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Today in Focus

Iran’s protest generation on why they won’t be silenced

Today in Focus

The Guardian

Daily News, News

4.65.9K Ratings

🗓️ 10 November 2022

⏱️ 30 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

There have been arrests, violence and a rising death toll during more than seven weeks of protests in Iran. Demonstrators across the country – many of whom are students or even schoolchildren – are refusing to back down. What do they want and why are they willing to risk everything to get it?. Help support our independent journalism at theguardian.com/infocus

Transcript

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0:00.0

This is the Guardian.

0:02.0

Today, the voices of Iran's protesters on what they really want.

0:12.0

This voice belongs to an Iranian student. We're going to call Nergis.

0:38.0

The song's called My Orange. It's about a longing for something that feels just out of reach.

0:50.0

Up until a few months ago, Nergis's life was a lot like those of other young Iranians.

0:56.0

She studied at university, she worked a job, she sang, and she lived with a sense of dread

1:02.0

about the things happening in the society around her.

1:06.0

My only happiness was to be able to work and earn for myself.

1:12.0

My real feeling was that I would wake up early in the morning and eat breakfast and prepare for the new day.

1:20.0

And of course, I would hear worse news every day.

1:24.0

She also wrote her motorcycle, not an entirely relaxing hobby.

1:32.0

Women in Iran can't get a license for motorcycles and the country's religious leaders have repeatedly said women shouldn't ride them.

1:38.0

But Nergis doesn't care.

1:40.0

I love riding motorcycles, but every day I leave the house with a stress because I might get cut.

1:48.0

These kinds of routine restrictions on what she could do as a woman had chaffed on Nergis her whole life.

1:54.0

At university, she had done some protesting, but nothing like what she's done these past two months.

2:00.0

Months that have transformed her life that started with the death of another young woman.

2:10.0

Her name was Masa Amini.

2:12.0

On the 16th of September this year, Masa died in the custody of Iran's morality police.

2:26.0

A unit of the Iranian government that dictates what women can wear in public.

2:30.0

And those women are mostly young, like Masa or Nergis.

2:36.0

And since that moment, Nergis has been in the streets.

...

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