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Thursday
May 3, 2001

* Looloo khor khoreh

Goli, you are not "ommol" and you are not old-fashioned ["Don't need gays"]. But you are over-reacting. And Tavakoli [""Don't need gays""], was this gay guy imposing anything on you or anyone else? He just said he's gay and he has a problem meeting up with his lover.

Did he say he wants to come over and rape your children? Did he say he's having an affair with your brother or husband? Did he say he has AIDS and wants to infect you? Is he even within a 1000 miles of where you are? Calm down baba! Looloo khor khoreh keh neest.

The Onion had a very funny article about people who are paranoid about gays and think they are trying to, well, read here.

You don't like gays? Okay... but do they have to drop dead? I'm not gay and same-sex relationships don't appeal to me. But I don't see homosexuality as a threat. The only thing gays are trying to impose is the right to be accepted as normal human beings just like you. Yes, normal... being gay is not a disease.

Shali

* Join the human race

I would like to point out to Golyjoon ["Don't need gays"] that the question to Kobra Khanom was not "about being gay" and to Tavakoli, ["Don't need gays"], that no one was imposing anything on him. It was a question about a long-distance relationship that was as valid a question for a straight relationship as a gay one.

All of the relationship questions addressed to Kobra Khanom involve some airing of private matters, and the writer provides some background details (eg. age, ethnicity, sexual orientation) that may or may not influence the answer. That's my rational response to Golyjoon and Tavakoli.

But the response I'm really feeling is: Join the human race, you idiots! Why should people be so offended at a reasonable, politely posed question about a serious relationship? After all, no one reacted to poor Saeed who wrote "I hate girls... Fuck them all."

Who really is imposing their views on others here?

Zara Houshmand

* Being different is not sickness

After reading the letters "Don't need gays" and "Don't need gays", I have to say that my first reaction was horror and disgust at my fellow Iranians' ignorance. This ignorance however, makes me feel not hatred but sorrow for people who label gays and lesbians as "sick".

Just because someone is different from you, it does not make them "sick". Should someone hate you solely due to the fact that you are Iranian?

Unfortunately, I have come to expect this view point from the elder members of our society who were raised to belive that gay people are ill; I am shocked, however, that a 22-year-old person feels this way.

I would really advise you to look within yourself to find out why you have this hatred. If you get to know people who are gay, I can assure you that you would not be frightened of or hate them.

I am by the way a 24-year-old woman who has been married for almost three years and I have been fortunate to have been raised in San Francisco with open minded parents. Some of the best people I know are gay.

You are doing yourself injustice by not getting to know many wonderful people in the world due to your lack of understanding. Open your mind to new ideas and you will be amazed of what you can learn.

Jasmine

* Not ommol, but clueless

Fascists in Germany didn't think we need Jews and our 22-year-old "modern" Iranian woman thinks we don't need gays, and we wonder why we end up with Khomeini. I don't know if the woman who wrote the response to "being gay" is ommol or not. But, she certainly is clueless about modernity and pluralism.

Naameh

* Just marry the guy

Your story ["The key"] is quite sad but if I may intrude in your life: Based on your writing I assume you are over 18 and you still have a job. All it takes to be with the man you love is a $900 roundtrip ticket to Tehran, a few forms for a "fiancé visa" and one hell-of-a-willpower to go against the family.

Don't worry about your children witnessing family tensions! We all have seen worse and have grown up relatively normal.

Why not return to Iran and claim your love? This will be a great story to tell your children, and they will be all proud of you! They will be a little upset about having six fingers, but they still will be proud of you! I'll even chip in for the ticket :-)

Ramin Tabib

* Rather feel pain

I very much enjoyed reading your article "The key" :-)

Sweet, honest, passionate .... can really feel your pain coming through. And to answer your question! YES! I do feel what you are saying. Personally, no matter how painful an sad, I much rather have experienced this than never. Can you imagine going through life and never feeling this way for anyone?

Farzaneh Rouhani

PS "... To the world, you might be one person; but to one, you might be the world ..."

* Maybe I should be najib

I came from a family which most Iranians call it a "GOOD FAMILY". My parents are both educated and wealthy but somehow my parents are so against "DATING" ["The key"]. I am living in U.S, so the guys I usually meet, want to go on a date at least for one year before you can even talk about marriage.

Every time I go out with some one and it doesn't work out, I feel so bad. I have to sit with my dad for hours and hours and try to explain why it didn't work out. Even though I only went out with very few people, my dad feels that I have dated the whole Iranian community in U.S.

I do have my Persian values, and I do believe in marriage and family values, but I really don't know what to do. I am 23-years old but I feel I can never find the right person. I do have a lot of friends (guys and girls) but they all know how my parents think so they are kind of scared. I respect and love my parents very much.

