Street protests began in January 1978. If individuals were killed, the seventh and fortieth days became part of Shi'ite public mourning and renewed protests. The autumn of 1978 saw renewed vigour in public protest, escalating during Muharram, December 1978. While predominantly urban, the demonstrators came from all classes. Yet differences in style and political discourses were of course evident.

Different groups of women were active in demonstrations. It was suggested that some came on to the streets through the inducements of bags of rice or tins of oil. To begin with, many women on demonstrations were bare-headed but as the movement took on a more Islamic tone, women were required to cover our heads on demonstrations. At some demonstrations, men formed a ring of protection around the women protestors.

Back then, the majority of the population was rural, with 64,000 villages. Only in 2008 did the urban population reach 50%. Many people were quite poor while stories of the "one thousand families" who were rich and powerful circulated widely.

As the political movement began to grow, so people discovered new tools to use to make their voices heard. City walls became a political canvas, with stencil art, posters, graffiti, bloody handprints producing a multi-layered wall hanging. Nightly, state services would come out and paint over much of the day's work, only for new slogans to have appeared by morning.