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Iranian-Canadian refugee's photogenic protest inspires worldwide viral meme
It was an iconic image: A photogenic young Iranian woman filmed herself lighting a cigarette with a picture of Iran’s leader, an evocative protest against the misogynistic clerics who run Iran.
It grabbed the attention of a world captivated by the Iranian uprisings, quickly inspiring copycats — including other young women and American politicians — and stylized artwork as well as AI knockoffs.
Social media fans called her “iconic” and “cool,” and praised her bravery: “Young Iranian women are leading the revolution against the Islamic regime,” said one user who shared the short video.
It wasn’t initially clear where the video was taken; it showed snow and a suburban building behind her.
But a 23-year-old Iranian refugee in Richmond Hill, Ont., has now confirmed to National Post it’s her, and that she was herself inspired by a similar protest a few days earlier.
She says she does not want to be identified out of fear of reprisals. “A lot of spies, a lot of Islamic Republic fans are here,” she said from Richmond Hill, a Toronto suburb. The X account where she posted the picture calls her Morticia Addams, after a character from The Addams Family.
In her X account she also refers to herself as a “radical feminist” and includes a reference to “52Hz,” the nickname of a whale that speaks in a language all its own, as documented in the film The Loneliest Whale .
Morticia, as we’ll call her, grew up in Iran but ran into trouble with the regime when she was a teenager. During the 2019 protests also known as Bloody November, she participated in marches against the regime, and even spent a night in a detention centre after being picked up by police.
Then in 2024, after then-president Ebrahim Raisi died in a helicopter crash, Morticia said she was arrested at her parents’ home.
“I was taken in for interrogation, actually, and I was subject to severe humiliation and physical abuse,” she said. “And after two days of interrogation, they let me go. I don’t know why they released me. And so I fled to Turkey and then to Canada, because I had my student visa.” She then applied for refugee status in Canada.
“Canada, it’s my saviour,” she said of her new home. “It was my hero and saved me from the Islamic regime. And I might live in Canada even afterwards … because I’m not sure what is happening in Iran.”
The image she shared is a powerful one. A screenshot from a short video, it, shows her, head tilted and a cigarette between her lips, grasping and leaning into a burning photograph of Ali Khamenai, Iran’s supreme leader. The video, Reuters has confirmed , was taken in Richmond Hill, just north of Toronto.
It was filmed by her boyfriend, whom she said is Persian, the main ethnic group in Iran.
Since she posted it to X , where it had 1.4 million views as of this writing, the image has been copied and modified and replicated. So too has the act itself, with many others taking part around the world in what one commentator called “the only cigarette that is not harmful to your health.”
One of the images of Morticia even replicates the style of the Barack Obama “Hope” poster of 2008, with the colours of the Iranian flag washing over the image.
— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) January 11, 2026
Of course, nothing exists in a vacuum. In 2022 and even earlier, Iranian woman could be seen burning their headscarves in protests over compulsory wearing of the hijab. Morticia said she had seen a similar image to hers on X recently and wanted to post her own version, though she had no idea it would receive the attention it did.
“I didn’t think so, because I was about to let my friends know in Iran that I am still with them. I am still fighting, and I’m so sorry that I cannot fight beside them right now, because I had to flee.”
She continued: “And suddenly it was everywhere. I just wanted my friends to see it and realize that I’m still standing with them, even though I’m really far from them. And sadly the only people who haven’t seen my picture were the same friends, because that very same night the blackout happened.”
Iran imposed a communications and internet blackout when the latest protests began, making it difficult for messages to get in and out of the country.
تنها سیگاری که برای سلامتی مضر نیست pic.twitter.com/1U3suHP95K
— Uncle Sam - عموسام (@cryptosamz) January 10, 2026
Morticia said her hope for Iran is simple. “I only hope for the removal of the Islamic regime, and replacement with a democratic government that brings peace and security to my people.”
She is optimistic as well as hopeful. “Actually, it was a really big movement during the past 47 years,” she said, referring to the 1989 death of the Ayatollah Khomeini. “So yes, I guess it’s likely to happen soon. I hope.”
She is also hopeful that her act of defiance can have a part to play in that change, that it “drags all the attention to Iran.”
“This is the only thing that matters to me,” she said. “People are … just getting killed with no one to answer about their life. It’s the biggest crime in Iran, against humanity.”
Dictators are temporary. Iran is eternal. pic.twitter.com/Gb6neV728s
— Tahmineh Dehbozorgi (@DeTahmineh) January 11, 2026
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