Date

IMAGINE

What if Israel bombs Iran?

Just about everyone in the world will assume that the U.S. was complicit

30-Mar-2012 (12 comments)
Imagine that you wake up tomorrow morning and discover that during the night. Israeli planes had conducted a bombing raid on Iran. How would your world have changed? Apart from the sensational headlines and breathless reports, the initial change might not be very significant. You would probably want to know whether the United States approved or assisted in the attack on Iran's nuclear sites. In fact, it doesn't really matter>>>

KASRAVI

حماسه فراموش شده

آشنائی من با احمد کسروی

30-Mar-2012 (16 comments)
کسروی نشان میداد که پایگاه اجتماعی ارتجاع در ایران همان توده های مردم زحمتکش اند که آن روزها رفقای چپ همه امیدشان را به آنان بسته بودند. و اتفاقا این این تحصیل کرده ها و فرنگ رفته ها بودند که از حقوق بشر و آزادی دفاع می‌کردند، و در مقابل هم این رنجبران و زحمتکشان شهری بودند که به آزادیخواهان هجوم می‌بردند و بر رویشان چاقو و چماق می‌کشیدند>>>

STORY

Jinn

I looked down and noticed he had hooves instead of fee

30-Mar-2012 (5 comments)
My ominous association with ghosts goes back to my early childhood years. Aunt Sedighe, my father’s youngest sister lived in Shoushtar, one of the oldest cities in the world, dating back to Achaemenian dynasty (400 BC). Shoushtar used to be the winter capital of Sassanian dynasty and it was built by the Karoun River. The river was channeled to form a trench around the city>>>

POETRY

عشق یافته
30-Mar-2012 (4 comments)
این بار عشق را
در روز اوّل نوروز
بر زمین یافتم
و آن را از زمین
برداشتم
عیدی نوروزی.
>>>

VIEW

Obama’s “Flexibility” Gaffe

In Tehran it may have a different resonance

28-Mar-2012 (3 comments)
The whole sales pitch behind the U.S.-sponsored European missile defense program in Eastern Europe has been about thwarting the Iranian missile strikes on European targets. If after the election, the U.S. would become “flexible” – meaning, conciliatory and concessionary – with respect to the deployment of missile defense in Eastern Europe, it would be in part because the Iranian threat – actual or perceived – is no longer there or substantially degraded>>>

CRIMINAL

صادق لاریجانی میرغضب جمهوری اسلامی

رژیم ایران پرونده چنان سنگینی دارد که جامعه جهانی در متهم کردن عالی‌ترین مقامات آن به جنایات ضد بشری مشکل چندانی نخواهد داشت

28-Mar-2012 (4 comments)
اگر برای نشان دادن درجه سبعیت، وحشی‌گری، بدویت فرهنگی و ایدئولوژیکی رژیم حاکم بر ایران تنها یک دلیل و شاخص لازم بود همین نحوه رفتار و برخورد آن به مسئله اعدام کفایت می‌کرد. رژیم‌های زیادی در جهان به کشتن و بستن و سرکوب و زندان و شکنجه دست می‌زنند. ولی همه این کردارها یک توجیه «عقلی» دارد: حفظ یا اعمال قدرت. کشتن خونسردانه فرد اسیر و بی‌دفاع و بی‌خطر که به نام اعدام انجام می‌شود، اما، کمتر توجیهی در حفظ یا اعمال قدرت می‌توان داشته باشد>>>

REPLY

In defence of nude protest

Dim-witted idiocy or revolutionary?

28-Mar-2012 (8 comments)
Azar Majedi of the Organisation of Women’s Liberation - Iran has attacked the Nude Photo Revolutionary Calendar and supporting video of Iranian women as being similar to the tabloids (namely the Sun’s page 3), ‘dim-witted idiocy’ and ‘buffoonery’ and Golshifteh Farahani’s nudity as ‘commercial’ whilst supporting Egyptian blogger Aliaa Magda Elmahdy’s nudity. Her attack is a masterpiece in dishonesty, hypocrisy, and regressive politics. Let me explain>>>

LIFE

30 Years Later

Where did the dreams go?

