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Poseurs or Revolutionaries?
30-Aug-2009
Since Election Day and the uprising that ensued those who come back from Iran speak with different degrees of detail and candor about the events. Their stories are more interesting in terms of revealing their character than of revealing any useful information regarding the protests. There are those who immediately tell me that they do not want to be quoted in any articles that I may write. There are others who are more forthcoming and allow me to tell their story without revealing their name. There are those who are so scared that they avoid me altogether. There are also those who regret having talked to me when they see their comments in black and white -- I had one person reprimand me after I had quoted him anonymously and published the article even though he initially wanted to be quoted. My friends on Facebook who want to go back to Iran delete me although some of those who live in Iran and are active online have been faithful.
The most overly cautious Iranians are the ones who have homes abroad and inside Iran. They just don’t want to give up their lifestyle of living in Western cities and going back, every year or few months, for a quick nostalgia cure and vacation, to Iran. They are more cautious than those who are stuck there and do not have the means to travel or live abroad. Even some academic friends who were very vocal about the Gaza massacre or Obama’s campaign are now suspiciously silent not wanting to risk those research trips back to the dusty libraries of the old country.
No Iranian coming from Iran will admit that they did not participate or witness anything during the protests. Iranians hate to be thought of as ignorant or unaware. Their arrogant and boastful nature makes them embellish or lie outright. The way I can tell if they are lying or not is if they describe things like bbc or voa would. They talk about what happened in Isphahan and Tehran University on a given night with equal authority when they could not possibly have been at both places at once and were most likely in front of their TV, glass of Scotch in hand, their only difference from me being that their living room is in Shahrak Gharb and mine here in France.
Many people in Iran only witness what is going on in the streets and prisons from the comfort of their living rooms and in front of their satellite TV screens! Yet they boast of their active participation in the protests. One middle aged man, came back recently from Iran, I saw him at the July 25th protest here in our town where less people showed up than at my friend’s birthday party. Like many others that day he was wearing a cap, big sunglasses and scarf to hide his face, he stood way back and did not repeat any chants or slogans, he boasted to me of chasing plain clothes men on motorbikes during the recent protests in Iran. I thought to myself: how can this guy, who worked for the foreign ministry under the Shah, who covers himself so much here in the safety of Place Massena, have had the courage to go chasing motor-biker bassijis in Tehran? When I remembered how he cheated when we played doubles last summer I decided that perhaps he was not a good source.
Another woman, in her seventies but looking more like in her forties thanks to the good skin and better botox, told me in a dramatic, poetic, Forough Farokhzad high voice, about how she went to all the protests in Tehran with her friends in a minibus but refused to come to the one here because, “you know, I still have my papa’s factory there and have to come and go. They may have spies photographing people.”
One other extremely well-aged woman in her seventies, who was a notorious beauty and in her heyday had broken up at least three marriages, recounted how a high ranking army officer, presumably smitten by her looks, helped her and her friends by giving them a ride home when they were stuck in the middle of a street fight. Everything for this woman still comes back to advertising her good looks and ability to seduce!
One guy an octogenarian Azeri ex-army officer under the Shah whom, the monarchists here claim was a Tudeh party member, told me that he was on the street every day and once he, personally, talked the basiji out of entering his street in Tehran and arresting the youth of the neighborhood. His wife told me a little later that day, by the pool in our residence, “We were so scared we never left the house. We watched bbc and voa all day long!”
Another woman in her forties looking hard for a third husband and doing business in Iran was down right aggressive. She lashed out at me about the uselessness of those of us who live abroad and how we are so blind to the real suffering taking place in Iran, how we are all ‘talk and no action’, how we have no ‘roots’ in Iran and do not understand the plight of ordinary Iranians. She complained about how those of us living outside Iran refuse to take risks while the youth inside was daily risking life and limb. When I agreed with her and asked her if I could quote her she snapped, “No, no, I have to go back soon I have a big deal coming through with the Koreans!” I replied meekly, “yes, but I will not use your name.” She went on to say, “no I rather not take the risk.”
