"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone" - Jesus of Nazareth
"If you look at our women, they're active in every level of society as researchers and social groups and universities, in parties, in the press, in the arts, in politics, in political associations," Ahmadinejad told reporters at the National Press Club. "They're [among] the most active women in the world and they're free.""[These] groups say what they want."
19 comments:
you could have posted a picture of me or dina smiling blankly at overpriced shoes.
and
you could have posted a picture oof a young iranian woman who had been burned beyond recognition with acid for being the victim of rape.
Exactly.
That is true Jasai.
However, could I have posted dozens of pictures of Iranian women sucking horses penis' and swallowing a half gallon of horse semen?
Could I fill a "soccer stadium' in Iran, not with silence, but with meth and crack whores?
Are there 10,000 18 year old girls in Iran working in the Porn Industry?
Could I have posted images of Millions of Iranian women "gazing" at prescription drugs?
I am an American. I love America and have great hopes for what this country can be.
However, this business of hypocrisy and ignorance will be the death of us.
You can cherry pick horror stories about women from Iran, just as they can cherry pick horror stories about women in America.
"Abuse" is relative. It is also a buzzword before occupation.
Your reluctance to acknowledge that and incorporate it into the discussion is disappointing.
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On 30 May 2005, Farkhondeh Sadegh, a graphic designer, and Laleh Keshavarz, a dentist, became the first Muslim women to make a successful ascent of Mount Everest. In December 2005, Iran won the Asian women's canoe polo crown. In 2006, Iranian wushu athletes won five medals in the Third Grand International Wushu Festival in Warsaw, Poland. Iranian women's national team athlete, Elham Sadeqi, won three golds in taolu (wushu forms) events. Iran's top race car driver is Laleh Seddigh, who is skilled in both circuit and rally driving.
In America, we still find that female race-driver named Danica chick a cute anomaly.
I am not reluctant to acknowledge any such thing. And if it seems that way to you that is only because you are dragging around an equal amount of reluctance to admit the opposite truth. I am perplexed by what you want to be said in order for you to get off of this "they are ultimately better off then us" bandwagon especially considering your admission that abuse and the strangling of freedoms exist on both sides of the coin.
When do you incorporate that truth? And more importantly what is the ultimate point you are trying to get at? Should we be more like them and simply don their mild forms of oppression? If your wish is that we would acknowledge that they are no worse off than us and that we should leave them alone, I think the vast majority of Americans would agree. Except we don’t have newspapers or televisions shows through which we might advertise this point of view daily. In fact we are so busy living out lives and trying to beat back our own demons and issues that I don’t think the majority of us know or care. Is that the issue? Should we know and care?
Dina, do not be disingenuous. There are many things that some American women are doing that some Iranian women would like to do and that as a nation they experience as an anomaly.
I am tickled that the both of you feel like you have to defend these very strong, worthy, accomplished women so fiercely. It would seem, according to the picture you have painted that they do not in fact need defending. So what/whom exactly is this really about?
Jasai,
You seem to forget.
We Are About To Bomb Them.
They Are Not About To Bomb Us.
We Are Calling Their Elected President Hitler.
Our President Threw Our Votes In Dumpsters.
I am not saying "be like them".
I am saying don't be hypocritical warmongers who repeat the propaganda of those that have killed over 1,000,000 of "them" in the past 10 years.
I am very disappointed in your rigid hostility to another point of view and your tacit tolerance of the barbaric policies of this government and this press.
Especially since you are usually the voice of universal truth and spiritual brotherhood.
"I am very disappointed in your rigid hostility to another point of view and your tacit tolerance of the barbaric policies of this government and this press."
Please paste the quote of mine that gives you this impression. I am disappointed that you would like to paint any opinion that is not yours as that of acquiescence to evil, warmongering, and wrongdoing. Noting is simply black and white, or should I say DV’s opinion and the wrong opinion.
Universal truth is that we all have work to do. and brotherhood requires we make enough room in our hearts for every person to do their own work.
Dina, do not be disingenuous. There are many things that some American women are doing that some Iranian women would like to do and that as a nation they experience as an anomaly.
