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![]() ![]() “My uncle was arrested and considered an enemy of the state and my cousin had been shot. They are what she describes as “relaxed” Muslims. Her parents, she says, were not particularly political. ![]() And people fairly close to us they were in our family.” “People were being imprisoned,” Panahi says. Putting their family at risk, all of the photos of Panahi’s mother with relatives of the Shah had to be burned or hidden properly. When the infamous Ayatollah came to power, Panahi’s mother had worked in a senior midwifery position at a hospital that bore the name of the Royal (Shah) Family and was patronised by them. The single mother’s childhood memories in Iran were of an idyllic life on the Iranian coast.īy 1979, the family had moved to Tehran and although Rita Panahi was still little more than a toddler, she remembers the mounting fear when the Shah was overthrown. When Rita was still a child, the family went back to Iran. Rita Panahi came into this world in the year 1976 in Pine Bluff, Arkansas in America while her Iranian father was studying at the local university to become an agricultural engineer. She was born in the USA but went back to Iran: It was also the revolution that redrew the map of global alliances. Soon after the western world felt the unimaginable power of radical Islamic resurgence and its strong hatred of the west. She and her family were refugees from the Iranian revolution of 1979, in which the western allied Shah of Iran was overthrown by the repressive theocracy of Ayatollah Khomeini. Rita clashed on live TV with Andrew O’Keefe, in an exchange about Islam and terrorism and went viral: You know, privileged, middle-aged, middle income white people, who were born and bred here, telling me my views on racism and a cohesive Australian society are wrong.” 5. “But I do have an issue with people who haven’t got my life experience patronising me with their opinions. I’m a single mum, I’m not some privileged, middle-aged white man who would normally have character traits ascribed to conservatives. “I’m someone who’s ethnic, a migrant to this country, an atheist. “I’m not your plastic conservative,” Panahi says. One thing she is not known for saying is: It’s very hard not to be fond of Rita.” 4. Plus we share a deep love of the mighty Hawthorn Football Club.”Īnother colleague says, “She is a great, ballsy, brave woman. “She’s a really interesting person and I admire the way she deals with the abuse she receives on social media, and the fact that she remains relentlessly positive and upbeat. “I don’t always agree with her opinions, but we have great discussions and arguments about politics,” says Whinnett. ![]() The Herald Sun’s national political editor, Ellen Whinnett, regards Panahi as a friend: As for herself: “I am, for the most part, reflecting mainstream Australian values.” 3. It’s the left-wing commentators, the feminists who write for Fairfax’s Daily Life – and the “nut jobs” who tackle her on social media – who are the controversial ones, on the fringe. Then, was his downfall evidence that the majority of Australians are less right-wing than she might think? Not at all: “I think the centre is a lot more to the right than most people in the media would like it to be,” she says. In Panahi’s view, Tony Abbott (28th Prime Minister of Australia from 2013 to 2015)lost popular support partly because of his inability to communicate, but mostly because of a vehement media campaign by left wing journalists. Giving money to beggars is “akin to voting for the Greens – it only encourages them, and prevents them from doing something useful with their lives”. Greenies, bellicose socialists, confused pensioners and progress-hating layabouts”. Protesters against the East West link, in Melbourne’s suburbs during the last Victorian election, Rita views as a “ratbag gang of unionists, unwashed hippies, NIMBY ![]() After Grant’s speech, Rita Panahi spoke immediately and said she was moved but still asserted that it was wrong to characterise Australia as racist. Rita Panahi was on the opposing team to Stan Grant in a debate on racism that went viral in early 2016. ![]()
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