For all the legitimate concerns about privacy loss, the spread of misinformation and the like, one thing mass global access to the internet has done is made it ever harder for oppressive regimes to keep things under wraps.
Whereas once the Iranian government could have strived to keep images of widespread popular protests out of view and carry on as usual, nowadays even trying to block internet access hasn’t stopped the whole world from watching everyday Iranians from young to old, Sunni and Shiite, Kurds and Persians, take to the streets in anger. Every American who purports to revere freedom should cheer them on.
The spark was the shocking death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who perished in murky circumstances last week at the hands of the fearsome morality police — who enforce the regime’s strict codes of oppression masquerading as a concern for decency. Even Amini’s surviving family remains unsure of what she is accused of doing and how she met her end, beyond the fact that she fell into a coma after sustaining injuries consistent with a beating.
