Parham

Rosie

What the @&%Ç do you know about me to be running your mouth about me like that?? No, really?

I'm convinced iranian.com has become the place for major (and some minor!) lunatics who just know nothing but to run their mouths aimlessly the way it has been run ever since the messaging system has been set up. There are only a couple of people with whom you can exchange a few words and the rest are just loonies! Either that, or the Iranian population in California is even nuttier than I ever thought.

Well what are you suggesting they do? I am telling

you that within the humanly possible they CHOOSE. Some take the radical choice. They boycott elections. Others take the cautious choice, they choose between the lesser of two evils, but they CHOOSE. we know they did CHOOSE to boycott because they didn't do it when they THOUGHT the choice was betterthan just the lesser of two evils, that is with Khatami. They CHOOSe. They try to be democraticc as best as they can.

Why are you talking about "they"? I can legitimately do that, I'm not Iranian. You are. What do you expect "them" to do, what have you done for "them" other than denigrate people like me who write you long, considered posts, with caustic little soundbytes while the ones who can get through the filters read this site? Some cheerleader you are. Did you know that many of the youth of Iran, which are vast majority of the population, at best distrust and at worst fear or dislike, the expat community?

I do. I've heard it many times from different sectors of the expat community who've gone there.

I wonder why.

Would YOU risk going to Evin prison to organize a riot after knowing about Khomeini's purges and what's happened ever since?

My god that poor young blogger isn't even cold in his grave and you are asking why haven't "they" done this or that? what have YOU done? Leave. Really...

Rosie

So why haven't they had it yet then?
AND you didn't answer!

Jamshid

I thought you asked me what the Shah would do.
Okay, I read your question again -- I don't understand your point. Could you explain it to me then?

Parham, you wrote:

Voting in the IR presidential elections where candidates are screened and placed in front of me is an insult to my own intelligence

Questioning whether the Iranian people are capable of having a democracy is an insult to their intelligence.

or maybe I'm just not intelligent enough to understand how stupid they are.

Teach me.

Simple enough

I asked you what would you do if you were in place of Mosadegh. I didn't ask you what you would do if you were yourself. So, "I would side with Mossadegh" wouldn't constitute a proper answer.

That answer wouldn't be the thought exercise I intended nor the discussion you intended either.

I agree with you though. just enough already. Really, my fault for having too much expectations!

Rosie

YES or NO:
- Voting in the IR presidential elections where candidates are screened and placed in front of me is an insult to my own intelligence.

Jamshid

Never mind! If you can't understand such a simple answer, you'll never understand anything I'll tell you. My guess is you pretend you didn't. But really, if you're not pretending, never mind anyway, just enough already!

Parham

Like the last time I challenged you with the same, you are dodging it again. But that is fine.

Bottom line: Not me, not you, not shah, not mossadegh, not anyone could find a realistic way in those days to 1. stay in power, 2. do not resort to dictatorial methods, and 3. hold back all domestic and foreign forces working against Iran's interests.

It is one thing to be an idealist and another thing to be a realist.

I would side with the realist.

We don't know whether they'll vote for a non-democratic

system this time (or at least a relatively non-democratic one). Last time many people boycotted the elections because they were so disillusioned with the Reformists that they did it as a protest. Other people voted against Ahmadinejad because they (justifiably) feared him. I;m talking about educated, non-fanatical people.No, I don't have statistics and if I did they'd be skewed anyway, but that's my impression.

Ueducated people are always highly susceptible to propagada. in my opinoon, the conservative backlash came from the flanking of Iran militarily on both sides. Had that not happened, I believe the Reform would've continued. 

I don't thnk voting for Reform is a sign of voting for a non-democratic system. It's a sign of trying to make democracy work as best as it can WITHIN a non-democratic system. Within the schizophrenic political structure that is IRI.

 i normally don't blame the "West' for Iran's travails because I think attitude carries a denigration of the agency of the Iranian people whicch I do not subscribe to. But in the case of Ahmadinejad's winnng, I do blame Bush and Rumsfeld for the backlash. And I highly doubt it was the educated non-fanatics who voted him in. Please correct me if you think I'm wrong.  Remember, they overwhelmingly voted for Khatami, the new kid on the blog. But RELATIVELY far more democratic than any candidate prior to him.

Rosie

If that is the case for our current generation, why are they still voting for a non-democratic system and non-democratic candidates?

Rosie

If that is the case for our current generation, why are they still voting for a non-democratic system and non-democratic candidates?

Jamshid

I would side with Mosaddegh.

