Guest Post from an Iranian
The following guest post was written by a Shtetl-Optimized fan in Iran, who’s choosing to remain anonymous for obvious reasons. I’m in awe of the courage of this individual and the millions of other Iranians who’ve risked or, tragically, sacrificed their lives these past few weeks, to stand for something about as unequivocally good and against something about as unequivocally evil as has ever existed on earth. I’m enraged at the relative indifference of the world, and of the US in particular, to these brave Iranians’ plight. There’s still time for the US to fulfill its promise to the protesters and do the right thing—something that I’ll support even if it endangers my friends and family living in Israel. I check the news from Iran every day, and pray that my friends and colleagues there stay safe—and that they, and the world, will soon be free from the Ayatollahs, who now stand fully unmasked before the world as the murderous thugs they always were. –SA
Guest Post from an Iranian
The protests began in Tehran on 28 December 2025, triggered by economic instability and high inflation, and spread to other provinces. People, tired of the regime and aware that every president is just a puppet with no real power, began targeting the source of authority by chanting directly against Khamenei. After government forces killed several protesters, Trump said on 3 January that if they shoot, then U.S. will come to rescue. Protests continued, and on 6 January, Reza Pahlavi called for demonstrations at 8 PM on January 8 and 9. At first, all the regime supporters mocked this and said nobody will come. On these days, they shared videos of empty streets on the news to claim that nobody had shown up. But actually, many people joined the protests. Right around 8 PM on January 8, the government shut down the internet. Only Iran’s internal network remained active, meaning local apps and websites that use Iranian servers work, but the rest of the world was completely cut off.
The regime fears the internet so much that it has officially announced that anyone using Starlink is considered a spy for foreign countries, especially Mossad, and will be punished. As a result, Starlink owners are extremely cautious and rarely let others know they have it.
I know many students who missed deadlines or interviews because of internet shutdown. Some students were forced to travel near Iran’s borders and use Afghanistan’s or Iraq’s internet just to check their email. I personally missed the deadlines for two universities. Just before the internet shutdown, a professor sent me a problem sheet that was part of the application process, and I could not even inform him about the situation. For the past four years since completing my undergraduate studies, my only dream has been to pursue a PhD. I come from a low-income family, and I did everything in my power to reach this stage. I tried to control every variable that might disrupt my four-year plan. Yet now it seems I have failed, and I face an uncertain future.
At the same time, U.S. sanctions have significantly limited Iranian opportunities to study at universities worldwide. With Trump’s travel ban on all Iranians, along with some European countries following U.S. sanctions by rejecting Iranian applicants solely based on nationality, our options have become limited (for example, see the “Evaluation criteria” section). The recent internet shutdown has worsened the situation and left us with even fewer opportunities. While the regime shuts down our internet and takes away our opportunities, the very people responsible for this suppression are ensuring their own children never face such obstacles (I will return to this at the end of the post).
On January 8, my sister and I participated. We were inside our car when Special Units and Basij thugs shot at civilians on the pedestrian path using a shotgun, exactly two meters away from us. I was so shocked that I could not even respond. My sister pushed my head under the car’s dashboard to prevent me from getting shot. I come from a very small town, and this was the level of suppression we witnessed there. Now imagine the scale of suppression in major cities like Tehran, and suddenly the number of protesters reported killed in the news begin to make sense.
We now see tweets on X that not only deny the killings but openly mock them. Is it really possible to deny the body bags in Kahrizak? If a government shuts down the internet across an entire country for three weeks to prevent information from leaking out, do you believe it when it claims the sky is blue? (Check NetBlocks.org and this on Mastodon.)
After January 8, many of the regime’s puppets, who are funded to spread its propaganda in Western media, began whitewashing events on U.S. and European TV, claiming that nobody was killed or that it was a terrorist attack and the government had to act. Some even claim that the protesters are violent rioters and the government has the right to shoot them with war ammunition. Iranians call these puppets “bloodwashers.”
These bloodwashers forget that since 1979, people have tried every possible way to express their opinions and demands, and all of it was ridiculed by the regime and its supporters. Every attempt was suppressed without even being heard. So how do you think things will turn out? Clearly, people become more aggressive in each wave of protests, a pattern you can see in every uprising since 2009. This is also accompanied by worsening poverty. Ordinary people suffer from hunger because some radicals refuse to talk with the U.S., while regime supporters enjoy unlimited access to money and privileges.