Even the useful sources that have given me the one or two real street level accounts of what is happening seem to begrudge me having written about it. One such person was so offended by one of the comments, expressing doubt, below one of my articles that she stopped communicating altogether. Another one wrote to me, “you who live comfortable lives in Europe and the U.S will never know what it feels like to live here, I will never leave Iran while so many are perishing in the prisons.” Two weeks later she was in Dubai at her father’s villa.
What many Iranians inside Iran don’t seem to comprehend is how some of us outside Iran are still very attached to the motherland. They think that life here is a bed of roses. They do not realize that you can live in Nice, France and be poor and unhappy. They don’t realize that some of us never recuperated from the damage inflicted upon us by the ’79 Revolution. They cannot fathom that we still cry about Iran, that we feel a loss so great that nothing can replace it. They cannot understand how the dream of living a simple life in Iran, going to work and raising our children there, has been denied us. They cannot see how much we have suffered in these past thirty years from our absence in a place we still feel belongs to us. They refuse to grasp how while this election uprising expressed their plight it also expressed ours. They cannot perceive that someone like me who lives in another country, writes in another language can still have such a painful and real yearning to go back, to belong to that place, to make it once again her own.
I lived in Iran a few years ago for four years which was long enough to see how many inside Iran live luxurious, tax free lives in their opulent cocoons. They have maids and drivers, they have lavish parties, even during these protests I know of at least two huge weddings and three wild parties that have taken place in Tehran. I personally know more people who attended these gatherings than those who took to the streets to protest!
There are also those friends living abroad who simply do not want to talk about Iran because it will ruin their mood. People here are tired of me and look the other way if they see me at a party or near the pool. I have come to embody our collective tragedy! This ‘election uprising’ has gone on too long and they simply do not want to be bothered with it. One friend on the phone recently cut me short and said, “Let’s talk about nice things!”
I’m aware that the people I know are not the majority; I also know that there are genuine freedom fighters outside and inside Iran. I love and admire those dead, in jail or actively engaged in the movement. What peeves me is another kind of Iranian whom I think is in many ways responsible for the mess we are in: the one who thinks first of personal profit and safety, the one who poses as a patriot and a revolutionary while he lies and collaborates, kowtowing to the regime when it suits him, the one who criticizes those of us living in the West while he himself thinks only of his own welfare and security never stepping foot outside his luxury apartment in Tehran to attend a demonstration.
These kinds of compatriots refuse to see that we have a simple and common goal: a democratic Iran. They are poseurs even in a time of great national emergency they worry more about how they seem than whom they are or for what they fight. They mistrust, feel superior and resent in a very Iranian way everyone else’s intentions and are oblivious to the need for a collective consciousness. What is incredibly annoying about these types of compatriots is the fact that they think those who do not think or act like them are idiots!
A few times I have been praised for courage in putting my own name to my writings about the uprising. Usually, though, people either think I am stupid for risking not being able to go back or they think that since all my inheritance has already been confiscated I have no real reason to want to go back. They do not consider that I have a mother who is old and whom I badly want to be able to visit should she fall ill, they do not realize that I simply love that place we all call home and the thought of never seeing her is unbearably heart wrenching.
Iranians sneer at this kind of sentimentality. The worse thing that has happened these thirty years is that Iranians have become callous and bazaari pragmatism has replaced that sense of empathy that gives Iranians their signature tolerance and hospitality. This is not a nation that values love and courage it is rather a nation that only respects shrewdness: where as before we looked up to the likes of Golesorkhi now we admire Rafsanjani!
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Magasaak
by KouroshS on Tue Sep 08, 2009 02:01 PM PDTWho could not be fascinated with you? I mean you and your man dar avordi plots and stroy lines. It is so captivating LOL.
Beyond Delusion! (to KouroshS)
by kharmagas on Tue Sep 08, 2009 09:16 AM PDTKourosh, so far I thought you were just fascinated with Mr. Kashani, ..., and Mr. mossadA ...., and King Jamshid, now you are fascinated with a male kharmagass! That goes beyond delusion!
Delusional exiles! (to Kourosh)
by kharmagas on Tue Sep 08, 2009 05:53 AM PDT"since i really have no idea what you are talking about"
I would have been surprized if it were otherwise! Dai Jan Napelon also had no idea about many things they told him: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBwrZr6qHTg ! ..... there is however a difference between you and Dai Jan, he was not an exile-e and reached your level of delusion!