Democracy in 2009

Rosie for the sake of making things easy and in all honesty and quite frankly "these people" (brave and patriotic non-IRI-apologists ;) consider democracy the ability to cast votes under the approval and independent monitoring of United Nations. Preferably vote count to be certified by the accounting firm of Delouitte and Touche!

Now if Iranian people vote to keep IRI then we're back to square one and deserve what we get and prove Shah (not clear which Shah ;) was right all along!

However, for those who study history and specifically Iranian history, we've come a long way. From the days of Naser-din Shah giving away chunks of Iran while being massaged in his hirams by one or more of his thousands wives and under the high of Opium to today and everyone in between.

Democracy is a work in progress and as you mentioned in your comment it wasn't static in Europe and wasn't a one time gift. Of course we can easily resolve this democracy question for Iran right here and right now, but why bother?!

Hi, Derakhshandeh,

what I refer to actually started in England 800 years ago (my mistake). It was King John's being forced to sign the Magna Carta in 1215, which guaranteed legal rights and prerogatives to nobles which had not existed before, such as habeus corpus. Over the course of tme (of course not without enormous setbacks at timies) there was a gradual process of extending the rights themselves, extending them beyond the nobility to the bourgeoisie, and then finally to the working class (this is recent, the working class in England during the Industrial Revolution were treated as nothing but machines used to operate machines...)

It's not possible to refer to huge Colonial ambitions  for any European country before the Renaissance.

The last point you make is the same point I was trying to make when I spoke about how illiterate and ignorant the current "working class" of the US is. When they got shipped off to Iraq they had no idea where it was or what it was, they pronounced the name wrong, they thought it had an atomic bomb, half of them thought it was Iran, and they had voted for the guy who shipped them off. So to what extent states which are called democratic really are is a real question, from which the phenomenon of so-called "iIRI apologism" emerges. They aren't really apologizing, most of them, for the Regime IMHO. What they are continually saying is that the Western concept of "democracy" is hypocritical anyway, so their own anti-war, anti-colonialist focus should come before the human rights violations within Iran, which will work themselves out in time (I have very mixed feelings about this and focus equally on both)

In any case overall I think countries like Spain are making pretty good progress these days in trying to make their democracy work in practive the way the IDEALS of democracy have been mouthed for two hundred years now by various countries in the "West", and I really believe that given the chance, the people of Iran would choose the direction of Spain. And would prove themselves quite capable at it too. It is not regardless of, but BECAUSe of, the mistakes they made in allowing Fascism to happen, that Spain has developed a talent for democracy. I can't see why Iran would not do everything possible to avoid the same mistakes again, too.

And also let's assume for a moment that Reza Shah really did SAY what the blog claims he did and at the time and even that he was RiGHT-just hypothetically--what if anything does it say about the mindset and potential of the Iranian people in 2009?

Rosie

Good points. The problem is the premis of this blog and this question is similar to asking "why did the Shah fall?". Really?!

It is shooting from the hip! You know what I mean?

By the way what do you mean by "On the other hand you have Britain with the seeds of a democratic tradition going back a thousand years." What seeds? A thousand years ago Britain was a brutal Monarchy with huge Colonialist ambitions, I think.

Let me ask you this way, has there ever been any country that was born into democracy? USA was a British colony for years before they had their revolution and even then for years they enslaved people.

If I may be so bold...

what does it mean to be "ready for democracy"?  Most people would agree that Spain and Germany have successful flourishing democracies. However the birth pangs of these democracies were dire, these democracies emerged, in a Heglian sense, out of their opposites, that is Fascism. That of Germany was extreme to hallucinatory dimensions and threatened the entire world, but do not minimize the Spanish Civil War's one million dead and 40 years of Franco.

There are very different socio-economic cand cultural factors at play, but basically both Spain and Germany, like Iran, did not have an organic democratic tradition and had a brief period experimenting with Democracy in the early part of the 20th century, which failed and led to totalitarianism. On the other hand you have Britain with the seeds of a democratic tradition going back a thousand years. Britain is not essentially more democratic than Germany or Spain today. At times it seems to be less.

Then you have a democracy like the United States. It is a democracy in which the working classes are purposefully undereducated so that they can barely read (trust me, I've taught in urban public colleges for years) and can't make an informed decision about anything except what cell phone to buy. It's not just the "society's" fault, these kids like being this way, it's comforatble. They're lazy . Trust me, it works both ways. And that's how people like Bush get voted in twice. People were asked the second time, do you think he was doing a good job? and they said no. And then they were asked so why did you vote for him, and they said, he messed up Iraq, he has to fix it. It's like being hit by a drunk driver and asking him to drive you to the hospital. Is that an intelligent democracy?

