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Welcome to the Quillette podcast, hosted on alternate weeks by me, Jonathan Kay, and by Iona Italia.

Quillette is where Freethought lives. We are an independent grassroots platform for heterodox

ideas and fearless commentary. You are about to hear a free preview of this week's episode.

To hear the full episode, and to get access to all our podcasts and

articles, visit us at quillette.com and click the subscribe button.

I'm your host today, Iona Italia. My guest today is the writer, academic, and journalist

Roya Hakakian. Roya is the author of three books.

Her second book, Assassins of the Turquoise Palace, 2011,

is an account of the murders of three Kurdish-Iranian activists in Berlin and its aftermath.

Her third book, A Beginner's Guide to America for the Immigrant and the Curious,

is a love letter to her adoptive nation. In addition to her books, Roya has produced an

extensive body of writing that ranges from investigative journalism to Persian language poetry.

She has also a founder member of the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center. She has written

several articles for Quillette and has previously appeared on our podcast to talk to my colleague

...