The Basiji beat down a man in the street in Tehran.
This is how the Clerics keep control and suppress human rights and freedom in Iran. I’m sure God would approve.
About The Author
BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
When did you last publish a photo like this from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Morocco and the long list of other US “allies”? Photos like this come out of Palestine every day.
Are you currently auditioning for a job with another US soft power think tank, is that it?
keep rooting for the people with truncheons. It’s quite endearing and revealing.
Maybe this one will move you?
Guthman, it would be nice if BooMan would have more to say about, and more pictures to show of the horrid brutality of US allies such as Egypt, Jordan, KSA, and, of course, the most brutal of all, “The Only Democracy in the Middle East”, not to mention the regime of the U.S.-installed-late-great-best-friend, Shah Reza Pahlavi. However, that in no possible way makes it inappropriate to show and decry the brutality of the current Iranian regime.
The Prophet, and maybe even more Imam `Ali would die of shame to see this kind of thing being done in their name and in the name of God.
I would hope so.
Count on it.
To be fair, such incidents are rarely, if ever, reported in the US news. The only reason we payed close attention to Iran’s election in the first place is because of the connection to our own national interests.
I think most folks on this blog are realists about the nature of the regimes the American government has supported over the years.
“A force for good and stability” is how Obama characterized Hosni Mubarak recently. I suppose that’s half true.
Yeah, and Egyptians know which half.
Let’s leave god out of this.
Why? This is all being done by godly men in god’s name. That seems significant.
Yes, it is. But god has nothing to do with it. And I’m not being cryptic. Let’s say this is their idea of respectability, as odd as that might seem. Something like the extreme and not so extreme right wing in the U.S. It drove the Nazis to extremes too. Respectability. Maybe civility is a better word.
In Iran, God has everything to do with everything.
The saga of Ayatollah Khomeini’s exile and return spoke deeply of the story of Imam Hussein in Kerbala, with the Shah cast as the villain Ziyad.
The rallying cry of the people was “Everywhere is Kerbala, and every day is Ashura.”
Mousavi’s supporters are going to the rooftops to scream out the Shahada and allah o akbar.
Even if God does not exist, he has everything to do with what is going on in Iran.
Agreed.
I’d agree that after power and wealth, religion has a lot to say in Iran. God? Well, I don’t know, that may be an entirely different matter. Who can say? Just as who can say who won the election. No one can say, in fact, not at this point. Moussavi and his wife are also not out to transform the Islamic Repbulic. Don’t get them wrong. Nor me. Agreed, they’re an improvement over Ahmedi who has gone to Russia for a gab-fest. Is he really so confident? The sly fox.
My point was that Booman’s vision of all things Middle Eastern is conveniently (and nauseatingly) selective, as are his resulting vistas. His sudden ardent political romanticism and naiveté are typical American Exceptionalist hypocricy.
In light of the last eight years, it is easy to forget that the American Manifest Destiny crowd has always come in two varieties, one of which is liberal. As Abbas Barzegar noted on Saturday in the Guardian : “In the future, observers would do us a favour by taking a deeper look into Iranian society, giving us a more accurate picture of the very organic religious structures of the country, and dispensing with the narrative of liberal inevitability.”
Oh, I thought your point was that people love repression and that it would be absurd to think they might vote against it. But even if they did vote against it, it would be silly and selective to support them in one place when you are not supporting it in another place where people are not actually revolting against repression.
Yes keep making up my answers.
Moussavi is not oppressive? Will not be oppressive? He and his wife are made of the same wood as Ahmedi, but with more polish and more class and, probably, a bit more tolerance. But they are there to support the Islamic Republic not satisfy western fantasies.
Look, when it comes to the Middle East I disagree with BooMan often and vigorously, but you are being ridiculously unfair here.
Who brings up Kent State and Berkeley further down in the thread, isn’t that you?
Yes. So what? I brought it up as an example in response to a very specific question. What does that have to do with BooMan’s bringing up the current brutality of the Iranian regime toward the demonstrators?
It’s called context.
Sorry for being dense, but I am not following your logic at all.
there is no logic.
he’s defending the integrity of the vote and saying I have no right to criticize Iran.
That IS kind of how it sounds, but I would prefer to hear his explanation.
The context: how unwanted public dissent is handled by the authorities in different countries.
americanforliberty: Wonder how long the Police will continue to harm peaceful protesters (in Iran)?
hurria: Remember America in the ’70’s? You know, Berkeley, Kent State, etc.?
MNPundit: Or the 2008 conventions.
