See me. I am so many of the many me’s. I cry out for life. I scream for freedom.

I am trapped here. Trapped in a system that oppresses me. I am trapped here. Trapped in a system that is killing me. I am trapped here. Trapped in a corrupt justice system that won’t let me participate in my trial and produces fabricated evidence in court to legitimize my death sentence. I am trapped here. Trapped under the same sun as you, only you bathe in it, and I burn under it.

Look at me. I am a woman. I cry out for life. I cry out for freedom. I am Jina. I am 21. I am Kurdish. I am dead.

They murdered me.

Murdered because I was a woman. Murdered because I belonged to a minority. Murdered because I was young and had so much life ahead of me. Murdered because the scarf on my head would not have the same meaning to me as it did to them. I can no longer scream for life and freedom. But now many thousands of people have been shouting my name for a year. They scream every day. They pay with their lives. They continue to scream. Stop the feminicides! Stop the murders!

Look at me. I am a woman. I cry out for life. I cry out for freedom. I am Hadis. I am 23.

I am dead. They murdered me.

Murdered because my fist in the air was more threatening to them than their gun was to me. They hit me with twenty bullets from twenty meters away. The last sequence shows me from behind, combatively tying my hair into a plait. Let’s go into battle! On to liberation! My liberation went differently than I would have wished. They even want to dispose of the dead. My parents weren’t allowed to see my lifeless body for two days. The regime wanted them to believe I had had a heart attack. That’s how they always do it. But the holes in my body punctured their truth, so they forced my parents to keep quiet after my death. But what else do you have to lose when you say goodbye to your child alive and greet them in the mortuary?

Look at me. I am a woman. I cry out for life. I cry out for freedom.

I am not allowed to sing where I could be seen and heard. I am not allowed to dance where the eyes could follow my body and trigger “wrong thoughts”. It’s my fault that they sexualize me and my body. That’s why they imprison my soul and me in a veil that I don’t want to wear. I’m not allowed to ride a bike because my silhouette on a bike is obscene and too arousing. That’s why I’m now burning the symbol of 44 years of oppression. My hair in the wind is as free as my spirit. You can’t break me.

Look at me. I am a child. I cry out for life. I cry out for freedom.

I am read as a girl and as a girl – forcibly married in the regime at the age of ten. People are allowed to be over twenty and officially sexually abuse me by law. I am still a child. Just like Hasti, Helen, Mona, Kian and Diana. They were only seven or eight. They were shot and beaten to death on the street by the regime. Like so many other children since they murdered Jina. As well as so many poisoned children. Why is UNICEF silent? Why does Samaneh, who fights for children’s rights, have to go to prison? Why does Yalda die one day after being released from prison as a result of multiple physical and psychological tortures? Why do they abduct Sepideh the day after her release? Why do parents cry at the grave of their children in Nooroouz? Why can’t I see the colors of the rainbow anymore? Why is the world just watching?

Look at me. I am queer. I cry out for life. I cry out for freedom. I am Nika, I am 15, I am Luri. I am queer. I am dead.

They murdered me. Murdered because I was loud after they killed Jina. I was loud because as a queer person I have no rights in the patriarchal-dictatorial system. I love soccer. Just like Sarina. They murdered Sarina too. She was only 16 and we were never allowed into a stadium. They say this is only a place for men, because when men sweat and run around in shorts, it might excite us women. That’s funny. I didn’t like men at all, and I never said that I identified as a woman. I liked Nele. We met on the internet. We’ll never see each other. I’ll never fool around and sing on a stage again. My laughter will never be able to dry my aunt’s tears. After my death, they continued to scream. They paid with their lives. They continue to fight. They are subjected to sexual torture in prisons and sentenced to death for depravity on earth. They continue to scream. They remain loud.

Look at me. I am a woman. I cry out for life. I cry out for freedom. I am Ghazal. I am 21.

I am blind. My eye bleeds like my mother’s soul as she watches my rays go out on one side. They attacked me on both sides and hit me. They shot my right eye while my left watched. Their hatred for me is great, but my will for freedom is greater, because: I am not allowed to travel alone without the permission of my husband, my father or any other male relative. I am trapped in the patriarchy. I scream and am loud. They kill me on the street or lock me up in prison. There they torture me. Even to death. Before I’m dead, they rape me, especially if I’m unmarried – because they think I haven’t had sex yet – so that my soul doesn’t find its way to “paradise”, because unmarried women who have sex belong in hell.

Funny, because this is hell. Day after day. That’s why I’m the revolution. For me and my sisters. For me and my queer siblings. For me and my mothers who have been hostage to the regime for four decades. For me and my Mohsens and Mehdis and Mohammads who fought for me and were hanged on the gallows before dawn. For me and my Toomajs and Jamshids and Yassins who have been dying alive in solitary confinement every day for many hundreds of days. For me and my political prisoners who should be in university and not in torture. For me and all those who, because they are not for them, cannot be for themselves. For me, you and our freedom. For our future.

Look at me. I am a woman. I cry out for life. I cry out for freedom. I am Armita. I am 16.

I am dead. They murdered me.

Murdered because I resisted. Against the patriarchy. Against the dictatorship. Against fanaticism. Against everything they stand for and what we are fighting against.

“Even the darkest night will end, and the sun will rise”, I wrote under a picture of me without a hijab on the streets, a year after Jina’s murder. Our pictures show us similarly, almost as if twelve months of fighting had not existed in between. Almost as if our bloody hands hadn’t changed anything. Hospital. Coma. Tubes. Screams. Brain dead. Consequences, for me yes, for them no. Much like Jina and so many others whose names – unlike ours – did not become slogans for freedom, their brutal beatings broke my will. A month of darkness, hoping for light, but my sun never rose.

Look at me. I am so many of the many me’s. I cry out for life. I scream for freedom.

Bo Jin Jîyan Azadi.
Baraye Zan Zendegi Azadi.
For Woman Life Freedom.

I am bleeding. I bleed to death. I fight. I burn. I am burning. My life here is like death. So they don’t take my life only when they kill me, but day after day while I try to survive here. That’s why I keep fighting. Until the sun hovers on the horizon after nightfall and there are no people on gallows. My voice is your voice, be my voice too. Be loud. Be steadfast. Be the mountains. Be the sea. Be the coffins. Be the pain. You cannot be free if I am not free.