Staff Reports
In a world where sensational headlines and clickbait seem to drive the news cycle, one can’t help but notice a glaring oversight in mainstream media coverage. While they seem to have an insatiable appetite for certain domestic stories, they are conspicuously silent when it comes to the atrocities being perpetrated in Iran. This radio silence seems paradoxical given the gravity and sheer scale of the crisis unfolding in the Middle East. The Iranian regime, a theocratic authoritarian nightmare since 1979, is currently squashing uprisings with brutal sadism, using its infamous Revolutionary Guard as the enforcers of its despotic will.
What makes the current protests in Iran particularly noteworthy is their unprecedented scale. Tens of thousands, perhaps over 50,000, citizens have been ruthlessly massacred in recent weeks. It’s a staggering number, but you wouldn’t know it from the lack of coverage in Western media. This indifference stands in stark contrast to the media frenzy that occurs whenever a noteworthy incident happens within American borders—a disparity in coverage that should have us questioning the media’s motives.
The Ayatollah regime, aware of these protests’ potential to attract international sympathy and attention, has strategically cut off the country’s communication lines, including shutting down the internet. This digital blackout is designed to obfuscate the bloodshed from the prying eyes of the world. Unfortunately, many in the West, with their short attention spans, have seemingly obliged, turning a blind eye to the plight of Iranian protestors. It’s almost as if they’re defaulting to the adage of “out of sight, out of mind.”
One cannot ignore the hypocrisy of media outlets that lavishly cover instances of domestic turmoil while neglecting massive human rights violations abroad. When a single incident in Minneapolis garners weeks of in-depth coverage, yet tens of thousands of people being slaughtered in Iran get barely a whisper, it raises the question: how have so many in the West become selectively outraged? Are the lives of Iranians less valuable or compelling to the media consumer? It would seem so, given the current state of coverage.
Indeed, there exists a worldview among some factions of the West that seems predisposed to only critiquing America and its allies. When grotesque crimes occur elsewhere, these same critics are often conspicuously silent, unless they can find a way to somehow point the finger back at the West. It seems almost comical, if it weren’t so tragic, that the Iranian regime’s colonialist and imperialist ambitions go uncommented by those who are otherwise so quick to bombard us with narratives of Western imperialism. In the end, standing up for Iranian voices who seek freedom and autonomy is not just a political or humanitarian duty—it is a moral imperative.