It is hypocritical to revel in one’s inner anti-authoritarian anarcho-fundamentalism and be shocked, shocked, shocked at police brutality in Iran, while conveniently forgetting the brutality of the US authorities in a much freer society.
Hurria, something tells me you are Syrian. Imagine you get arrested in moderately-tyrannical Syria for some transgression that is very moderately serious. You know what will almost certainly happen when you’re interrogated. The same thing will happen if you’re arrested in Lebanon, which is theoretically not tyrannical at all. But its police apparatus is. The cultural norm is very authoritarian. That’s the context.
Within that context, the brutality of the Iranian authorities has been quite restrained actually.
If massive unrest had occurred post-2000 in the US, the police response would have been brutal. Probably not THIS brutal, no. But much more brutal than it would be, say, in Scandinavia.
Booman wants to discover his inner anti-authoritarian anarcho-fundamentalist? Fine, but then (a) he ought to focus on the country that keeps 2% of its population under lock and key, namely his own country. And (b) as far as foreign lands are concerned, he ought to be an equal opportunity anti-authoritarian anarcho-fundamentalist please. And not just when it’s politically convenient for the liberal Manifest Destiny agenda.
yep. Working overtime as a relativist.
It’s morally embarrassing, even if it feels right to you.
Unless I expended your prescribed allotment of pixels on criticizing the American prison-industrial complex I can’t spend pixel-one pointing out that there is brutality going on in Iran.
If Iran is being brutal, it’s really quite restrained by the standards of the Islamic world, so why not come back here and cast around for someone with equal or near-equal propensity for brutality?
Jesus, look what Bush did? How could an American ever criticize someone from another country? It would take 50 years to create enough anti-American pixels to even begin having the cred to criticize Iran.
Your comments are rubbish.
You keep inventing my answers. How convenient.
I keep pointing out the logical implications of your garbage.
You keep avoiding the issue: the politically expedient selectivity of your outrage and instead find refuge in distortions and outbursts of petulance. The logical implications of your own discourse are very clear: when black and white serves the US liberal Manifest Destiny agenda, then black and white is the order of the day. Intellectual honesty is something else.
I don’t even know what the liberal Manifest Destiny agenda is.
Someone forgot to copy me on that memo.
But, get this. I’ve got a dozen reasons why I don’t want to see this coup in Iran succeed and only about half of them have to do directly with the interests of this country. I don’t like religious conservatives having control over people anywhere on this planet. I don’t like it when liberal-minded people (artists, intellectuals, students, the LGBT community) have their political agenda thwarted and the rights abused. I don’t like Ahmadinejad’s big mouth and the way warmongers use it to make more war, I don’t like how Iran’s foreign policy perpetuates the cycle of violence anymore than I like how many of our policies do the same thing. I don’t thugs with motorcycles and truncheons going around beating on people.
So, yeah, I am opposed to this coup.
And I am totally in favor of an Iranian government that ran on increased liberties, rights for women, a less belligerent foreign policy, and an openness to Obama’s overtures getting credit for winning the approval of the Iranian electorate over a bunch of goons that just might bring on more war either through their own crazed actions or through the way our own crazies react to them.
So, fuck off, Guthman.
I’m with you for the most part, BooMan, until you once again insist that Obama should get credit for the (maybe) choices of the Iranian electorate. To that I have to say, just get over yourselves, Americans. It’s not about you, it is about the dynamic within Iran.
Some of us Americans know this.
Thanks no3reed.
As I said a bit later, it is really shitty, though not surprising, for nice, liberal and progressive Americans to try to take the credit for the progressive and courageous actions of people in other countries. That is, of course, assuming that the election really was rigged, which we may never know.
By the way, I have been a bit curious about that 3 in your name. You know, that is used to represent one of the Arabic consonants that has no equivalent in English. What is it doing in your name?
You’re welcome, Hurria.
As I just wrote in another post, I don’t think BooMan (just to take him as an example of many nice, liberal and progressive Americans) was trying to take the credit for these actions. I do think he was trying to give the USA some credit, which is probably still too much.
My screen name is a tribute to the music-making side of my existence. Mainly a player of single-reed instruments (saxophones, clarinet); the reeds are graded by numbers indicating their stiffness. “No. 1 1/2, no. 2, no. 2 1/2”, etc. usually up to five. Though it varies with the playing situation and with other things, my default is a no. 3 reed. This is probably disappointing information.
How would the Arabic consonant be represented phonetically, or in terms of some other language? I’m genuinely curious about that.
