The conventional wisdom in the United States seemed to be that elections in Iran weren't all that important. Boy were we wrong. The reasoning went as follows: since the elected officials of Iran don't hold ultimate power, nobody really cares much either way who is in charge. It is all for show and the sheepish Iranians will eat what's put on their plates.

But Iranians aren't sheepish (remember that revolution they had a few years back?), and though they enjoy a limited amount of political freedom, it turns out to be a freedom they hold dearly. This shouldn't come as a total surprise to westerners; for years writers having been trying to wake us up to the fact that Iran is not a mere caricature of extremism, but a complex and nuanced society. One doesn't write books with titles like "Reading Lolita in Tehran" for no reason.

If you assumed that Iranians would take this election and it's irregularities with a shrug of indifference, don't feel bad, it seems that Iran's ruling class felt the exact same way, and there's the rub. It's one thing for a bunch of foreigners to underestimate you, but when your own government holds you in such low regard as to run an election that, at the very least, seems highly suspect, well, that's another thing entirely.

Thousands of Iranians have taken to the streets over the past few days to protest the election. The eventual outcome is still uncertain, but one thing is for sure: the Iranian voter is not to be trifled with. 
 

Photo:  Magnus Manske. This file is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 License.