Many of those who took to the streets in the 2009 “Green” uprising against the disputed reelection of then-president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are sitting these protests out. In 2009, the protests were led by the middle-class youth and professionals alongside the country’s reformist political faction, once an integral part of the ruling elite. But poor and lower-middle class families in Iran’s flyover country — small towns on the country’s periphery, agricultural hubs, and dreary satellite towns of large cities — appear to be at the forefront of today’s protests.

But for Iranians inside the country, joining a nebulous, leaderless protest movement involves extraordinary physical and political risks. Older Iranians say they went to the streets in a 1978–1979 revolution against Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, only to get a regime they despise more.

It’s easy to understand why Iranians would oppose their 37-year-old clerical regime, a religious autocracy characterized by corruption, mismanagement, and political and social repression. Lately that list of grievances has included risky and expensive adventures abroad. The Trump administration and some Iranians in the diaspora have wholeheartedly embraced a week of anti-government protests that mostly began in small towns and cities and have since spread across the entire country.

Yasaman was too young to join her siblings and parents as they took part in the 2009 unrest that last threatened to disrupt the regime in Iran. Now they’re aghast at her participation in the protests that are currently rattling the country. But that disapproval didn’t stop the 21-year-old as she surveyed the scene in front of the gates of Tehran University on Tuesday afternoon, the sixth day of the demonstrations.

Yasaman’s family is among those who’ve stayed indoors as others have gathered to march, she later told BuzzFeed News in an interview conducted over WhatsApp. (She asked that her last name be withheld for fear of reprisals.) Her friends derided the protesters as “tribal” small-town folks; they’re burning police stations and attacking security forces, they said, not out of political considerations but to settle rural vendettas, reflecting part of the bigotry of the cosmopolitan elites toward the rural poor that has characterized Iranian society for decades.

“People in Tehran are not as hard-hit by the issues, which are driving protests in the periphery,” said Mohammad Ali Shabani, an Iran scholar at the School for Oriental and African Studies in London. “They have more access to services, jobs, though Tehranis are by no means spared from any of the ills of the current state of the economy.”

He added, “The current protests appear to show the middle class largely staying at home at least partly for fear of the violence perpetrated by the working class.”

Middle-class and urban participation is a decisive factor in whether the protests will lead to significant change or can be stamped out by Iran’s security forces. “For any successful protest movement of this type with radical demands a broad alliance is required,” said Mohammad Ali Kadivar, an Iran expert at the Watson Institute at Brown University. His research suggests the protests might be winding down, although they could be given a boost on Friday.

“They need the numbers,” he said. “Tehran is crucial because it’s a city of millions. If the protests stay within these small towns I’m not sure how long this can persist. Protesters can also get tired, and do get tired.”

The origins of the protests have also confused many Iranians, contributing to the disorientation confronting anyone trying to understand Iran’s political alliances and undercurrents. The marches were originally spurred by hardliners in the religiously conservative city of Mashhad, perhaps to embarrass the moderate president Hassan Rouhani. The president had earned their anger after revealing previously undisclosed details about budget allocations to the senior clergy’s pet projects in the weeks before the protests began.

Though the movement may have since taken on a life of its own, many among those sitting on the fence have suspicions that it is being allowed to fester in part to put pressure on Rouhani, who was elected twice thanks in part to the support of the 2009 movement’s backers. “The middle class in Iran are educated and experienced enough to understand who is who in this theater,” said the editor of a centrist Tehran newspaper close to the leadership. He spoke to BuzzFeed News on condition of anonymity, given the chance of a potential crackdown. “On the other hand they know that no government better than the Rouhani’s one is waiting for them, so they are very cautious and even critique unrest, which quickly falls into the hands of inexperienced teenagers or mobs.”

On Wednesday, the commander of the Revolutionary Guard, Maj. Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafari, strongly suggested that Ahmadinejad, a onetime darling of the hardliners who now rails against the establishment, could have been behind the protests. The centrist newspaper editor noted that preventing Ahmadinejad and his ilk from coming to power was the entire reason they took to the streets.

“I was active the whole of 2009 and I went into the streets and we got beaten,” said Ali, a 26-year-old unemployed architect in the northern city of Rasht, a major industrial hub of 650,000 that has been the scene of nightly demonstrations. “We are more than anything in shock. How did the protests become so serious all of a sudden? The longer this goes on, the more it hurts Rouhani. There’s a large possibility they want to bring him down because of his stance against corruption.”

Iran’s demographics are changing as well, shifting the makeup of the people taking to the streets. Ninety percent of those arrested appear to be under 25 years old, according to Iranian officials, but Iran’s youth bulge has flattened; Iranians are aging and perhaps less willing to take risks. They stood in long lines in 2013 and 2017 to elect Rouhani, who has at least tried to bring a measure of accountability and moderation to Iran’s domestic politics.

“Thus, beyond class, there appears to be a generational gap between those on the streets now and those who went out into the streets in 2009,” said Shabani.