Out of the four presidential elections held after 2009, people elected three presidents who promised to pursue a deal with U.S, the so-called Reformist party. People were desperate for change because they knew their situation could only improve if the regime talks with U.S. Many called the voters naïve, arguing that presidents cannot truly make a difference and lack real power, often saying, “Khamenei would never allow that.” I believe many of the voters knew that deep down. They knew that each time a president speaks about negotiating with the U.S., Khamenei suddenly gathers all his supporters and states “No, I am not okay with talking with the U.S.”. Still, people felt they had no real alternative but elections. After the 2015 Nuclear deal (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action), people thought they can finally live normal lives and have normal relations with other countries (See how people celebrated the deal on the night it was finalized). At the time, I was even planning to assemble a new PC and thought it might be better to wait and buy parts from Amazon! We didn’t yet know what the IRGC had planned for us over the next ten years. Now, all their actions and stubbornness have led them to this point where they have to surrender completely (the deal Trump is talking about, which essentially takes away everything that makes Islamic Republic the Islamic Republic), or force another war on our people, and then surrender disgracefully. People are now saying that “Come on, the U.S. you wanted to destroy so badly has come. Take all your supporters and go fight it. Or perhaps you are only brave against ordinary unarmed people” This was an inevitable outcome after October 7 attacks, that their time will come one day, but they still did not want to listen. I often see debates about whether U.S. involvement in other countries is good or whether it should isolate itself as it is not its people’s business. I believe decisions regarding Iran were made weeks ago, and we now have no choice but to wait and see what happens. I just hope that the situation turns out better for the people.
As I mentioned earlier, Islamic regime officials chant “death to the U.S. and the West,” yet they send their children to Western countries. These children use funds and opportunities that could have gone to far more deserving people, while living comfortably and anonymously in the very societies their parents want to destroy.
They flee the country their parents made and climb the social ladder of western societies, while ordinary students cannot even afford a simple TOEFL exam and survive on as little as five dollars a month.
When ordinary Iranian students apply for visas, especially for the U.S. and Canada, they are forced to provide every detail of their lives to prove they are not terrorists and that they will return to Iran. Sometimes, they may have to explain to the embassy officer the topics of their professors’ papers, the health condition of their father, and whether they own houses, which the last two indirectly indicate whether they will return or not. If they are lucky enough not to be rejected within ten minutes, they may enter a clearance process that takes at least a year. Only then might they receive a visa. But how is it that when it comes to the children of regime’s officials, they freely enter and live there without issue.
There are countless examples. Mohammad Reza Aref, a Stanford graduate and current Vice President who has repeatedly worn IRGC uniforms in public support, has sons who earned PhDs from EPFL and the University of Florida, and one publicly attributed this success to “good genes”. Ali Larijani, an IRGC officer, had a daughter working at Emory University until last week. Masoumeh Ebtekar, who climbed the wall of the U.S. Embassy during the 1979 Islamic Revolution, has a son, Eissa Hashemi, who is an adjunct faculty member at The Chicago School of Professional Psychology.
Many Iranians are now actively raising awareness through petitions and protests at these individuals’ workplaces. One example is the petition regarding Eissa Hashemi. Protests at Emory University have reportedly led to Fatemeh Larijani’s recent unemployment. (Larijani family hold critical roles in the regime, and in fact, many members of the family have studied or currently live in Western countries. There is even a saying that while people were forced to fight the U.S., the Larijanis were filling out university application forms.)
When these individuals occupy seats in your labs or use your tax-funded resources, it directly affects the integrity of your institutions and the opportunities available to those who actually share your values. You do not even need to spend time investigating these people yourself. Iranians will protest outside offices or send emails about your colleagues with this condition. All I ask is that the next time you receive multiple emails about a particular Iranian colleague, or hear about protests near your workplace, you spend just five minutes considering what is being said.
Thank you to everyone who took the time to read this. I know it is long, and I know it is heavy. I wrote it because silence and denial only help suppression survive, and because attention, however brief, matters.
I hope that better and freer days come.
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