Payman Dailami

Dear Karim M, I know what you are saying, but others do not

Since the show highlights other propaganda outlets news (so it doesn't add new news info of its own) and takes a satirical look at the IRI, condeming Parazit is not smart. Especially since the creators have a conviction for the good ideas they are promoting. Condemning IRI and focussing regarding abuses of human rights, freedom and democracy are good things.  Instead of just using the word propaganda use detail, for example explain how the US govt uses Parazit to manipulate Iranians with the intention of hurting iranians, even more than they did so far with the IRI regime the USA brought to power, keeps in power and has benefitted from.  Explain in detail how do they use human rights, equality, democracy, freedom to visciously and brutally harm Iranians? 

Explain in detail the daily workings of US foreign policy for Iraq, Iran for the past 45 years.  It is almost as if the USA is pretending that by promoting a show which speaks in favor of democracy, human rights etc, they are trying to fool iranians by implying the USA wants these things and stands for these things in the world. That is a Big lie.  The late Shah of Iran, stood more for human rights, freedom and democracy in 35 years than the USA has in 135 years, remind how the US used these concepts against Iranians back then?

Bahmani to the rescue (not really!)

In his (spontaneous!) "article" in defense of Parazit, Bruce Bahmani says: "The truth is that the show is merely BROADCAST by the VOA."

What an unbelievable and irresponsible defense he puts up for Parazit!! Really?!! Parazit is only BROADCAST by the VOA, and it has nothing to do with VOA?!!! As government employees and contractors, it should not be difficult to find out how much of our tax dollars are paid to Kambiz Hosseini, Saman Arbabi, and Co., as government employees' salaries are public records. If they get paid by VOA, they work for VOA! Sheesh!

Parazit is a program produced by Voice of America whose mission is to broadcast US' foreign policy and propaganda into other countries. As I said before, Parazit is propaganda we like because we hate the Islamic Republic of Iran and are appalled by their atrocities. That's why many people are not sufficiently sensitive about Parazit's propaganda.

But Bahmani's silly and outrageous defense of Parazit is actually the worse case built against them by anyone! With friends like him, Parazit doesn't need enemies!

Imran Garda's Agenda

But the show was not just about Hosseini and Arbabi. Imran Garda,  the interviewer was the other party in the show. He was the one who would not let go of his own agenda.

He was stating it on Aljazeera TV for the whole world to see and hear.

Imran: "your show is considered U.S. propaganda".

"It's an obvious fact why denying it?"

Parazit couple's reaction actually was over-reaction.

And the following question by Imran: "You work for Hillary Clinton right?"

Their first reaction was 'Do We?'

It was continued with: "No we don't, we do the show for ourselves and for 'democracy' in Iran"

So in a way, Imran tried to 'expose' them as U.S. employees and hence, not considered to be in the same league as Arab Spring crowd.

And of course, Imran was performing too, in order to keep his own boss and in extension, his own audience satisfied.  

Dear Hooshang,

Isn't it amazing how the West-residing IRI Groupies on Iranian.com keep coming back under new and improved user names. I thought reincarnation was a Hindu belief, but I guess the followers of "Emam's Line" are capable of it as well. Amazing!  :-)   Take care.

Amir, we could start to record the cluster of multiple ID users,

their past names, current ones, and probable future! Couple of these guys really stand out: Sartah, and Farid Azal especially among others. We could call it; The Ultra-Reflective blog, or: A brief history of losers on IC.

Iran Khan, what you misreably forget to address, again, is that how would it have been possible for such an average TV show, to become the most populat TV program in Iran, especially as it relates to the younger crowd, youth of the nation. Could it be the violent domination of a blood thirsty  theocracy that violently controls every aspect of the life in Iran?

A theocracy of which you're always so mute, as a true Ajam. Would Lal be a good translation for Ajam?