Yeah, well, taking ANY credit without some actual evidence, is still pretty arrogant.
Thanks for explaining the name. Not disappointing, I figured it didn’t have anything to do with the Arabic sound.
That letter has its own phonetic symbol, which looks – just exactly like the Arabic letter that represents the sound: ع So, you can see that using the 3 to represent it makes a certain kind of sense. I usually represent it with `, however, because it looks less weird in the context of the English script.
The only languages I know of that use that sound are Arabic, and languages that have a lot of Arabic-derived or borrowed words, such as Farsi, Urdu, etc. It is very difficult to describe (and apparently very difficult for most English speakers to pronounce). It is a voiced pharyngeal spirant, that is produced by tensing deep in the throat. The name `Ali begins with this sound. I will see if I can find a good example of this sound somewhere on the web. I checked a few sites, and videos, but they did not have good, real Arabic pronunciation of this or a lot of other letters. Some of them were just dumbed down – very disappointing.
OK, this is the best source I have found so far for presenting accurately the sounds of the Arabic alphabet. The sound we are talking about occurs about 1:35 seconds into the video.
You left out the link.
Oh – sorry. here you go.
PS It’s pretty shitty of you guys, quite frankly, to try to take credit away from the Iranian people and give it to your President.
I haven’t said that Obama is responsible.
Here is what I think.
Bush’s agenda was partly about what he did and said to scare people, and partly about people being really scared by 9/11.
You can blame the American people, too, but both Bush and al-Qaeda created the political atmosphere.
Bush’s axis-of-evil speech and his invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq created an atmosphere in Iran that was conducive to Ahmadinejad winning an election.
Bush’s economic war on Ahmadinejad contributed to the failure of his term in office.
Obama’s overtures to Iran helped undermine one of the main pillars of Ahmadinejad’s appeal.
This example is far from perfect, but imagine what would have happened if bin-Laden’s 2004 pre-election message had been different. Imagine if it had been totally conciliatory and he had said that he was not going to threaten America any more. Maybe Bush would have received credit. Or, maybe, people’s fears would have been alleviated enough to vote on more economic issues, and vote for John Kerry.
Many people think UBL’s message gave Bush a late boost that might just have swung the election. I am agnostic on that, but it really does matter what Obama says, and it can swing votes.
In saying that about the 2004 election I am not denigrating the intelligence of the American voters, and in saying this about the 2009 Iranian elections, I am not denigrating the intelligence of the Iranian voters. In neither case, was a message from a foreigner the sole factor, or necessarily the determining factor.
But U.S. policy to Iran, including Bush’s threats and war on Iran’s economy, all had an effect on the 2005 and the 2009 elections.
OK, BooMan, I get what you are saying. I just get bloody sick and tired of hearing people saying that Obama won the Lebanese election for America (Oh, yea, for all practical purposes that is what a lot of people have said), and now that it was the “Obama effect” that caused the ostensible real results of the Iranian election, and even that it was the “Obama effect” that has brought them to the streets by the hundreds of thousands. What an insult. As if brown people in west and central Asia can’t decide for themselves and try to forge their own destiny independently of the Empire.
Oh – and of course all this business about the “Obama effect” in Iran depends on the so far very thinly supported assumption that the election really was rigged, doesn’t it?
Well, I don’t think Boo did this, exactly. He cited “openness to Obama’s overtures” as one factor in the reform movement he salutes.
Nevertheless, I agree with you that it’s one factor too many. Look — here from my vantage point (watching on a computer screen, in other words), I’ve seen many signs and heard many chants that included various proper names. “Obama” and “USA” are not among them.
Moreover, even if — I say “if”, and think it’s a highly implausible “if” — Obama’s election, presidency, and speech had a significant role in what’s going on in Iran right now, it would be not only politically stupid, but cognitively worthless, for an American to say so. It smacks of the self-congratulatory insertion of this country into the center of every narrative (at least, every narrative “we” approve of) of which just about everybody else is obviously, and deservedly, sick. If others decide that the USA or Obama have been significant factors, let ’em say so. WE don’t have the right to say so, and to say so anyway stinks of presumption.
Just … stop it.
(Obama seems to know this, by the way.)
“If others decide that the USA or Obama have been significant factors, let ’em say so. WE don’t have the right to say so, and to say so anyway stinks of presumption.“
Right on. It is yet another deeply offensive American habit to tell third world people, usually in a very self-congratulatory way, why they did whatever they did – as if third world people are incapable of understanding their own actions much, much better than Americans are. It is presumptuous, patronizing, condescending, and narcissistic. Not to mention insulting to the intelligence.