Taghdeem be kharmagas joon
by KouroshS on Mon Sep 07, 2009 10:27 PM PDT//www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3AtG9yjzgY
Excuse me
by KouroshS on Mon Sep 07, 2009 09:10 PM PDTAs we say in what? persisn??? You are so out of control.
since i really have no idea what you are talking about, and more than likely neither do you (Possibly due to over-medicating yourself) I seriously think that the Word "delusional" suits you the best. next time you are about to post a common, at least have the decency of not loading up on alcohol or any kind of medication.
Shabe khoobi dashte bash. Try to get some sleep.
Delusional exiles! (to Dai Jan Kourosh)
by kharmagas on Mon Sep 07, 2009 12:51 PM PDTAs we say in Persisn, 'in gooyo in meidan', your experiences in wars of Mammassani and Kazeron (Dai Jan Napoleon part 1: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBwrZr6qHTg) should help you to embark on your quest for "freedom" of Iran .
Kharamagase azizam
by KouroshS on Mon Sep 07, 2009 10:42 AM PDTYour sense of realism is in dande khalas and mixed with a bit of the same delusion that you use to lable us. You just go a little too far with it. That is all!
In the West? Mostly Poseurs, some Revolutionaries
by dingo daddy En passant on Sun Sep 06, 2009 04:46 PM PDTIn Iran, it is the reverse.
Delusional exiles (thanks Kourosh!)
by kharmagas on Sun Sep 06, 2009 11:25 AM PDTKourosh jan, thanks for the complement ... as I said below I see Iran as a glass half full ...... my perception about delusional exiles stems from realism not bitterness.
Kharmags
by KouroshS on Sun Sep 06, 2009 10:50 AM PDTHas anyone ever mentioned to you ... How should i say this... You have such a dry and mind-numbing sense of humor??
Try to enjoy your sunday and don't stay bitter.
well ... Kourosh!
by kharmagas on Sun Sep 06, 2009 10:37 AM PDT"Has it ever ocurred to you that the 100 army men was mentioned maybe as a starting point and a first step?"
... sure, Kourosh jan, if King Jamshid's 100 men army has you (another exile) as it's toopKhanechi, all the equations might change, there will be a new balance of power, ..., the whole IRI and the green Qmmander will be blown away!
Kharmagas
by KouroshS on Sun Sep 06, 2009 09:22 AM PDTOh. You are not Anannymous 8? LOL oops. My bad. You know i am getting OLD like the rest of SOME of you folks. It is ok though Despite the :) sign, i know that it makes you mad to be mistaken with anaymous 8. So don't be angry.
I Doubt if your commader even knows what color he has chosen to represent his views Yet.
You can not be sure how many years he has spent outside of iran. How can you really know? Why should years of stayin away from country make anyone delusional? Based on your assertion, more than half iranians abroad are delusional and we should not count on what say they have in all of this.
Has it ever ocurred to you that the 100 army men was mentioned maybe as a starting point and a first step?
Delusional exiles (to KouroshS)
by kharmagas on Sun Sep 06, 2009 07:28 AM PDTKourosh, although I beleive at this juncture greens would have been better for Iran, I don't care that much for them, and therefore my "commander" can not be a green! Why would anyone (other than khodies) want to spend any serious amount of energy to replace the existing corruption and nepotism with Rafsanjanie's nepotism and corruption (as the dominant....)?
My disagreement with extremists such as king Jamshid .... is not because I think they are entirely wrong, ..., but because I believe years of being outside Iran has turned them into delusional exiles who think they can change the country with a 100 men army ......
BTW, Kourosh jan, I am not Anonymous8? Why did you confuse me with him :)
Kharmagas Ananymous 8
by KouroshS on Sat Sep 05, 2009 11:21 PM PDTI will accept that position based on two conditions:
1- If you will be my commanding officer and my immediate superior.
2- if your commander stops using "your argument is devoid of substance" in every single rebuttle. You know, it is getting way too old.
Call my secretary when you are ready to sign the paperworks:)
OK, Jamshid, thanks for the advice, still comedy though
by Q on Sat Sep 05, 2009 07:27 PM PDTthe tragedy that your petty existence is, and for the future that is awaiting you in afterlife, if there is one.