Iraji what do you think about tis cluster project? I actually watched the whole thing and have a compeletely different reading from the body language, to the content. All they requested from the host and the "little inquisiter" was, to cite a single specific instance, a segment from two years of programs that would qualify as propaganda. And on that specific request,no one had a single freaking word to say .So, in the spirit of our little inquisitor, as they say back in Brooklyn: Propagandize this!

بهرام که گور می‌‌گرفتی‌ همه عمر دیدی که چگونه گور بهرام گرفت

If one had sat down thru the whole 39 minutes of the interview,  he would have observed Hossieni and Arbabi reacted like a pair of 'cats on a hot roof' from the get go. They did not recover from it.

Their reactions could have been like: "Yes, we do get paid by VOA and our show could be catagorized as propaganda, so what!"

Then the conversation would have been directed towards more important issues facing all. But unfortunately they presented themselves as 'light weights' in the arena of public opinion.    

Aljazeera is funded by whom ?!

If saying reality about what is hapenning in Iran is Propaganda, I'm fine with Propaganda.

I would ask Stream guy who paid his check and what is relationship between his Boss's country and Iran ? Is his questions come from Sheikh ?

The # of MBAs uttered by EoH during past 32 years, 3200,000,000!

At every MBA gathering across IRR, a total of about 1000,000 two-legged olaghs (aka element of Hezbollah (EoH)) scream from the bottom of the lungs MBA!

Estimating these gathering by 100 events/year and 1000,000 Olaghs/event across IRR results in total of 100,000,000 MBA/year!

Then for the past 32 years, you have somewhere around 3200,000,000 MBAs total!

The US population is around 320,000,000!?

Dividing 3200,000,000 by 320,000,000 = 10 MBAs. 

This means each and every American citizen has been MBAed at least 10 times!

Now, the resident EoH of IC are not content with this and demand more. They want VOA to turn its Antennas 180 degrees toward America and utter more MBA.

The folks attacking Parazit are the IRI's ducks

No matter how many different user names they are reincarnated as (Mola Nasreddin yesterday, iraj khan today, who knows what tomorrow), the fact remains that the West-residing IRI Groupies hate Parazit for being a popular anti-IRI program. In their opinion, the only thing Iranians should hear 24/7 is "Marg bar Amrika" from the IRI's media and nothing but that. 

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck

then, most probably it is a duck.

Those 'nature lovers' who have had a chance to watch a duck know well the characteristic walk and the unique sound uttered by a duck. 

Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing  the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group.

As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda, in its most basic sense, presents information primarily to influence an audience. Propaganda is often biased, with facts selectively presented (thus possibly lying by omission) to encourage a particular synthesis, or uses loaded messages to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented. The desired result is a change of the attitude toward the subject in the target audience to further a political, or other type of agenda. Propaganda can be used as a form of political warfare.

//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda

It's obvious that parazit is a propaganda tool and is financed by VOA.

I'm just saying,

Iraj 

Amirparviz Jan

Explaining PARAZIT and how it's worse than PROPAGANDA.

First off PARAZIT is not propaganda in the traditional sense, ie they do not push out lies. That would infact harm their real mission as planned in the minds of its backers at VOA, which is to have popularity and credibility among Iranians, so they can use the wide spread appeal they depend on to manipulate many many Iranians and ultimately hurt them. Therefore the people that write and speak out the material definetly have the freedom to say what they want, the way they want to, against the IRI regime and address Iranian people in a honest/fair/credible way regarding the injustices Iranians feel by the brutal dictatorship they are facing. 

From an intellectual standpoint, it is anti-intellectual, in that the show is created by people who themselves have been fooled while getting educated by western media.  So it is anti-intellectual in a similar way to Islam, first the system fools the priests, who then after fooling themselves/becoming fooled become mouth pieces for fooling others.  Since lies are not the way this system works it is not PROPAGANDA.

That said, it is in many ways worse than propaganda, because it is still a major source of manipulation of Iranians and the basis for creating untold hurt on Iranians, using beautiful concepts that unite Iranians against the regime, like human rights, freedom, justice, democracy.