If BooMan’s analysis is off the mark, then you will need to explain more clearly, because his take on it is awfully close to what I took away from your message.
Guthman, more often than not I agree with you on substance if not magnitude or intensity, but not this time. I do not have the energy, nor do I wish to expend the time to take all this apart bit by bit, so I will simply say that it appears to be based on pure ideology, and, perhaps for that reason, is not well founded or fair, and is distinctly lacking in common sense as ideologically-based arguments frequently are.
The old saw about one being free to start one’s own blog comes immediately to mind.
Also a visual reality from a US allie today.
France 24 | Police use violence to break up Tbilisi protest | France 24
Btw. I admire the courage of the Iranians to stand up and fight for what they want. However, why their fight is more newsworthy than the fight of the Georgians isn’t quite clear to me.
Are you currently auditioning for a job as a spokesmodel for the Iranian dictatorship? That’s as relevant a question as yours.
What is moving and striking about that picture is not the beating, but that it is women that are rushing to the victims aid.
If that pattern holds up, and the thugs start beating women in public, the Iranian government will fall into dust.
nalbar
Those thugs beat women all the time – for not dressing “properly”, or for wearing makeup, or for not behaving “correctly” in public. And in some parts of the country even allegations of certain categories of “wrong” kind of behaviour can result in far worse than mere beating.
Yes, Hurria, I am aware that the women in Iran are oppressed and take regular beatings (though not quite as many public ones as you imply).
But this is different, it is not a single woman being picked on by a gang, with bystanders afraid to intervene. This would be the situation of troops attacking groups of women who might be chanting ‘God is Great’. While the whole country is on edge. It’s a different dynamic. And you know it.
nalbar
Nalbar, please save the finger-wagging tone for someone who deserves it.
When hasn’t there been an oppressive regime in Iran? Well, certainly at least not for a century going back to Daddy Pahlavi. Yes, I’ve ignored the two or three years of Mossadeq who had later to live under house arrest for a good many years because of U.S. preferences. And then the deeply mournful tone of the particular kind of Islam. So much emotion. Black. And now this, which, I suppose, is fast going no where. How can we understand it? We can’t. But it is an obsession, this former U.S. client state with then triple A status. And now this, again. The real news of the day is the Israeli PM’s gift to the world.
.
Furthermore between 200-300 police and Basij came into the dormitories and attacked and beat the students. They Basij pushed some students off the balconies and some students jumped themselves out of fear for their lives.
… Iranian police has destroyed the dormitory at Tehran University, the biggest university in Iran. Iranian police acts directly under leader rule (Khamenei).
A university student is injured by wild iranian police (Basij)
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."What has been most interesting to me, in monitoring coverage today, is that despite the largest anti-regime protests in the history of the Iranian revolution, Western (especially US) pundits, reporters, and “experts” are treating the election results as though they will stand and the protests as irrelevant. Maybe they will stand, maybe they won’t; regardless, the protests, which may well be larger tomorrow, are an historic event. This attitude (which the NYT article BooMan highlighted is a good example of, but hardly the only one) says far more about the authors’ contempt for the power and relevance of ordinary people than it does about events in Iran.
They need a more extreme Iran as a bogeyman to which Israel can point to as a threat to their existence.
for that reason I’d say the coverage is more wishful thinking than actual coverage
I think it’s more about 1) ignorance re voting fraud, willful or otherwise, and 2) if they point fingers in Iran, they’ll have to do the same the next time our vote is stolen at home. And as long as they stole it “fair and square” I don’t think the Times would go to bat on this issue.
Well, Americans will roll over for pretty much anything except maybe changing the taste of Pepsi, so why would the press think otherwise about anyone else?
Actually I am rather impressed that the digital TV transition has not sparked riots.
.
Website banned in Iran by government a few hours ago.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."http://www.youtube.com/citizentube
Wonder how long the Police will continue to harm peaceful protesters.
Remember America in the ’70’s? You know, Berkeley, Kent State, etc.?
Or the 2008 conventions.
no…
Better yet, study the history of Palestinian peaceful protest first against Zionism, then against Israel’s actions.
The monotheists’ god would most certainly approve. Just read your “holy book” of choice.
So are you exempting Christianity because it’s trinitarian? (Or Polytheistic as some would have it!)
“the Iranian election belongs not to Frank Gaffney or John Bolton, or to the Obama administration – but to the Iranian people themselves.
“As Americans, we need to remove ourselves from the process and allow it to unfold on Iranian terms.
“