Yea, I really should value religious advice "az khoda betars" from someone who is not sure there is an afterlife!!!
complete lack of substance as usual.
Natalia: Yes, some people can learn from mistakes. Some others have personalities that gravitate to extremism. The cause or the environment is not important. If those people still don't understand that there is such thing as nuance in the world, then they surely haven't yet learned from their mistakes.
Sad Chicago Dad
by Natalia Alvarado-Alvarez on Sat Sep 05, 2009 06:54 PM PDTI think it would be good for you to know that Jamshid and Q have had an allergic reaction to each other since the beginning of blogging on this web site. They are on extreme opposites on many issues.
I really don't see this changing anytime soon.
solh
Oh Q, thanks for the tragey, but no thanks
by jamshid on Sat Sep 05, 2009 06:49 PM PDTThat is, for the tragedy that your petty existence is, and for the future that is awaiting you in afterlife, if there is one. You believe in Islam's version of God, don't you? You can make fun and jokes about people's pain and miiseries. You can make fun at their anger too. But what about God's anger? Go read your own Koran, it'll tell you, in many verses and in very descriptive ways, what it will be like for folks like you when you become the recipient of God's wrath.
Trust me, I have read the Koran several times and in two languages. Go dig it out. It's there. Your sorry future that is.
As we say in farsi, boro khejaalat bekesh, boro az khoda betars.
RE: Q
by Natalia Alvarado-Alvarez on Sat Sep 05, 2009 06:49 PM PDTWell, I would like to humbly say that one can learn from past experiences. One gains wisdom.
Re: KouroshS
by jamshid on Sat Sep 05, 2009 06:35 PM PDTThank you for your kind remarks. We should always remember that the cold blooded murderers and rapists of the IRI regime do not reside only in Iran. They lurk abroad too, and some in this very site.
Although in here, they do not enjoy the same kind of criminal abilities they have in Iran, but the signature of their cold bloodedness is the same everywhere they speak.
I don't know if there is a God or not. But if there is one, I am certain that he has a special place reserved in hell for these enablers of murder and rape.
the 100 men army (to Kourosh jaan)
by kharmagas on Sat Sep 05, 2009 08:46 AM PDTKourosh, Jamshid has been tossing around the idea of 100 men army for sometime ..., it just occured to me that I should recommend you for his guy in charge of toopkhAneh if it is alright with you?
Iran, a glass half full!
by kharmagas on Sat Sep 05, 2009 08:32 AM PDTTimely article Khanome Setareh. I wish many of the after election events had not taken place, but at the same time I believe most Iranians in both sides showed high level of maturity considering the overly charged internet influenced atmosphere. As Robert Baer pointed out (see //iranian.com/main/2009/sep/craft-spying ) ... Iranians are ahead/far ahead of many other neighboring countries in terms of political maturity....., I rather look at the glass half full.
Oh Jamshid, thanks for the comedy
by Q on Sat Sep 05, 2009 12:52 AM PDTYou really wouldn't know truth if it hit you over the head. Isn't your biggest claim to fame the fact that you've been fooled in the past? Do you somehow think that experience makes you a better judge?
You can clown around by ignoring most of my words and taking some pathetically out of context for selfish juvenile attack purposes. Anybody who wants to (includeing SCD) can read my full comment below. No one really needs you to "interpret" for them.
This is fact. You can deny it, you can turn it around and make it sound like I'm defending it... whatever... I really don't care. But it is nothing short of the absolute truth. So, I will repeat it. Any excess noise is yours alone:
I have heard of prison guards, raping, abusing and killing inmates. I have heard of Police killing black people and assisting in lynchings. I have heard of FBI violating the law and carrying out extrajudicial assassinations, and illegal methods against "enemies of this country".
Rape is about power. It happens in many places where one set of people without adequate oversight have been place in control of the bodies of another. It is illegal in both Iran and the United states, but it gets abused in both palces.
note how I take the full paragraphs instead of chopping it up with ellipses like a dishonest lobbyist who doesn't have enough respect for the readers and thinks they can't just scroll down and read the original.
You really have the nerve to talk about "manipulation" of truth? That's the funniest thing I have heard today.
