In Iran, when television was under the monopoly of the government, all windows of critical thinking were closed and all avenues of influence for thoughts, beliefs, and existing discourses were obsessively blocked. As an arm of the security apparatus, it also took on the mission of suppressing the government’s opposition. Some speakers and journalists were interrogated and forced to participate in the usual rituals of confession from political suspects. In all of its representations – from news to short and long series – it focused on portraying an imaginary enemy and incited divisive rhetoric, using literature filled with hatred and animosity. It engaged in extensive news and advertisement business and turned the world into a battlefield of its own ideological war. It considered people as ignorant and malleable children who could be molded as desired, and from the perspective of families and household walls, they were removed.

After that, in a short period of time, they turned away from the Turkish-made series, which are mostly vulgar and have a sexist view towards women and depict depraved love triangles, and instead focused on portraying the desires, hopes, and struggles of a society torn between traditional values and the demands of a dominant economic system. They became the guests of households day and night.

But then came the smart and timely home cinema, quickly finding a permanent place in regular stores and becoming a staple in household baskets. Home cinema, with a critical and passionate approach, exposed the suffering and pain of people from injustice, their disgust with religious spaces, the lies and deception of the media, and the deprivation and hopelessness that fueled the pursuit of large profits in transactions. It launched a thriving business, catering to people’s need for happiness, laughter, and humor, sometimes delving into post-colonial reflections on people’s behavior, and mocking the traditional and hegemonic norms that had settled in people’s minds. At times, it became so vulgar, ridiculous, and degraded that mothers feared their children would sit through these films, and at times, it brought back the heavy and controversial history. In any case, there was a strong fascination and imitation of successful Western series, and lessons were learned from their experiences. Whatever it was, it was still cinema; a product of a specific

However, at that moment, all dimensions of the hidden and visible existence of the military system, which did not have the ability to bring happiness and freedom to the people, were so disrupted and abandoned by the Mahsa movement that they suddenly came to themselves and put aside all preventive policies and only considered severe and inhumane suppression as applicable. In the midst of this, home cinema could have been the carrier of the message of the people’s revolution and could have somehow led to solidarity and identity bonds. But the security apparatuses arrived and, as always, were busy fulfilling their historical mission, analyzing a phenomenon called television series that had been made outside the framework of the national broadcasting. The power system in the Islamic Republic is authoritarian. No one can tolerate anyone at the economic table; just as it is extremely stingy with those who are popular among the people and always has the toughest settlements with this group of individuals.

Home cinema had taken over in many ways, like a lover to the soul of the Paranoia device. First, as we mentioned, the idea that a group who were not in line with the system would become wealthy through home cinema, it was time for this valuable commodity to fall into the hands of the rival. Furthermore, the artists who had struggled in the movement could use home cinema for widespread and organized communication with the people. In addition, home cinema could serve as a means of conveying the messages and slogans of the people and help solidify the movement; just as all the efforts of television to feed its corrupt ideological products to the people were in vain, and in this way the repressive forces that had been lurking in the media, expelled a countless number of home cinema workers, and the government, pleased with this action, took over both its economic position and its content. Of course, this was not the only settling of scores with the government and the artists, they did not hesitate to

Representatives of the fearful parliament brought the proposal to intensify the punishment of celebrities who speak out to the parliament, security forces threatened and suppressed them, and deprived them of their social rights; without realizing the fact that an artist is also a part of a society that has reached its limit, not a separate conspiracy that people rise up and sit down with his gesture.

And so, one of the safest devices in the country, known as “universal sound and image”, fell and with all its might, took control from the hands of the Ministry of Guidance. As they say, “the cultural governance sphere has done its regulatory work” and handed over the management of production, distribution, censorship, suppression, and policy-making of domestic cinema to a designated authority called “Satra”. In other words, two completely unequal rivals, namely the powerful radio and television that consumes a considerable budget from the people’s pockets and is the tool for creating hegemony and establishing the regime’s ideology, with its vast dimensions of wealth and power, faced the home entertainment network that, with limited budget and resources, but with the people’s interest, came to the field and lined up, and eventually the work ended up in the hands of the one who also took over the small part with the removal of the Ministry of Guidance and the Cinema Organization.

The organization for regulating audio and visual content in the virtual space, known as “Satra”, after a period of collaboration with the Ministry of Guidance, under the shadow of the Ibrahim Raisi government, without any legal basis, took control of the home cinema industry. This institution, which has been allocated a significant share of the budget, has not complied with the law and has not taken any steps towards its establishment, either through the approval of the Islamic Consultative Assembly or by enforcing Article 110 of the Constitution. Satra apparently receives approval from the leader of the Islamic Republic on a regular basis, which in itself is illegal. In any case, today it has become the sole auditor, arbitrator, and judge between individuals, and has taken on the role of suppressing and interpreting the decisions of other institutions and doing whatever is necessary to eliminate its main rival, the national broadcasting organization.

It is futile to talk about the constitution and ordinary laws, the process of deviating from them, and legitimate ways of dealing with an illegal institution in the Islamic Republic. Because on top of this system, there is an unaccountable ruler with unlimited power, holding a whip in his hand called “government decree” which whenever the interests of special groups or the need for further suppression arise, the whip is put into action and destroys the law – whatever it may be.

In the realm of discussion, the harsh and ominous music of the cycle of poverty and its impact on life, wealth, and existence can be felt by the thousands of hands involved in the production of homemade series, and their exposure to poverty and unemployment. Now, the censorship of homemade cinema products will face difficult and sometimes impenetrable obstacles, with an increase in the number of necessary permits for film production and a more difficult and selective process that filters out the artists involved in making a film, making it more stingy. The production of these films has become economically unjustifiable.

Artists and their colleagues in television series on the home network are a part of the people of this land, who are now receiving their share of deprivation, oppression, suffocation, poverty, unemployment, and intense pressures caused by it; on one hand, we see young people killed or girls and boys who have become victims of rape, torture, and blindness, and on the other hand, we see the injustice towards the people of art. The solution for artists is not in insisting on enforcing the law, nor in insisting on preserving their rights and settling for the relatively mild censorship of the Ministry of Guidance, but rather in serious participation in creating a great and fundamental transformation for a just government and the elimination of all inhumane foundations that produce inequality and injustice. The Islamic Republic and its institutions are more bankrupt and devastated than for the people and artists to seek their rights through reformist means and its enforced laws and to restore their name, voice, and dignity. The border between the people and the