The Incredible High of Gunning Down Strangers

In the fourth episode of “Anon and I”, I speak to Iraqi Zoomer “Zoso”. We discuss youth culture in Iraq; the national economy; whether Iraqis are nostalgic for Saddam Hussein, and how they see themselves; gender politics, conspiracy theories and the bloody death of a psychiatrist; Kurdistan in the Western imagination and reality; the Iraqi space programme; America’s last advantage in geopolitics; whether anyone does anything other than watch TikTok; what it is like to be a schoolboy in Baghdad; Zoso’s dramatic involvement in anti-government protests; and how it feels to shoot and be shot at.