The deadly repression appears to have only fueled further outrage, and again among the younger population in particular.
Videos circulated on social media show that in Saqez, the home of Mahsa Amini, scores of schoolgirls marched through the streets in protest. Girls in Karaj crowded a man – evidently an official – out of their school gate, chanting “Dishonorable.”
Rather than be afraid of these schoolgirls, rather than arrest them and kill them, the Iranian authorities should instead admire their bravery – like everyone else in the world is doing – and, above all, listen to them.