Like what? How do you know what Iranian "women" want to do? How do you know what they can and can't do "as a nation"? Yes, there are crazy things that happen. Just like there are crazy things that happen here.
This obsession with what happens to Muslim women is the height of arrogance and smacks of Manifest Destiny/White Man's Burden. The Muslim feminists I've read have repeatedly, over and over, told Western women to mind their own MF'ing business. They aren't infantile little victims who can't speak for themselves. But it gives Americans a great sense of self-righteousness to "liberate" those people from what we unilaterally designate as problems.
Here's what's so hypocritical about these discussions. When something happens to an American, you take it as an individual event that does not reflect on the whole of the American nation. When something happens to an Iranian woman, you take is as confirmation of the inherent inferiority and "injustice" of the Iranian nation. And I'm calling bullshit on that double standard.
Everytime you cite a woman who gets stoned, I'll find a woman who climbed Mt. Everest. For whatever pathological reason, you accept that the former example is a representation of the entire nation of Iran, but the latter does not. That is what is disingenuous.
"Iranian women gathered to watch soccer outside the doors of Tehran's biggest stadium during a match between Iran and Bosnia on 31 May 2006. This symbolic action was against all those rules that do not give any right to Iranian women to watch soccer in the stadium. While in the other side of the wall 100,000 men shout hurrah for their team, women are kicked buy police forces. They even do not have the right to watch the game in TV behind the high walls of stadium that its name in Persian equals "freedom".
"The Muslim feminists I've read have repeatedly, over and over, told Western women to mind their own MF'ing business. They aren't infantile little victims who can't speak for themselves. But it gives Americans a great sense of self-righteousness to "liberate" those people from what we unilaterally designate as problems."
-DV
Or to defend them like your life and the bread on your American table depends on it.
Same shit, different angle.
I don't know what they want. I am answering your assertion that they have and do everything they wish. I challenge that you can not know that and to the extent that you assume they do, one could as accurately (which is to say not at all) assume they don't.
because surely you don't know every Muslim woman to speak for them.
surely not.
“When something happens to an American, you take it as an individual event that does not reflect on the whole of the American nation. When something happens to an Iranian woman, you take is as confirmation of the inherent inferiority and "injustice" of the Iranian nation. And I'm calling bullshit on that double standard.”
-Dina
are you speaking to ME specifically? If so, you might want to pull back. Any response or comment I have ever given on this subject has been in response to something posted. I am not the moderator here. So the statement you made above as to your motivation is exactly the same as mine.
if you would stop being so offended by the obvious reality that trauma, pain and oppression belong to every group as does triumph, joy and freedom (in whatever form people interpret it) you would have a less constricted chest about the whole thing.
unless it's personal, and in that case, my heart goes out.
"Iranian women gathered to watch soccer outside the doors of Tehran's biggest stadium during a match between Iran and Bosnia on 31 May 2006. This symbolic action was against all those rules that do not give any right to Iranian women to watch soccer in the stadium. While in the other side of the wall 100,000 men shout hurrah for their team, women are kicked buy police forces. They even do not have the right to watch the game in TV behind the high walls of stadium that its name in Persian equals "freedom".
-IFJ
sothis is bullshit too huh?
Really i could care less becuase i know freedoms for all people, all over the world are restricted in some way or another. but to come down on those who refute the rosy picture that some here would like to paint to weak and telling.
Jasai ... I've read what you posted. At least twice.
For the life of me, I don't understand your point.
The point of the post was to 1) illustrate the duplity and inherent hypocrisy in the way Iranian women are represented in this country - by using the same jaundiced eye to represent American women.
2) To illustrate the sinsister way this and other intentional misrepresentations are being used to launch yet another evil war in the middle east.
With which part of that do have a problem? Did I fail to illustrate it? Are you saying I have no business attempting to illustrate it?
Seems like you are bothered by coverage of anything but Jena, yoga and pretty images of ancient Egyptian women.
It seems to me like you are saying "There is nothing wrong with American women. How dare you look at them through such a negative lens. The Iranian women are no better off than anyone else. Stop portraying them in such positive light."
