Mobilizing pity: the dialectics of narrative production and erasure in the case of Iran’s #BlueGirl

ABSTRACT

In this article we present a case analysis of Sahar Khodayari’s transformation into a global injustice icon, the #BlueGirl, after she set herself ablaze outside a courthouse in Tehran, Iran, allegedly in protest against the ban on women entering football stadiums. We focus on the ways in which ‘pity’ was generated, mobilized, and transformed into indignation against the Iranian state by digital activists. Drawing on the literature on the politics of pity, we explore the creation of a global icon, the #BlueGirl, draw attention to the gendered elements of Sahar Khodayari’s iconization, and take a closer look at the mobilization of affect mechanisms set in motion. The article suggests that the politics of pity rests on a chain of erasures that deprive the pitiable other of their agency, history and historicity, and erase the global conditions that contribute to the suffering of the former, thus, localizing responsibility and instituting western moral hierarchies.

KEYWORDS:

• Politics of pity
• iconization
• gender
• mobilization
• feminist activism
• Iran

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments and to acknowledge the editors of Jadaliyya.com for their feedback on a commentary on the death of Sahar Khodayari that appeared on their platform.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 This association of self-immolation to mental illness is not without precedent as the case of Fadoua Laroui in Morocco, whose act was discredited by the state media as ‘the lunacy of a psychopath’ (Pandolfo, 2018, p. 351) or Tibetan self-immolators described as mentally ill, emotionally vulnerable individuals by the opposition (Morrison, 2014) suggest.

2 It is difficult, of course, to know whether Sahar’s father’s statement has been the product of pressure, threats, or fear. It should be noted though that Khodayari’s father used the opportunities afforded to him in his media interviews to express his loyalty to the regime and condemned those who instrumentalized his daughter’s case to ‘talk against our country’ as he characteristically said. A media report stressed that a representative of the Judiciary talked to him on the telephone to offer his condolences and praised him for his ‘measured statements that prevented the enemies of the state from reaching their goal’ (JahanNews, 2019).

3 The Iranian opposition is highly diverse and fragmented. In addition to the reformists inside Iran who do not question the reality of the Islamic Republic but advocate policies that often set them in opposition to state apparata not under the purview of elected governments, royalists (in the diaspora for the most part), inspired by nostalgia for the Pahlavi dynasty pursue its restoration primarily through lobbying efforts in the US and Europe. The Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), contributed to the overthrow of the Pahlavi monarchy, during the Iranian Revolution, but eventually positioned itself against the Islamic Republic and were subsequently suppressed by it (Abrahamian, 1989). Having regrouped in the diaspora, they allied themselves with Iraq during the Iran–Iraq War. The organization was designated a foreign terrorist organization by the US State Department for fifteen years, until 2012 when it was delisted and, subsequently, allied itself with the Iran hawks inside US policy circles.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nazanin Shahrokni

Nazanin Shahrokni is Assistant Professor of Gender and Globalisation at the London School of Economics. She is the author of Women in place: The politics of gender segregation in Iran (University of California Press, 2020). Her research focuses on the gender politics, gendered geographies of exclusion, and critical policy ethnography in Iran, the Middle East, and beyond. She also serves on the Executive Committee of the International Sociological Association.

Spyros A. Sofos

Spyros A. Sofos is Researcher at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Lund University. His research focuses on the intersection of societal insecurity, identity and collective action. He has written on nationalism, populism, and political mobilization. He has coauthored Tormented by history: Nationalism in Greece and Turkey (Oxford University Press, 2008) and Islam in Europe: Public spaces and civic networks (Palgrave, 2013).