By being a US funded show it gets lots of exposure and resources to send its hosts credible message out to Iranians and therefore have serious impact.  So being US Funded the show does work as part of US Policy for the Region and to implement the Agenda of the USA for the Region.  I would add to “he who pays the piper does decide the tune.” by saying that he decides the tune without the piper or the audience realizing how they are being manipulated.  That is the Key for the VOA approach to work.

SO THE REAL ISSUE BECOMES TO UNDERSTAND HOW ARE THE CREATORS AND VIEWERS BOTH BEING MANIPULATED, TO WHAT END AND WHAT IS THE HURT BEING DONE TO THE IRANIAN PEOPLE AND WHAT EXACT ASPECT OF IRANIANS IS BEING CUT AND CAUSED TO BLEED AS A RESULT OF THIS.

Shirazi is a nobody

"New York-based political commentator and blogger, Nima Shiraz..."

Are you for real? That Nima Shirazi guy was a total jackass! He's a nobody that was (at best) reeking with hypocricy on multiple levels:

1. A show like that needs big time funding. That automatically limits your options. 
2. Funding can only come from either private or govt sources.
3. No matter where the funding comes from, there are bound to be strings attached. Even if an NGO funds you, youll still have bias. There's no way around it.
4. Private sources are no better than govt sources. Would it be any better (less biased) if Parazit were funded by FOX or MSNBC?
5. And who the hell funds Al-Jazeera? Why did the hosts keep acting so high and mighty about VOA when their own platform is also govt supported? Who r they to judge?
6. Who gives a hoot if Parazit is funded by American govt? So what? Theyre damn good, and they should get more funding.
7. Shirazi's insisting that Parazit should focus on American news to be balanced is total hogwash. Who cares about OWS? We watch Parazit because we're concerned about the situation in Iran, not Oakland, CA, you dumbass! I dont wanna know the crimes of America, because it wont make me feel any better about the crimes of IRIran!
8. If people like Shirazi have so much problem with the US Govt, then why the hell do you live here??? Be a man and go live under the rule of Velayat e Fgahih e Motalgheh to see how theyll stuff a lengeh kafsh up your rear if you dare say anything about agha or Islam! God these hypocrites make me sick! These ppl have no fucking clue what freedom and living free means.
9. And finally, unlike the claims of Shirazi et al, Iran actually drew first blood against the US in its history:

//iranian.com/main/2010/oct/who-drew-first-blood

Funding

Does that mean that a privately funded station is not biased? Anyone think Fox is unbiased :-) Folks bias is a part of the whole system no matter who funds it. 

To H. Michael Jalili: It is the Persian Gulf, not "The Gulf"

Why did you call it "The Gulf?"

AlJazeera is funded by ...

How interesting and dishonest that the host of this program, who questioned the indepedence of a government-funded medium, did not mention that his show is entirely funded by the Qatar government. How come Nima didn't question why he was used on a program funded by another government.

H. Michael Jalili is a writer based in the Gulf.

It's also the only show of

It's also the only show of its' type. Oddly, nobody had thought of making a satirical show like this before.

Why is Parazit so popular?

 Are Al-Manr, Iran

 Are Al-Manr, Iran Press-TV and whole bunch of other media outlets of the IRI throughout the world not mouthpieces of the Islamic Republic of Evil?? 

 "According to the US department of treasury, Al Manar is the media arm of the Hizbullah.[16] The station manager Muhammad Afif Ahmad, said that al-Manar belongs to Hezbollah culturally and politically.[17] Hezbollah launched the network in 1991.[18][non-primary source needed] allegedly with the help of Iranian funds,[2] by 2004, Al Manar was estimated to hold 10-15 million viewers daily worldwide.[5][18] Critics[who?] argue al-Manar's agenda is strongly influenced by Iran by virtue of the "significant portion" of Hizbollah's budget shortfall that is covered by Iran, via some of the "$100 and $200 "

 //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Manar

"It is the chain of communicat­ion, not the means of production­, that determines a social process."

