Letter from the Editor: Homecoming celebrations remind us not all are free

When I first arrived on campus as a freshman in the fall of 2020, there were barely any students physically at SIU. In fact, I didn’t have a fully in-person class until the next fall. During that first semester, everything that a college freshman experiences during a normal year, we missed because of the pandemic.

No RSO fairs, no football games (with the exception of one in October), and no homecoming. The only “normal” thing I did as a freshman was walk around campus, albeit, a very empty one. 

Naturally, as things began to return to normal last year, it was all we could talk about. For pre-pandemic students and alum, this meant a glimpse of normalcy. For those of us 2020 freshmen, it meant living the college life for the first time. 

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It’s easy to get caught up in it all, especially after a year of living alone in a dorm, never even leaving for classes. 

I loved going to the homecoming parade and feeling the nostalgia of what’s usually a yearly festivity, feeling a part of something, a part of the long legacy of Saluki history.  

I loved watching my friends get ready for the dance, wearing beautiful dresses and finding elaborate new ways to manipulate their hair in ways that I wouldn’t dare to attempt. The glamor of all of it was just so intoxicating. 

All that week, I spoke to alumni who found their way back into the Daily Egyptian newsroom, telling me stories of when they were sitting in the same desk as I was, however many years ago. They told me about how the carpet has changed and the nerves they felt going on their first assignments, or how River Region Evening Edition now sits in the old DE sports desks. 

I felt connected to something bigger and I was proud that my name was listed among the names that came before me, documenting their pieces of history during their time at SIU. There is a saying that journalists have a “front-row seat to history” and I was speaking with people who sat in the front row through a lot of it. 

But as I now take my place in a front-row seat, I remember why I took up my camera and pen in the first place: to inform and to give a voice to the voiceless.

Hidden behind the charm and excitement of our current lives, there is a war being waged for freedom around the world. In Iran, women are protesting the death of Mahsa Amini and fighting for the basic freedom to dress how they choose. 

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While women and girls around this country prepare for dances, trying on dresses and hairstyles, the women in Iran are lining the streets, removing their head scarves and cutting their hair. 

Now, as the Iranian government has shut off Internet access in the country, their voices are being muffled and shut off from the world. This is where it becomes our duty to share their voices and their stories and to inform the world about the lengths and struggles the Iranian people are going through for a small piece of freedom. 

This fight does not begin and end with Iranian women. As part of Generation Z, we are part of a powerful group of change-makers, and in the age of the Internet, we all have access to our front-row seats to history, journalists or not, to inform others of this fight for freedom and give back the voices of the women who are being silenced.  

To hear from Iranian students about what is happening in their country, see our full coverage on in “‘For woman, life, freedom:’ Iranian protestors resist repression,” and do your part to fight for their freedom by hearing their voices sharing their stories.  

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