Penn Caught Up In Freedom Protest

"Journalist" Sean Penn was caught up in a protest in Tehran that involved hundreds of women yesterday. According to Publius, it was the first such protest by women since their rights were stripped in the 1979 revolution that brought Islamic fundamentalism to the nation.



The protest was the first public display of dissent by women since the 1979 revolution, when the new regime enforced obligatory veiling. “We are women, we are the children of this land, but we have no rights,” they chanted. More than 250 marched outside Tehran University, and about 200 others demonstrated two blocks away after hundreds of riot police swarmed in and barred them from joining the main protest.

Penn had his video camera briefly confiscated in the melee that ensued. This puts Penn in an interesting situation. Chrenkoff even notes he is in a unique position to create a modicum of credibility for himself.

This will be the ultimate test for Penn, and the last opportunity to prove that he's motivated by humanitarianism, however misguided, rather than anti-Americanism of the kind officially approved by Iran's rulers.

Only time will tell, but I look forward to Penn's report on this event and others. Can he be objective or will he simply make excuses for the mullahs?

Regime Change Iran has plenty of photos from the protest, including the one used above. Publius, naturally, has all the protester babes.