We Are All Iranian

The last week has given us video of spectacularly brave protests and utterly gruesome killings. Watching these videos brings out many different emotions, with the two most predominant being anger and pride. The anger goes toward the authoritarian regime, and pride to fellow freedom lovers.
Nothing will bring fire to my heart faster than people using their power to brutally oppress people they disagree with. There is no more of a cowardly act than to send goon squads into student’s dorms, citizen’s homes, and hospitals to silence critics and protesters. How poor of a philosophy must you have if you need to arrest (i.e. kidnap) top political figures of the opposition? If it comes to the point where the regime needs to silence opponents and cannot defeat them in the arena of ideas/philosophy, then public trust is lost and there is no going back. The only way forward is either a stricter authoritarian rule, or revolution.
The videos of student protesters, like “Neda,” being shot and dying before your eyes does not only pull at the heartstrings, it completely rips them out. It brings the world to tears. I cannot help but to put myself in their shoes. Would I be courageous enough to stand against a brutal regime? Would I be out in the streets knowing that my life could end with the pull of a trigger or a baton to the head? These are questions that I pray I will never have to answer, but these are the realities of millions of Iranians today. To see so many of them answer those questions in the affirmative and on the side of freedom, it fills my heart with hope. Hope for Iran, hope for the region, and hope for the world.
The sense of pride comes from the feeling that we are all brothers and sisters, because essentially we are all the same. We have the same inalienable rights. We all yearn for peace and happiness. We all have the same emotions and feelings. The human body is essentially the same, with some slight variances of color and features. We may speak different languages, but we are saying the same words. That is why when we see people who have limited freedoms fighting for true freedom, we get behind them. We don’t back them because it is politically advantageous, but because we genuinely care about the plight of others. Those of us whose freedoms are guaranteed know how great it is to be free, and wish that everyone could share in it. The freedom of the people of the world is directly proportional to its greatness.
The majority of the world has had its freedoms challenged in some way. It comes in the form of cruel dictators and terrorists among others. Today, the Iranians have seen their freedoms and rights snatched away and are now willing to fight for them. On 9/11 America had its freedoms challenged, and we went to protect them. The people of Iran responded by holding a candlelight vigil for the Americans that were killed in the attacks. And just as Iranians and the whole world considered themselves Americans on 9/11, today we are all Iranian.