There is a strain of fascism that is perpetuating among Iranians with many similarities to the Corona virus…

1- This strain of fascism feels like a benign, common nationalist “fervour” where in fact it is violent, dangerous and attacks the very foundation of decency, humanity and justice all under the guise of a simple case of “alternative views”!

2- People can be infected with it and spread the “ideology” without even knowing they have it, all the while disguised as a liberal, passionately guarding their country’s independence and forcing their jingo-liberal ideas down people’s throats. This strain of fascism has the external features of moderation, reform, peace and peaceful dialogue and internal characteristics of dogmatic fascism reminiscent of an earlier version of this virus that spread in Europe during the 1920’s.

3- Similar to COVID19, social distancing from those infected with this strain of fascism is neither a cure nor is it a solution to the exponentially increasing problems arising from this socio-political disease. Early detection, effective tracing and swift identification and spotlighting will help to contain this strain of inconspicuous fascism. Extreme caution must be taken in such engagement however, as no mask or protection can protect you from its violent, absurd logic. The best protection against this virus during engagement is to avoid entanglement in the vulgar reasoning and unsophisticated thuggish behaviour of those infected.

4- You can’t isolate yourself from this strain of fascism because it is aggressive and spreads in strange, invisible ways. It spreads fast and seeks out your central information system. In fact this strain of fascism is designed to make us self-isolate and live in quarantine while it perpetuates and takes over the public discourse distorting, subverting, inverting and polluting the reasonable democratic process. This strain of fascism acts literally like a virus, it is designed to inject itself into a normal, healthy, thriving community and infect every aspect of its being.

5- Even the symptoms of this Iranian Fascism are similar to COVID19; It causes social disarray, feverish factionalism, extreme loss of basic common sense and civil discourse and violent outbursts of baseless emotions. This strain of fascism injects itself into every component of society and confuses the natural defence mechanism to react with such extreme fervour that the defence mechanisms themselves, becomes allied with the virus, helping to destroy the community from within.

6- This strain of fascism looks like the common cold but behaves like a dangerous parasitic infection. It establishes pseudo organizations and uses misdirection to trick the normal immune systems of a democratic society into thinking that these pseudo entities are part of the democratic discourse. This strain of fascism is so evil and inconspicuous that it even attaches itself to neighbouring bodies, other democratic institutions in the society at large and infects them from within.

Ladies and gentlemen, the COVID19 outbreak shook the world. In fact the effects of COVID19 are so profound and wide reaching that the post COVID19 world will be fundamentally different from that we left behind in early 2020. In some ways this outbreak expedited certain trends of change that were destined to happen while in other ways COVID19 derailed certain other trends that became obsolete over night.

There is one big lesson, a positive lesson that COVID19 had for me. This virus induced quarantine was enlightening indeed. The more I studied and learned about the virus, the more I understood the nature of another virus that has been infecting Iranian society for decades. A dangerous, post modern iteration of fascism, religious fascism that shares many of its characteristics with COVID19.

Let’s hope we can find a cure for it because with COVID19, at least self isolation and social distancing flattens the curve, but this fascist virus amidst Iranians thrives on social distancing and self-isolation. Unfortunately the more you engage with it, the more you are in danger of being infected. The more you distance yourself from it, the more aggressively it spreads and infects its surroundings. The Iranian strain of religious fascism is far more complex to cure than COVID19.

Lets’ hope that our efforts to survive this disease and attempts to cure it will not fall into the equivalent fallacy of Hydroxychloroquine or bleach injections into our own system. The upside of this new world order uniquely imposed upon humanity by a virus, could be that Iranians may once and for all see clearly, the danger that has been lurking amongst us for decades. Hopefully this time we can find a cure for it.