Where do the rumors about acid attackers come from?
The 7% of the population supporting mandatory hijab are more isolated than ever
Where do the rumors about acid attackers come from? Analyses by Mohammad Rahbari, a data analyst and PhD in political sociology, from examining nearly a million tweets and retweets on Twitter, show that apart from value-driven and revolutionary users, who make up only 7% of the entire Twitter network, other Iranians present on Twitter, regardless of their political and social inclinations, oppose the morality police and mandatory hijab. This analysis can be considered as a sample or statistical representation of all Iranians.
Although, according to this data analyst, this unity among the Iranian community on this social network is a rare occurrence on Twitter, it seems to symbolize and represent the unity of Iranians worldwide, regardless of their beliefs and political thoughts.
In a detailed thread, he explained that usually, differences in political inclinations dominate people’s online behavior, but now, in this case, there is a sort of harmony among various groups from justice-seekers to opponents of the Islamic Republic, who are willing to retweet each other.
From Vahid Ashtari, a justice-seeker, to Mohsen Bayat Zanjani and Mahmoud Sadeghi and Abbas Abdi, reformists, to Hossein Bastani from BBC and Pouya Zeraati from Manoto network, all are seen in a single cluster through automatic and intelligent categorization, which is unprecedented.
The game is in the hands of the people, not the politicians
Contrary to the main platforms dominated by reformist and principalist political currents, and contrary to the perception that the entire media space is occupied by these two currents, especially the principalist current, these threads show that in unofficial media, these two currents are in fact marginalized, and what is loud is the voice of the real people, to the extent that it can be said that the main share in the cluster of opponents of the morality police and mandatory hijab is not held by political users, but by ordinary daily users, athletes, and artists, with 40% of the entire network, showing that various segments of the people have united in protest.
The People’s Mojahedin of Iran are even fewer than KPOP fans
An interesting and surprising point in this analysis is that KPOP fans, the famous Korean pop group, have a significant presence on Twitter, occupying 6% of the cluster opposing the morality police and mandatory hijab, which is notable compared to the People’s Mojahedin of Iran, who have less than 2% share in this cluster.
According to Mohammad Rahbari, the fact that tweets and retweets from revolutionary and value-driven users make up only 7% of the entire network is also a rare phenomenon, as they always constituted more than 10% of the entire network, but now, in this case, they are more isolated than ever. It seems that apart from a section of them, especially their cyber army, many revolutionary and principalist figures have decided to remain silent in this incident, which is a fortunate occurrence.
Based on the published graph, revolutionary and principalist users are marked in orange on the right, and others including daily users, athletes, artists, and ordinary users are marked in light green, moderate, justice-seeking, reformist, transformative, opponents of the Islamic Republic, and overthrow advocates are marked in blue, Korean pop fans in teal, the People’s Mojahedin of Iran in purple, and users publishing English tweets with Persian hashtags in pink.
What is the rationale of the value-driven users?
Value-driven users who tweet in support of the morality police and mandatory hijab usually argue that hijab is a law and that lack of hijab is indecency, so it must be opposed. In the protests, they initially tried to blame everything on the reformists, portraying them as the leaders of the event. Some security agencies even contacted and threatened certain reformist figures.
They also have a scenario in the virtual space, claiming that those who didn’t protest the murder of Mitra Ostad are now shedding crocodile tears for the death of Mahsa Amini. They attacked Khatami’s statement and tried to blame the reformist movement for recent events in parliament. However, after realizing that the virtual networks are dominated by users who are themselves critics and opponents of the reformists, and not only do they not take the reformists’ supportive actions seriously, but they also see no difference between them and the principalists in power, they turned to other scenarios.
The rumor of acid attackers
Recently, they have used the issues of burning the Iranian flag, beating a veiled woman, and beating a police officer as excuses, claiming their patience has run out and there’s no room for leniency, stating that Iran, the homeland, the flag, and the veil are our honor and red line. Meanwhile, some users on social media have reshared statements by Mesbah Yazdi, the spiritual father of part of the principalist current, who said patriotism is idolatry.
On the other hand, other images are being reshared in the virtual space showing the same police officer who was beaten by the people shooting at the crowd, or another officer beating a protesting veiled woman. Some value-driven accounts on Twitter have spread the rumor of the presence of acid attackers among protesters in some cities. One of them claimed that the acid attackers were seen among the crowd with muscular bodies, military boots, and identical backpacks, different from ordinary backpacks, and some of them have been arrested.