I also do believe that as long as I am living in their house I have to respect how they feel. I don't want to move out, because I don't think it will look good in my family. Sometimes I feel maybe I shouldn't be so "khanoom" and "najib". I really don't know what to do. I know there are a lot of Persian girls out there that have the same problem as I do. So I am writing this from all of us.

Golyjoon

* Hazrat Abolfazl & the Shah

Can we start charity at home and have a civilized discussion ? (Babak ["Ignorants brought mollas"] , and others) Can we stop using phrases like "ignorant Peerooz" , " smart asses who don't know" or 70 million "idiots" who "can not educate themselves" and need a guardian to rule over them?

All I am saying is that CHESHMEH BAAYAD AZ KHOODASH BEJOOSHAD otherwise all the clean water that supposedly thePahlavis and others put in this dirty "ignorant" pond putrefied (GANDID). And it should not be repeated .

Winston Churchill once said "Democracy is a bad system, others are worse." If we have true democracy all other good things you mentioned eventually will come with it. And you know that democracy is a process that should be learned and can not be injected in people. And each nation has to learn it its own way based on its own culture. A good leader can speed up this process.

By the way those "ignorants" who saw Khomeini's face on the moon are the same people who believed HAZRAT ABOLFAZL saved Mohammad Reza Shah from falling from the horse and hitting a rock.

At any rate those 60-70 million "idiots" back home, are going through the hell to pay for their rulers' sins of selfishness, by trying to educate themselves through the process of trial and error, which started 150 years ago and interrupted by dictators.

Eventually after "A 1000 years" and hopefully sooner, they will get there, if another dictator does not postpone it again. There is no other way. We have tried them all, several times.

Peerooz

* Molla apologist

Ms. Seterah Sabety in her second article, "Reza Shah was no Mossadegh" leaves us no doubt that she is an apologist for the current Islamic government in Iran. With all due respect, it is disappointing to read an article that is so full of elitism, hypocrisy and historical inconsistency. Ms. Sabety claims that her late father was a senator during the rein of Reza Shah! This is can not be. Ms. Sabety, the 1905 Constitution did not provide for a bi-cameral parliamentary system. The First Senate convened in 1949 after the Supplemental Laws to the Constitution provided for an upper house. (Later Dr. Mossadegh dissolved the Senate and he the dissolve the Majlis and sought to rule by decree.)

Even if your father was in any position of legislation, this is a lucid barometer of the level of your hypocrisy. There is no argument that Reza Shah would not allow any independent thinker to occupy the seat of a legislator. If Reza Shah was so bad, how come your father chose to become a rubber stamp parliamentarian? The Late Shah had many faults but his worst shortcoming was his tendency to surround himself with "magasan dor shirini!" These inner-circle opportunists encouraged him to do his wrongs to gain his favor. However, later they abandoned him hoping new rulers would grease their pot. By her own admission, Sabety family was part of this inner-circle of opportunists >>> FULL TEXT

H. M. Jalili

* Railroad for Alies

I have some comments on the North-South railroad that Reza Shah built. I think it was built with funding of Iranian government (people) so that the Allies could carry war supplies to the Russian front. How else could you explain a railroad that would connect a port in the Persian Gulf with another port at the Caspian? A more logical South/North railway would have connected the population centers (Shiraz/Isfahan/Tehran) in that route.

SE

* Who should get a C-Section?

Thank you for your interesting article ["Dr. Butcher"]. I am a medical student at the University of Alabama at Birmingham with the interest of becoming an obstetrician/gynecologist. I had no idea about the prevalence of cesarean sections performed in Iran. I found an interesting article on WebMD.com about the pro's and con's of vaginal vs. cesarean births. here is the link to the article ---> WebMD - Who Should Have a C-Section?

There are also other Question and Answer articles that you may want to read and inform your readers about.

Mellissa Esfahani

* It's YOUR site, but...

I know it is YOUR web site and you have the right to do whatever you want with it, but lately your "Cover Stories" are becoming more and more obscure and irrelevant. Seriously, what possible interest would people have in the photos and the photos of photos ["Musicman"]?

TS

* Don't know what I'm talking about

Dear iranian.com, hello! My name is Fariba Forouhar and l am Leila's manager. I saw your web site and I saw some part about my sisiter Leila Forouhar some rang information about Shahram and Leila and also about the Leila as a drug addict.

I understand you want to make some thing difrent that people goes to the other page but is not right to write lock this does are not truth story you make it and it is more bether news that you can make for a artist and insted of negative word and subject. It is bether things that you can write.

And also I saw you writhing all rights reseved. About what and who that is mean you can write anything you wants. Any way our e-mail is leilamusic@cs.com and you can contact with us.

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