It’s About Power! It’s About Drive!

I entered 2022 in a state of total bliss. I was in Tehran, surrounded by family and friends, and waiting for my baby nephew to be born. I spent the next two months happier than I had ever been in the previous years. The closer I got to my return date to Finland, the more anxious I became. The feeling was not entirely Finland’s fault; it also had to do with everything happening in Finland’s vicinity: the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

While the conversations around me in Tehran revolved around what this war means for Iran and the ongoing negotiations with the US to reach yet another deal–that they most likely will bow out of in a few years–in Europe, people were left in shock of “How could this happen so close to us? Isn’t war something just for the non-whites of the world?”. I don’t want to get into the Western sham of solidarity made even more apparent by the Russian attack. The Western sense of superiority over all other beings in the universe isn’t something that needs further “unfolding” or “unearthing”. I don’t want to get into the deep-seated anger I felt when I saw all the Finnish art and culture institutions that we have been urging for months to extend solidarity to the Palestinian struggle for decolonisation publicly and to participate in the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, have not wasted one moment in issuing solidarity statements for Ukraine and halting collaborations with Russia. Mohammed El-Kurd was on point when he wrote, “Hypocrisy” doesn’t describe this adequately. The appropriate word is psychosis.”

Soon after the start of the attack, I witnessed a flood of public demands among the “progressive” art communities I know and happen to respect, asking their governments to issue sanctions on Russia. I heard about OP Bank suspending the accounts of Russian people residing in Finland. This was followed by the news of the Finnish Film Foundation halting all collaborations with Russia. Now, sanctions are something we Iranians—along with Cubans, Iraqis, Venezuelans, etc.—have lived with for many years and, in our right minds, don’t wish them upon any other people, so I thought I’d use my tiny little platform to at least make sure those close to me know what it is that, in their moment of fear, they are advocating for. I wanted them to know that “sanctions are an act of warfare – economic, to be sure, but warfare nevertheless”. After a few conversations, it was clear to me that nobody really seems to know what they’re pushing for entails: economically strangling ordinary people who are already oppressed by an authoritarian state, strengthening the state’s grip on power and the economy, causing a massive surge in corruption and inequality; brutally isolating the ordinary people from the Western world and its mainly stolen resources. It seems all the academic degrees in the world can’t help our lovely “progressives” get a grasp on imperialism and colonialism and the many cunning forms they may take.

I got many triggering “But, what’s the alternative?” questions. I’m telling you that the answer to killing innocent people is not to kill other innocent people, and you ask me about alternatives. As you can see, white people in panic mode are not exactly the best argument-holders. Some of them also tend to try and indirectly school you and tell you how to behave. I had to stop myself from telling them, “Oh dear, don’t you know that moral superiority is not something you can afford?”

This is a tragedy that is happening not to you but near you. You may not be blessed by the moral superiority you so weirdly crave; instead, you are blessed by time and infinite resources at your disposal to learn and educate yourself so that in the moments of panic, you don’t cling to the first worn-out solution you come across. It is then that you can hold your representatives accountable and demand them to do better, to come up with solutions that don’t kill innocent people, wherever they may be.

Sanctions, economic or cultural, have a failed history. We all want to be “doing something,” but doing something to whom? That’s an essential question to keep in mind. If your first response as an art institution is to issue punitive actions that harm artists from your neighboring country, the same artists that are now in their streets protesting the war, getting arrested and jailed for it, then you have failed to understand the ABCs of what your job first and foremost is: supporting artists—calling for peace and solidarity instead of adopting right-wing jingoism into your working ethos. If you are an art worker in Europe, watching these responses and opting to stay silent or worse, support these institutions, then please, for the love of god, take my sisterly advice and do the following: Don’t hold another workshop/exhibition on care, friendship, love, hospitality, accountability, transparency and diversity. These are things that must be extended to all people, not just the ones who look like you. Later, take a long pause and revisit the real so-called European values your governments want so badly for the rest of the world to adopt. Chances are you are not going to like them.