Please tell me I am reading you wrong, because that doesn't make any damn sense to me.
No one is trying to paint a rosy picture of what Iranian women experience. We're challenging the Satanic picture that Fox and CNN are creating. We're challenging the notion that we should measure another society by our standards. We're challenging those who live in glass houses to stop throwing stones.
With which part of that do have a problem?
-DV
1) Your illustrating the duplicity and inherent hypocrisy in the way Iranian women are represented in this country - by using the same jaundiced eye to represent American women.
2) Your illustrating the sinister way this and other intentional misrepresentations are being used to launch yet another evil war in the middle east.
Because these approaches neither refute the argument or help the situation to for which you claim to be spreading light. It is in no way productive, in fact it is even more divisive. This does not change the possible truth of impending war nor does it address the problem of freedom for women – however each group feels it should be manifest. At this point it seems you are just being disagreeable to be disagreeable. And for what? Is that your style?
If you have a problem with the possible truth that we may be launching another unjust war with Iran DO SOMETHING THAT WILL POSSIBLY CHANGE THE OUTCOME OF THAT. And if that feels like too much of a task for one man, then say that. I believe your fellow countrymen would sympathize with that sentiment. But to attempt to assassinate the image of one group of women over another out of frustration for a possible war seems like a long dark trip down a road that will ultimately lead to no real relevant place.
Did I fail to illustrate it?
-DV
No. but to what end did you illustrate it. What does it prove as it relates to your stated ultimate point? What does it change?
Are you saying I have no business attempting to illustrate it?
-DV
No, as a matter of fact I am not yet for some reason only God will be able to sift through, you want to believe so badly that this were true. DV, There is no boogyman wanting to keep you from your freedom of speech. And the fact that you keep insinuating this – especially in reference to me- is quite funny. I have no stake, nor reap any benefit or detriment from you expressing your views. No matter what they are.
"No one is trying to paint a rosy picture of what Iranian women experience. We're challenging the Satanic picture that Fox and CNN are creating. We're challenging the notion that we should measure another society by our standards. We're challenging those who live in glass houses to stop throwing stones."
and i think some of the people here were challenging Mr. Ahmadinejad on those very same issues.
so we all do agree.
very well.
DV, to these last three statements:
"Seems like you are bothered by coverage of anything but Jena, yoga and pretty images of ancient Egyptian women.
It seems to me like you are saying "There is nothing wrong with American women. How dare you look at them through such a negative lens. The Iranian women are no better off than anyone else. Stop portraying them in such positive light."
Please tell me I am reading you wrong, because that doesn't make any damn sense to me."
I will simply sip my tea, shake my head and smile.....
you ain't even gotta know me to know better than this.
"If you have a problem with the possible truth that we may be launching another unjust war with Iran DO SOMETHING THAT WILL POSSIBLY CHANGE THE OUTCOME OF THAT."
That is exactly what I am doing.
Hypocrisy fuels the war machine just as much stolen oil. Hypocrisy burns flesh just like the napalm that burns the flesh of children killed while we "Spread Democracy", "Liberate Women" and "Free Gays".
Reminding complicit Americans, even tea sipping yoga practicing situationally sensitive Americans, that their tacit approval of our national hypocrisy is just as much an act of war as is shooting a civilian - IS DOING SOMETHING.
Just as the people who expressed their opinion of what happened in Jena produced the reaction it got, PUBLICLY CHALLENGING HYPOCRISY is doing something.
It worked for Jesus Christ. It worked Martin Luther. No need to reinvent the wheel.
Jasai, how you can be Krishna Monday, Wednesday and Friday and Karl Rove Tuesday and Thursday is difficult for me to understand.
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just keep swimming....
you'll get there.
As I see it there is a fundamental difference between a society that allows women to make their own choices good or bad. Versus a society that limits the ability of women to make their own decisions. Apples and Oranges. However, I do agree with DV that this way of life should not become another nugget to justify U.S. military action against a nation that wishes to protect it's interest no different than Bush, Cheney & AIPAC.
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