Did Tehran’s Rich Kids Cause Iran’s Riots? Here’s The Lie The MSM Wants You To Believe

Millenials are often ripped on for being superficial and incapable - or at least that's the excuse older generations have for them getting college degrees and yet still not being able to find work in the crappy economy that got crapped on under the watch of the old guard.

But it is the rich millennials who are seen flaunting their wealth, stolen...ahem... earned by their wealthy but terribly inept parents while the rest resign themselves to scanning groceries at the checkout that really gets one's blood boiling.

This fact is true all over the world - but particularly in Iran, where the college educated are numerous, the economy harder hit by sanctions, low oil prices and poor economic decisions and a wealth-gap that's growing ever greater.

Which is why much of the mainstream media have latched onto a story about the Rich Kids Of Tehran (RKOT), an Instagram account that allegedly showcases the activities of Iran's wealthiest children, as a reason behind the recent spate of unrest in the country. So were protests in Iran another item that could be blamed on millenials?

 

The RKOT Instagram account is by no means a new concept, starting in 2014 as a copy of the infamous Rich Kids of Instagram account. The original RKOT Instagram account was soon shut down according to Business Insider, only for a second account to take over. The Iranian theocracy had also blocked the Instagram account from being viewed from within Iran.

According to the owner of the Instagram account, "the aim of the page is to show the world the good side of Iran". Unfortunately, if the mainstream media is to be believed, local consumption of their media might have had an unexpected impact.

"Every time Iran is mentioned on TV or news, they always talk negatively and we are trying to show the good side. Over the past eight years, 98% of the news has been about Iran's politics, sanctions, and nuclear issues. The Western media have used these topics to create a picture about Iran which would benefit their political agendas.

"Iran has been under heavy sanctions for over a decade by the West, which has almost crippled Iran's economics. There are more poor people in Europe and North America than there are in Iran, and these countries have no sanctions being imposed upon them."

However, they admitted to VICE that "80% of the kids feeding the account are the offspring of the ruling elite" as an explanation why the authorities never attempted to arrest them.

While there are many economic reasons for these protests, it seems over-simplistic of the mainstream media to blame it on an Instagram account run by spoilt brats who, according to them, took many of their most provocative photos outside of Iran.

An account which is also at least officially banned in Iran (while we in the developed world simply have no choice but to deal with the Rich Kids of Instagram who do not even have the excuse of changing the perception of their home country).

Interestingly, according to the World Bank at least, Iran is the second largest economy in the Middle East and North Africa (second only to Saudi Arabia) and grew 9.2% for the Iranian calendar year ending March 2017. Its poverty headcount ratio at $1.90 a day Purchasing Power Parity (this is a measure of the most extreme form of poverty) was 0.3% as of 2016, compared to 1% in the USA.

Iran's economic problems may be increasing, what with an over 26.7% youth unemployment rate (notably, Saudi Arabia ranks 6% higher in this regard) and a Gini Coefficient of 44.5 (compared to 45 for the US and 45.9 for Saudi Arabia according to the CIA factbook), but the situation hardly seems to be so dire as to have been provoked by Instagram snobs.

Was it the double standards when it comes to social policing that provoked the masses then? Iranian women have been allowed to drive for the longest time, a change that Saudi Arabia has only recently made. The fully covered Burqa is also non-existent in the country, and women make up the majority of those studying at university level.

In fact, the more one analyses the data, the more one wonders why if indeed Instagram was sufficient to start a revolution, one has not precipitated in the countries criticising Iran yet.