You want to live in a fantasy world where Americans are always the good guys? The joke is on you.
Jamshid
by KouroshS on Fri Sep 04, 2009 10:22 PM PDTThank you for speaking the truth. We need more people like you on this website.
Manipulatine the truth
by jamshid on Fri Sep 04, 2009 07:51 PM PDTWhen Sadchicagodad writes about Iranian protestors being murdered and raped, Q, this supporter of the regime of murder and rape, shamelessly responds:
"I have heard of prison guards, raping, abusing and killing inmates (in the US). Rape... happens in many places... It is illegal in both Iran and the United states, but it gets abused in both places."
Q, this insult to humanity, is equating our brave and noble youth who are fighting for their freedom to a bunch of murderers and rapists in US state prisons.
Violent crimes take place in most prisons in the world that house rapists, child molestors, murderers, thieves and other criminals.
But Sadchicagodad is not talking about criminals who are just thrown in an unsafe prison built specifically for society's worst criminals. He is talking about decent and peaceful citizens who are fighting for their basic human rights.
Q, has the audacity to equate the brutal rape and murder of decent freedom fighting Iranian citizens with violence committed among society's worst criminals in US state prisons.
Setareh Khanume
by sadchicagodad on Fri Sep 04, 2009 08:00 AM PDTYour kind words of condolence are most appreciated.
CD
Chicago Dad Aziz
by Setareh Sabety on Fri Sep 04, 2009 07:34 AM PDTSo incredibly sorry to hear of you and your wife's loss. I have teenagers too and I cannot imagine a worse pain than what you two had and have to go through. You are so courageous and strong I would never be able to do what you do and write like you do so poignantly and honestly about your loss.
It is very clear that your love for your wife and your deep faith keeps you going. I am really at a loss as to what to say other than to extend to you my sincerely felt sorrow for the loss of such a great son. may he rest in peace.
Ms. Sabety
by sadchicagodad on Fri Sep 04, 2009 07:02 AM PDTIf I could change my pseudonym to CD from SCD, I would do it. Unfortunately, the site doesn't permit me to do so.
The following links will answer your question about the "Sad."
//iranian.com/main/2007/my-real-iranian-0
//iranian.com/main/blog/sadchicagodad/writing-love-love-ill-never-forget
Best,
CD
yeah! I hadn't seen that. Q!
by Setareh Sabety on Fri Sep 04, 2009 04:59 AM PDTMaking the list above "an damaghi" and below my heroine, the young journalist, "Masih Alinejad"-- and with 2000 words & no video or pics at that!! thanks.
Setareh jan
by Q on Fri Sep 04, 2009 12:18 AM PDTfirst congratulations on making the most viewed list. This story deserves all the reads it got.
q you need to bad mouth ahmadinejad more actively with this crowd,
I accept this as friendly advice, but that's really not how I operate. "This crowd" needs to be respectful to other points of view, and abandon it's laughable conspiracy theories. It needs to at least try to comprehend the complexities and nuances of Iranian culture and politics. There's an unfortunate tendency for mob-style self-righteous mentality on this forum (I do not include SCD in the mob). But I really don't have time to go out of my way to constantly meet some bullshit "litmus test" just so a bunch of short-sighted obsessives consider me a khodi. Nakhastim!
These people really should be doing something useful with their lives.
ghobanet.
flying solo, anahid, bijan, littlebigman, Q, sadchicagodad, kave
by Setareh Sabety on Thu Sep 03, 2009 10:58 PM PDTthank you for your support and kind words. sadchicagodad and q your exchange was in fact very civil by the standards here. sadchicagodad you should not get angry with q he is just saying that unfortunately that sob ahmadinejad and that sorry idiot of a supreme leader have a considerable following in Iran still. which does not mean they have the majority it just means that the green movement needs to fight harder. if we get the oil workers, the bazaar and industrial workers on the side of the green movement then we will have much quicker progress. inshallah that will happen.
q you need to bad mouth ahmadinejad more actively with this crowd, you have much courage to actually spend so much time trying to prove a simple point.
sadchicagodad I was wondering why 'sad' whatever it is I hope you can be happy again. thank you for reminding my detractors to ease up on the aggressive language.
bigan and kaveh it is refreshing to see people with real names on this thread.