What is your model of democracy when you ask if Iran is ready for it?  If it is the democracy that the US has recently had, anyone is ready for that.  If it is the democracy of Spain or Germany,well, were they ready for that?  Somehow they got it.

It was often said that the Spaniards were anarchistic by nature (and they are, I know them, I've lived there, they're hot-headed, argumentative, hedonistic..) and that because of that they needed a strong man to govern them or the whole thing would fall apart. Well, it did. In 1936, and they all killed each other. And now these same attributes of  extreme individualism are working in their favor for democracy.

The opposite was said of the Germans: they are too regimented, too rigid, too hierarchical, too subservient to authority (and they are, I know, I've lived there), that they will need to follow a strong leader..and they did have one, and now they don't need one. These same attributes are working in their favor for democracy.

The Iranian "character" is probably a mixture of those two things. Why shouldn't they be ready for democracy? This is 2009. People have not only their invidival countries' histories, they have an entire global culture to learn from, good and bad. They have an entire planetary legacy to choose from. Why shouldn't the Iranian people be able to choose?

At the end of the day is it anything particular about the German or Spanish character anyway that has made them "ready" for democracy. I don't think so. I think it's just part of the Zeitgeit.

And I think that by positing the question, in a way you are underestimating your hamvatans. You see, you are looking at them from the outside in and saying they ARE like this, they ARE like that, while they are looking at the world from the inside out and they are saying, this is what we WANT to be, this is what we COULD be.  Why in the Internet age with five thousand years of civilization and a young dynamic population would the Iranian people choose anything but democracy and make sure they would safeguard and live up to it if they were given the chance?

PS I do agree with the commenters who say that our generation of Iranians were far more responsible for the Revolution than they care to admit or face, and that they purposefully turned a blind eye to many things. But that works in the favor of their children. With all due respect, they know their parents are full of sh-t and they are determined not to make the same mistake again. (Or so it seems to me, looking at it from the outside of the outside...)

Re: Parham

I think you were away for a while. It is good to see you back.

I would like to answer your question by posing another one for you and others:

It is 1953. You are Mosadegh. You have not seen what you have been seeing or reading from 1953 to today. In other words, you did not have the benefit of the hindsight.

What would you do in his place?

Let's have a thought exercise. You'll be a democratic patriot Mossadegh, and I'll be all of those who opposed Mossadegh, foreign and domestic. I challenge you to find a REALISTIC way to defeat them WITHOUT resorting to dictatorial methods.

Are you up to the challenge?

After all, if Mossadegh couldn't do it, who else could?

P.S. I think wanting a democracy is quite different than actually getting it. Also, calling the Shah a dictator without being able to present an alternative won't get us anywhere.

Masi

Why don't you start another one of the same topic and moderate it then?

To: Ali P.

I disagree with Ali P., my feeling is that Parham is doing a poor job moderating this controversial topic that he started, unfortunately.

Though, he brings forth a very interesting topic, and one that we, as Iranians, are long due to seriously contemplate and address.

SarbazIran, do you see the irony of what you have written?

"He was right
by SarbazIran on Fri Mar 27, 2009 04:24 PM PDT

The Iranian people does not understand democracy (atleast not at that time). The country was illerate,"

at least one grammatical and one spelling error,including the very word 'illiterate' LOOOOOOOL

CLARIFICACIONES......

YES,NO and YES...respectively;
Chavez AND ANOTHER OFFICER WERE WANTED BY FBI RIGHT AFTER NORIEGA'S ARREST (GOOGLE THE STORY),HAND COUNTING THE VOTES OF EVEN DEAD PEOPLES ARE norm EVEN IN THE U.S.A
SO THAT VOTING FOR WANTING HIM AGAIN IS .....
OIL SOURCE OF WEALTH IS NOT EXPLOITED IN LET SAY u.s.a EVERY ALASKA RESIDENT RECIEVES A FAIR SHARE OF THAT WEALTH TO SAY THE LEAST, DOES IT HAPPEN IN IRAN ,SAUDI ARABIA AND.... I DON'T THINK SO.

iar058

...there must be something chavez is aware of that america knows too its all dirty politic as usual.

Are you now suggesting that western powers are responsible for the fact that Venezualans have decided they didn't want democracy, after all? lol. Democracy just can't win, with some people, can it? Ten years ago, every nation in Latin America except Cuba had democracy. Now, half a dozen of them have either given it up or are in the process of giving it up. You can blame "western powers" for that if you want, but it seems to me that's the will of the people being expressed in Venezuala, Bolivia, etc. If they got fooled by anyone, it was their own leaders, who managed to convince them they didn't need a representative government thatresponded to the will of the people.

