Khomeini on Brain Drain
Actual quote from a 1980 interview with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini:
They say there is a brain drain. Let these decayed brains flee. Do not mourn them, let them pursue their own definitions of being. Is every brain with — what you call — science in it honourable?
Shall we sit and mourn the brains that escaped? Shall we worry about these brains fleeing to the US and the UK? Let these brains flee and be replaced by more appropriate brains. Now that they (the Islamic Republic) are filtering, you are sitting worried why they are executing [people]? Why are you discussing these rotten brains of [these] lost people? Why are you questioning Islam?
Are they fleeing? To hell with them. Let them flee. They were not scientific brains. All the better. Don't be concerned. They should escape. [Iran] is not a place for them to live any more. These fleeing brains are of no use to us. Let them flee.
If you know that this is no place for you, you should flee too.
Due to immigration restrictions, of course, most Iranians have nowhere to go. Just imagine how low Iran’s population would be today if everyone who “knew that this is no place for them” had been welcome in the West?
The emigration of hard working, law-abiding people seems like a win-win situation. But circumstances like this suggest the issue may be a bit more complex: https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/12/europe/amsterdam-riot-police-soccer-violence-intl/index.html
The irony of this quote is that Khomeini himself had fled to France, whence he incited a revolution against the Shah.