Fear speech
: The mullahs of Iran are succeeding in scaring webloggers and chilling their free speech after the arrest of fellow weblogger Sina Motallebi — but they have not yet succeeded in shutting them down. Read Lady Sun, who tells of a meeting of women putting out an e-zine who debate shutting down because of the danger and who tells us about her own fears:
It seems the doom of this week is not going to end. Sina is still in prison. Nobody knows what’s going on. They have summoned Alireza Alavi Tabar, journalist and university professor, for interrogations. In the interrogation paper they have mentioned Alavi Tabar’s title as the editor of the electronic news site Emrooz (a radical political website). It seems arresting Sina has been their warm-up, and they have started paying attention to internet sites. My fears are growing, both for our e-zine and for our Women in Iran (Persian _ English) website. Of course we have been very much careful and conservative in our magazine, but Women in Iran is not a conservative site….
I’ve become tired of all this fear and worries. I’ve decided to start posting in my Persian weblog again. The bewilderment of these days is pressuring me too much. I thought and thought and thought and came to this conclusion that I haven’t done anything wrong at all. I haven’t crossed any political red lines to be worried about. I have to forget about those people who are trying to identify me. It takes a long time to find me. And in case they find me, they can’t accuse me of anything….
Who would have thought that it would take courage to blog. There, it does.
