Iran: Protesters Chase Riot Police, Riot Police Run Away

I’ve never seen anything quite like it … and have more than a few shares of ‘protest/march/show up and be heard’ street creds.

Here is a must-see film clip from Iran, mounted on the BBC Middle East site

Half way through the film clip the most amazing thing occurs…. as the Iranian riot police in tan uniforms start hurling tear gas canisters into the crowd of protesters from afar… the front line of protesters breaks into dots and dashes

…and several citizens lurch forward, picking up the canisters and throwing them back at the riot control squads. We’ve seen this before at rock concerts, right? War protests in the 60s in the USA? ditto. Black panther marches? same. Anywhere ‘the guard’ has been called out.

But then you see one Iranian citizen, then two, then three… do what I have to call ‘rage-throwing’… they begin to throw the tear gas canisters back at the riot squads with such rage, with such force, that the downward sweep of the citizen’s throwing arms literally reach the toes of their shoes and seem they will knock themselves off balance by the velocity of the swing and the force of the throw.

But these kinds of world-class baseball pitching rage-throws dont knock the citizen-protesters off balance. In fact, the citizens begin to run toward the riot squads instead of away from them. The citizens bend down when they reach the cannisters they just lobbed at the squads, pick up the canisters and throw them at and into the riot squad again… running and hurling the cannisters, more running and throwing the cannisters…. again and again.

You see in the last third of the film a pan of the camera through a close-up of dresses and suits, and with lens turned in the opposite direction, you see the riot squads trotting, then running, truly running fast and hard… running away in full tilt boogie.

Running away in fear of the fearless.

Not even at Chicago at Grant Park did I ever see the riot squads back down or flee.

Never.

Amazing.