Cuba and Iran: Is the West too woke to care?

Western elites' lacklustre response to Cuban and Iranian uprisings

Iran is currently experiencing a new wave of protests centred on Khuzestan province, where criminal mismanagement of resources has produced a water crisis. This is the latest in the national uprising which began in late 2017, and comes shortly after the so-Islamic Republic regime’s “election” which was boycotted by the overwhelming majority of the population. The protests have since spread to other areas of Iran, confirming that this is indeed a national uprising and proving wrong claims that they are motivated by ethnic identity.

But as with the Cuban protests recently, they are taking place in a country presently ruled by a regime hostile to the West. Hence, we see indifference from the West’s liberal elites and a meek reaction by many governments. Iranians are already used to this, they know full well what to expect from Western politicians and commentators who won’t do the right thing. There are of course honourable exceptions like the Swedish MEP Charlie Weimers, a consistent advocate for the Iranian people.

Not that you’ll get too many prominent voices in the UK, USA, Canada or Australia to care. Because they’re too woke, hating themselves, their countries and Western Civilisation to believe that Cuban or Iranian people deserve to be freed from the tyrannies that have imprisoned those countries for decades. Because anti-Western moral relativism has both domestic (identity politics) and international (postcolonialism) dimensions to it.

Hence, woke athletes and footballers will grieve more for someone unrelated to sport and telling their own countries how “racist” they are, rather than be outraged that the Iranian regime executed Navid Afkari, while also sending someone to the Tokyo Olympics who participated in mass killings in Syria. This is what peak wokeness is: believe that your own countries are inherently evil, and believe somehow that genuine evil committed elsewhere is not worth caring about.

This a stark contrast from the leadership the West had during the Cold War which was prepared to support anti-Communist struggles in Eastern Europe and elsewhere. It also reveals a double standard about those who oppose sanctions and isolation of the Iranian regime (let alone bringing it down), compared to the vigour with which they pursued such a course for South Africa during the Apartheid era. Today, however, the infestation of anti-Western hate runs deep in the Labour and Democratic parties along with their celebrity, academic and media backers.

If Western democracies do not believe in their own values and foundations, how can they expect to stand up for genuinely oppressed people? Could it be that protesters in Cuba, Iran and Hong Kong have been protesting for the very freedoms that the woke elites seek to emasculate in the West? It seems the case to me.