sycasey said:
Anarchistbear said:
Cal88 said:
Anarchistbear said:
Cal88 said:
Anarchistbear said:
Cal88 said:
Anarchistbear said:
Iran is a repressive regime which has tortured, killed and brutalized their own citizens in the name of God.
The truth is that Iran is a young country and young Iranians are not particularly religious. This is why a bet on time- Iran nuclear deal- was wise
I'm not sorry to see Khameni dead, and would be ecstatic should a similar fate happen to Biibi.
I can't think of any government in the middle east that is not repressive. What is unique about Iran though is that it is a truly sovereign country, with an independent central bank.
Iran is not a particularly young country today, the median age is 34 (vs 39 in the US), it is a country of younger X geners and older millennials.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Iran#/media/File:Iran_single_age_population_pyramid_2020.png
It is also not a secular country by any means:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Iran#Irreligion
This being said, I agree completely about the bet on time and the nuclear deal being a wise options.
The state says it is Muslim but what else are they going to say
An independent survey found differently.
In contrast with state propaganda that portrays Iran as a Shia nation, only 32% explicitly identified as such, while 5% said they were Sunni Muslim and 3% Sufi Muslim. Another 9% said they were atheists, along with 7% who prefer the label of spirituality. Among the other selected religions, 8% said they were Zoroastrians which we interpret as a reflection of Persian nationalism and a desire for an alternative to Islam, rather than strict adherence to the Zoroastrian faith while 1.5% said they were Christian.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/iran-secular-shift-gamaan.html
This is the director of the outfit that did that "independent" survey:
https://x.com/LadiKhanom
Her outfit is funded by the NED, the Tony Blair Institute and the Department of State Foreign Operations.
Still think it's an independent survey?
Yes by my own experiences it's way more reliable than the state of Iran.
But far less reliable than the Pew Research Ctr.
It's not often that you take the neocon side in a debate. This is a good example of pinkwashing, priming liberals to endorse neocon wars of choice in the Mideast.
https://www.noirnews.org/p/gamaan-iran-polling-unreliable
Quote:
'Ideological,' 'not scientific': Iran polling firm GAMAAN flawed, not independent
GAMAAN has extensive ties to U.S. government-funded, pro-regime change orgs, and employs unreliable survey methods that produce misleading results
The Group for Analyzing and Measuring Attitudes in Iran (GAMAAN), an influential Dutch polling firm that employs unorthodox survey methods to "extract the (real) opinions of Iranians about (sensitive) social and political topics," routinely calls itself an "independent" research foundation.
News outlets and researchers citing GAMAAN have echoed this refrain when discussing the organization's headline-grabbing findings, which portray the Iranian citizenry as far more secular and regime-critical compared to other polling research. GAMAAN asserts that its survey results can be generalized to the entire population of "literate individuals over the age of 19 residing in Iran."
However, an investigation by Noir News reveals extensive ties between GAMAAN and U.S. government-funded organizations, many of which openly advocate for regime change in Iran, casting doubt on the polling group's stated independence. Further, GAMAAN's findings are not applicable to the entire Iranian populace due to biased survey methods that lead to an unrepresentative sample, according to multiple polling experts.
"[T]hey know what they think, and they want to use the language of social science to demonstrate that those claims are actually truth. And of course, that's a problem," said Daniel Tavana, an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Penn State who was a Principal Investigator for Princeton's Iran Social Survey.
"[T]hey're just ideological," Tavana said. "They are very opposed to the regime, want to embarrass the regime in whatever way they can, and are happy to say… whatever they think will most effectively do that in any given point of time, regardless of whether or not they have evidence for it."
While Iranian state-owned media has discussed some of GAMAAN's ties to Western-funded organizations and regime change proponents, and the limitations of its survey methods, Noir is the first to report the full scope of GAMAAN's numerous connections with U.S. government-funded regime change operatives, and the severity of its methodological issues.
I realize that this view is not very popular, but all you have to look at here is the experience of previous neocon regime change operations in the region, all of which have resulted in failed states and locals being crushed, with authoritarian regimes being replaced by chaos, poverty, civil wars and destitute misery, see Syria, Iraq, Libya.
These regime change operations are marketed as being done for the betterment of these target nations, with the results always being the opposite of that. In the case of Iran it will also result in global economic destabilization, more trillions for Forever War and casualties by the tens of thousands.
I'm not in favor of the war, not in favor of regime change. None of this is any threat to the US, but to believe that the Iranian theocracy is not a brutal, unpopular repressive regime is to ignore reality.
Cal88 never found an authoritarian foreign regime he wouldn't apologize for.
Quote:
What's black and white? Some foreign governments are authoritarian and restrictive of freedom, they just are. You have a high tendency to make arguments in favor of those governments. As I said, I don't agree with going to war with them all (unless they are actually trying to attack us), but I will call a spade a spade.
When was the last time you were in China? Have you talked with young mainlanders, and how does their perspective differ from those who left the country decades ago?
Have you ever been to Vietnam or the Middle East? Are you familiar with Russia liberal experiment in the 1990s? Does China's 5,000 year old civilization affect their modern political and social landscape?
Is the average Chinese citizen satisfied with his government? What was China like in the 1980s, when its GDP per capita was similar to Haiti's or Nigeria's? Can you leave a laptop or a fancy phone or handbag on your cafe table and go for a restroom break in China? Can you leave your keys on a moped, or you car unlocked in Dubai or Shenzhen? Can your young daughter walk home alone, or teen daughter take public transit late at night? Can you see a medical specialist on a walk in basis for the price of a discounted Haas Pavilion ticket? Do you need to go six figures in debt to graduate from college? Can you afford to buy a home as a young man the way Boomers did in the 1970s? Is life in democratic India better than in authoritarian China?
Are all of these things not part of life and the pursuit of happiness? Is there really liberty in a system of structural indebtedness?
This would be a very good debate, which I believe would expose the kind of cultural biases we are all prone to have. Perhaps in its own thread.