-- Robert Anton Wilson

Karim M

I didn't allege anything about Melody Safavi. Please read what I wrote again.

What is the problem with propaganda?

In order to be completly objective in an analysis you need two or more opinions about the same thing.

The problem is that people think propaganda is a bad thing, but it is not, it's just one view/opinion. Parazit is one view, IRNA is another view and so on. The choice of content is determined by the producers/editors, this is also the case in iranian.com.

Parazit's propaganda reaches out to many iranians because they believe it is the truth. There is no need for them to change the agenda. It's like saying to Mc Donald's that they should start serving pizzas. If you as a consumer want pizza, go to an e.g. italian place. This is also the case of media, however some news channels tend to be more broad than others, but remember that they have also narrowed down all the things that is going around in the world, despite big names such as CNN, BBC "world coverage" etc...

If you as a consumer want to hear the "whole truth", then you need multiple news channels on different levels.

Parazit has its focus (propaganda) on the IR and in this case it's hard to show any other views since the IR never reports about e.g. demonstrations, political struggles within the system, injustices etc. The IR also hide events completely. This lack of transparency and missed coverage is a form of suicide for the credibility of the iranian news agencies, hence people will trust Parazit more. Note that if Parazit doesn't cover US problems there are for sure other better programs that do this, but in the case of iranian news agencies there are no one that covers events that are not "meant to be covered"...

Propaganda we love

1. It is quite fashionable (and necessary) for everyone to talk about human rights abuses in IRI these days. IRI is the world's biggest prisoner of journalists, university students, activists, civil and labor activists, and a horrid abuser of women, men, and children. It does not just feel good, it is also an accurate statement of facts when people re-count IRI's human rights abuses.  But, any and all programs coming out of VOA, Parazit included, is propaganda.  Parazit's is propaganda that does not violate our sensibilities and is actually in tune with our own thinking.  At least for now.  I quite agree that if there is a US war on Iran, things could change.

2. Parham, there is no way VOA would have settled with Melody Navab-Safavi and given her job back if what you allege about her is true. She clearly had a good case of wrongful termination for VOA's violation of her basic human right, the right to free expression.

3. Bahmani, you are the most long-winded Iranian in diaspora.

Just watched Parazit

I got to admit I had not watched much of it before. Therefore I decided to do it. And it was right on point very well done and very accurate. Personally I do not care if it is legal or not. I want it to be there and keep going. Thank you VOA.

These are things we all want to say. But we don't have the platform. VOA thanks to my tax dollars has it. Good for VOA; Iranians and the rest of people. Nothing was propaganda sounding to me. 

I still say people have bias. However it sounded pretty reasonable and accurate to me. What is it that people are objecting to? Would those who oppose it please make a list of what are the problems.

VPK Jan, Have you heard of conservation of hypocrisy? No!

Well, it's because I just coined the term! 

It states that the amount of slipperiness of an IRR advocate stays constant over time, very much like a balloon where you squeeze on one side, the other side pops up!

You can't pinpoint them to look you in the eye and tell you the truth! They try all the tricks in the book to roadblock, stall, and weasel out but to address the issue at hand! :-))))

Dear Mohammad Ala

You are not going to get anywhere with the legal thing. Is it legal for IRI to fund Hamas? Was it legal for them to take American diplomats hostage. How about killings of dissidents in the West.

Nobody is paying  any attention to what is legal. Because without enforcement it means nothing. Did Stalin need "law" to take half of Europe? We may stamp our feet about what is legal. Or accept reality which is law is nothing without an enforcer. 

Therefore America will run VOA. IRI will fund Hamas. And the underage kids will drink beer. Pragmatism is the path for me. I suppose you could bring a law suit in a US court if you feel you are on solid grounds. But I would not do it.