And PS - Will soembody explain to me how it is that the argument "Western powers won't permit Iran to have democracy because they want to exploit Iran for the oil" is valid, when nobody had any problem whatsoever with a democratic venezuala?

.............)

Is there any connection as to Panamanian Noriega's 15 yrs jail in the U.S,ortega's fall,sandinistas,FLNS,And numerouse other failed and successed story behind CIA and the columbian drug cartel and lots of other thing that involve the so called western alliance to control the world as they please.
there must be something chavez is aware of that america knows too its all dirty politic as usual.
who is playing tommorrow ?
the games I meant.

he really said that?

"Are you kidding? You would like me to give democracy to these people? You think these people can take a democracy?"

It's not as if he was offering an extra camel was he?
nobody gives democracy to anyone, it's a system that evolves with rights and responsibilities.

Advisor

...because Western powers will do anything in their power to prevent it as
long as Iran has the oil and gas that the greedy world is after and
want to exploit.

That's interesting. I wonder what excuses they use in other countries that don't have any natural resources that anyone wants, where they have also failed to develop democracy? I wonder what excuse Venezuelans use, who had oil and also had democracy, and willingly threw it away?

The talk of "Western Powers" is a getting a little old, too. Look around. There is only one major world power that is Western. There are several that are *not* Western.

He was right

The Iranian people does not understand democracy (atleast not at that time). The country was illerate, we had western powers and eastern powers trying to gain influence in the nation. We had terrorist groups who acted like political parties (Tudeh, which later got them banned) etc.

Please don't forget the Shah also said that as soon as Iran is fit for democracy he will personally lay down his throne. 

‫آقا پرهام

‫آپالد راست میگوید. از طرز سؤال شما این بر میاید که پنداری شما خواهان دموکراسی در ایرانید، درست؟ اگر اینطور، چطور شما میگید که ملت، با همون روزنهء امیدی که این آخوندا براشون گذاشتند که رأی بدهند، انتخابات را بویکت کنند؟ مگر باید منتظر شاه بشیم که از اون دنیا دموکراسی را مستقیم پرتاب کند تو چنتهء مردم. با همین زور آزمائیهایه کوچک است که ایرانیان خواهند دانست دموکراسی یعنی چه، چطور بدست آوردنش سخت است و چطور باید ارزشش را باید دانست، بنظر شما، اینطور نیست؟


‫تازه من و شما اینور دنیا بشینیم راجع به سلاهیت ایرانیها برای داشتن دموکراسی بحث بکنیم، چی به واقعیت کم یا زیاد میشود؟ ثانیاً مگر فقط چشم آبیها برازندهء دموکراسی داشتنند؟ اصلاً، شاه اگر از دموکراسی چیزی سرش میشود، حکومت مردمی مصدق را واژگون نمی کرد و بعد بالاش بشینه آب بخوره. حالا این نظر اون راجع به مطلبی که خودش با زور برش انداخت، چه اهمیتی دارد؟

Replies

Advisor- Fair enough. Things might go that way, but in that case, I predict major social change that will bring about substantial political change as well. But that's really out of our point of discussion. The important fact in your message was that you think we won't have democracy until there's oil for greed, which is, like I mentioned before, what Behnoud had brought up way back, and is actually a good topic for discussion. Only I wished you had developed that one more.

Appalled - I sense trolling in your message that's why I'll refrain from replying to the major part of it, which to me in fact, is just pure nonsense.
However, if you are serious, and if indeed in your mind you equate simple voting with democracy; and again, if you think what's going on in Iran in terms of the current elections is democracy, either you are exceptionally gullible, or you are nothing but a charlatan. Which, in the end, comes to the same as it makes you and your argument completely irrelevant to the topic of this discussion.

Like I said

This was a sar-e-kaari blog, Parham. You yourself are the poster boy for the type of ignorance which has kept a group of Iranians fresh frozen in time, unable to make peace with the realities on the ground. That you are arrogant and rude to people who take you seriously, too, is another story in complete unison with your lack of tolerance, a necessary ingredient for any democracy. When you write a blog and invite others to "discuss" things, you should at least have enough grace to refrain from attacking opposing points of view. But that notion is lost on you, too. I concede now that I am no friend of yours. Bask in your ignorance outside Iran and let real Iranians deal with their choices which they seem to be doing just fine, no thanks to you. When Iranians learn and grow and achieve their rightful democracy, getting rid of their intolerant dictators, it would be no thanks to little dictators like you who pride themselves in not participating in elections.