28-Mar-2012 (9 comments)
This writing is not about my life but about a generation of Iranians between the ages of 45-55 who left Iran around the revolution. It’s the naked truth about an entire generation of exiled people who have lost their identity, their hopes and dreams, feel alone and lost and for the most part live in severe undiagnosed depression>>>

IDEAS

Cultural Lumpenism (4)

Keeping up appearances at any cost is Iran’s national lumpenist trait

28-Mar-2012
It is obvious that for Dowlat-Abadi, the origin of censorship by the “cultural management” is not its fundamentalist ideology and repressive attitude, but only its dogmatism. That’s why a few sentences ahead, he sympathized with the censors of the Ministry of Islamic Guidance as victims of their own actions. He said, “This discourse that they want to hear and hear it from the mouth of others, because they don’t hear it, they constantly repeat it themselves; what’s the use?">>>

TALK

Breaking the Ice

Pushing to end U.S.-Iran silent treatment

26-Mar-2012 (3 comments)
Thankfully, a commonsense and long overdue proposal has been introduced in Congress by Representative Barbara Lee (Democrat, California) and nine other Representatives to dispense with the absurd "no contact" policy on the U.S. side. The bill, the Prevent Iran from Acquiring Nuclear Weapons and Stop War Through Diplomacy Act (H.R.4173) would finally lift the ban on talking to Iran. Not only would eliminating this policy put us in a much better position to resolve the standoff, it will put the onus on the Iranians>>>

ROSTAM

اندرزادن رستم...

... و فرستادن عکس سه بعدی او مر نیایش، سام را

26-Mar-2012
زال ورودابه پس از پشت سر گذاشتن یک رشته درد سرهائی که بر سر راه بهم رسیدن آنها بوجود آمده بود، سر انجام پیوند زناشوئی می بندند و بهم می رسند. اندکی ازین پیوند نمی گذرد که رودابه باردار می شود و هرچه به ماه های آخر بارداری نزدیکتر می شود، شکمش فربه تر، بدنش سنگین تر شده، رخش زردفام می شود تا به جائی که می انگارد بجای کودک، سنگی در میان دارد>>>

IDEAS

Who Deceived Whom?

“An Islamic Republic, not a word more and not a word less”. Which part didn't you understand?

26-Mar-2012 (4 comments)
Recently I finished a book by Ali Gharib. The name of this book was “Istadeh bar armaan” The writer in this book attempts to give an accurate account of events leading to the 1979 revolution and Khomeini becoming a leader. Then he goes on to quote from the memoirs of people like Banisadr, Bazargan, Yazdi, Soroosh and many others as to how Khomeini betrayed all of them along with Iranian nation and diverted their revolution into the path that it was never supposed to take >>>

IDEAS

Cultural Lumpenism (3)

The main force of fascist groups often used as toys

26-Mar-2012 (one comment)
Based on either conformism or ignorance, lumpens claim not to be interested in political activity They do not have any clear political beliefs, they lack mental stability and are confused about political matters. Dowlat-Abadi declared his non-involvement in politics in a December 2011 interview he had with Ali Shoroughi and Sheema Bahremand from Shargh Newspaper, entitled: “Mahmoud Dowlat-Abadi: We are people as well”>>>

POETRY

خواب آينه
26-Mar-2012 (2 comments)
نسيم سرد پاييزى قلمى است مرموز
که رندانه زمستان را نقش ميزند.
و مرا که در آغوش سرخ و زرد و نارنجى
در بستر برگهاى ريخته عشق ميورزم
به ژرفناى مايوس حريرى سفيد
>>>

REALITY

Shahs of Tehrangeles

I kind of wish what happened in Vegas stayed in Vegas

24-Mar-2012 (11 comments)
I watched two very different Iranian worlds depicted in the powerful medium of film: one reality meticulously masked as fiction, one semi-fiction frivolously packaged as reality. Bear with me. 1. The first is the 2012 Academy Award winner for Best Foreign Language Film -- A Separation -- written and directed by Asghar Farhadi. 2. The second is episode 2 of the reality TV show Shahs of Sunset: It's My Birthday Bitches produced by Ryan Seacrest Productions for Bravo>>>