"Effective" is the operative word here, AMIR1973!

That's why the advocates of IRR are worried about VOA!

Our in-house legal counsel has issued a ruling....

Parazit has been decreed to be "illegal". The verdict is in. The discussion is over. Everyone go home.

However, the IRI's sponsorship of mass executions, assassinations (at home and abroad), torture, rape, flogging, stoning, limb amputations, kidnapping, hijacking, hostage taking, and embassy bombings, is not "illegal". Good to know.   

Fair and Square

The goal of parazit and voa is to entice and motivate those Iranians who are living under harsh economic condition and human rights abuse in Iran.

This is called PROPAGANDA, why deny it? No amount of beating around the bush is going to change this fact. No amount of hysterical reactions is going to change this fact, parazit, in the final analysis is a propaganda tool. 

In the United States we have Fox News that act as a propaganda machine for the Republican Party. Fox News claims it only reports the facts, but at the end of the day it only create its own lopsided 'truth'. 

Iran, for example has Press TV that boadcasts in English and it is also called PROPAGANDA, fair and square. 

Legal issues of VOA

Good discussions so far...

Violation of Alger Accord (an agreement signed by the USA and Iran in Algeria for USA not to interfere in Iranian affairs):
//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110213/ap_on_re_us/us_us_iran_twitter

The US and Iran made an agreement.  But the United States violated the agreement from day one.  In 1980, under the Carter administration, the United States began clandestine radio broadcasts into Iran from Egypt, at a cost of some $20-30,000 per month. The broadcasts called for Khomeini's overthrow and urged support for Bakhtiar. This continued.  Starting in 1982 the CIA provided $100,000 a month to a group in Paris called the Front for the Liberation of Iran. The US also provided support to two Iranian paramilitary groups based in Turkey, one of them headed by General Bahram Aryana, the Shah's army chief with close ties to Bakhtiar while also transmitting messages from the Shah's son indicating "he would return" (Stephen Shalom citing Leslie H. Gelb, "US Said to Aid Iranian Exiles in Combat and Political Units," New York Times, 7 Mar. 1982, pp. A1, A12; and Tower Commission, p. 398; Farhang, "Iran-Israel Connection," p. 95.). 

The USA has violated international agreements.  The Alger Accord (the final version, 1981) the USA agreed not to interfere in Iran's affairs (Signed by Reagan's people).  Yes, there is less or no coverage of final agreement because the USA does not want to get embarrassed about its illegal actions similar to Chicago Convention which the USA and the Western countries have acted illegally.  

Stream This!...

One of the oldest tricks in the media is that if you are a nobody and want to be noticed, pick on somebody! And it doesn't matter if the issue to pick with is a non-issue, as very much was the case here, as long as you are noticed...

Untill this moment, honestly, I didn't know Imran Garda from Nima Shirazi's you-know-where and vice versa! Which is to say neither one has had nearly a fraction of impact or presence as Kambiz and Saman have with their very creative, thoughtful, and effective show.

Payman, Imran, and Nima, put this in your typically Middle Eastern fashioned minds that is so used to thinking within despotic and do-as-I-say paradigms: In the free world, most often, people and entities - Yes, VOA included! - pay pipers and other artists to enjoy their original work!

Shocking, isn't it?!...

That is exactly the case with Parazit, which oozes with originality. What is this? Do Kambiz and Saman have to put thair hands on the Quran and swear that they are doing their own indpendent work?

Kambiz and Saman knew from the start that Aljazeera was not serious, as the issue brought before them was a non-issue. So why should they be serious?

Much to my and many of Parazit fans delight Kambiz showed he knew what was up right away with his pronunciation of "AL-JA-ZEEERAAA!!"

Kambiz, Saman, I say 'Noush' to you both and I commend VOA for spending my tax money so wisely on you and Parazit.

Keep up the good work and don't listen to DK (Noush...). You're doing fine right here in the good ol' USA.

Noush...