What are you doing on Iranian.com? (2)

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What are you doing on Iranian.com? (2)
by Paymaneh Amiri
13-Dec-2008
 

A virtual community such as Iranian.com promises to be accessible from many individuals’ keyboards  in their homes and offices all over the world.  It is a meeting place for real people who mostly contribute under anonymous names and persona.  It is a place to get information, humor, networking, and solace from homesickness and displacement from a land now far away.  Many people come here to learn, to laugh, and to feel like a community.  Some people come to have a dialogue, hear the others’ points of view and say their own.  But, is it my imagination or do some people come here to hate?  If so, why is that?  What is the point of having a community when we can’t love, respect, or at least tolerate each other?  I saw a new blog a few weekends ago.  The amount of hate that blog was receiving was so blinding, it felt awful following it.  Unverified anonymous users were posting hateful comments at a feverish pace, calling each other names and giving away such venom and hate, it was really not for the weak of heart to observe!

This community has come a long way from when it first started allowing users to publish their comments on posts.  It was so bad in the beginning, many users skipped over the comments section altogether and only read the post itself.  Some registered users left and never came back.  As an example, following is one of the more benign comments you could find on the site, written by a provoked user who felt passionate about a noble cause:    

 “That is his opinion and wish for you. You are already in a prison, the prison of your small mind. No, you and your kind will simply be forgotten, like lepers. You will formally and finally be rendered what you already are. Insignificant. Inconsequential. No, to kill you because of your ideology is to be lower than you, and I will not stoop to your depths. Besides, you are already dead to me. As I have already nailed you down like the simpleton you are, the next step is to completely ignore you, and no longer give you the attention you crave like crack. So, crawl back into your hole and rot.”

Phew!!  These days we have a lot less of that kind of potent and cutting language, but still, the rhetoric in the comments section could get pretty horrible to read.  Take a look at these comments: 

"Terrorists not welcome on this web site.  Get out of this web site, as a matter of fact this country.  Your are not welcome.  IRI supporters like you belong in jail.  Iran and Iranian people will be freed from IRI islamic fascists like you.” Or: “…leave your IRI style type of argument for your Hezbollah friends and your friends at the mosques when you are planning the next bomb attack.”  Or:  “I guess you're not intelligent enough to understand the point of my post...but here, I'll spoon feed it and change the caliber of the writing to fit your mental processing capabilities. …”

As you can see, there are no profanities in these comment, but can you feel the hate?  Why is that?  Can we discuss this? 

P.S.  Though I have shared some of the hate comments, thankfully comments which are interesting, to the point, supportive, kind, and encouraging are not scarce at all!  Do share your thoughts about those comments, too!   

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more from Paymaneh Amiri
 
American Wife

Make love, not war...:-)

by American Wife on

Yeah, I opt for the "feel the love" attitude as well.  Knowing that there is a thin line between love and hate, iranian.com brings together a group of people who share the same background and love of country.  It's amazing... the support and bonding of people for others whom they've never met and probably never will.  Within a word or two you can identify different personalities.  You automatically "know" what kind of response and who the participants will be just reading the title of an article.  It's political... it's personal... it's provocative... it's PEOPLE. 

"People who need people"... :-)


default

Let's All Go There!

by Killjoy (not verified) on


default

Where Do We Draw The Line?

by Killjoy (not verified) on

A Poem by Countee Cullen:

Once riding in old Baltimore,
Heart-filled, head-filled with glee,
I saw a Baltimorean
Keep looking straight at me.

Now I was eight and very small,
And he was no whit bigger,
And so I smiled, but he poked out
His tongue, and called me, "Nigger."

I saw the whole of Baltimore
From May until December;
Of all the things that happened there
That's all that I remember.

And the question still remains:

Where do we draw the line(s)?

Or should "We Wear The Mask," in our trifling attempts to spread the "love" that was never lost amongst us as free members of this ill-assorted "community?"


Q

There are OTHER pro-IRI hezbollahi terrorists on this site?

by Q on

I thought I was the only one! certainly feels that way everytime I write anything!!!

Thanks for this insightful blog.


bahmani

We're wounded. This is one place to heal.

by bahmani on

IDC used to be a one way conversation for 10 years, you came you read, you sent an email if something upset or inspired you. As a writer, I used to get comments on email, many of which turned onto arguments. Largely though, the site was dictatorial. Now with the comments section under each article, the site has moved to allow free speech. For the first time, for once, Iranians can freely express themselves without fear. This infancy of "Bayaneh Azadaneh" is a evolutionary step in our cultural development as a free people. While we are not yet entirely free, this site at least allows free speech outside of Iran. The infancy part is where we do not respect the opposing view. The urgency of catching up with the rest of the world, encourages an easy and quick tempered intolerance with a view you might disagree with, which compounded by being very emotional, a bit more bitter than others, and very very very suspicious of each other, manifests itself in the kind of exchanges you illustrated. All of this is entirely understandable when you include the fact, that as a people, we are still wounded from the past. 2500 of dictatorship has made us conspiracy theorists, suspicious, untrusting, and in your words hateful of each other. This site though, is the first and best step we have taken towards healing our deep national wound. As with all injury, the physio-therapy is the hardest part of recovery. I think of this site as a daily exercise in respect, patience, and (a lot of) forgiveness.


Souri

Thanks Peymaaneh jan

by Souri on

Thanks for your nice observation. I agree with all you said and especially point this part :

"It is a place to get information, humor, networking, and solace from
homesickness and displacement from a land now far away.  Many people
come here to learn, to laugh, and to feel like a community.  Some
people come to have a dialogue, hear the others’ points of view and say
their own".....

Personally I do criticize people and get lots of feedback, deserved or not. Sometimes they are well said, sometimes they are misplaced, and I get used to it. My problem with this, is not " why people don't agree or why people criticize each other's ideas. This is human, and happen in other forums too. My problem mostly comes from the fact that here, people CHASE each other. In the other word " be hamdige gir midan".  Example: if in a debate, you say something and the other party can't have the last word over it, they chase you (mostly anonymously) in all and every other blog you participate, to  :

1) make fun of you

2) belittle you

3) accuse you of being this or that

Most of the time those argument are not even related to the subject at hand, but come from the "hate feeling" from the past issues.

What surprised me here the most is, from my own observation, the Male friends here are more "into" this kind of revengeful action, than the women "I apologize to all men here, nothing personal" ...

What is it ? Is that the pride ? The masculine pride getting hurt ? I don't know. Just can say that it is very disappointing to me.

 


Monda

Dear Paymaneh

by Monda on

I clearly hear your frustration with the anonymous or registered-Haters on this site. However, I do agree with IRANdokht that there is so much positive shared on this site that I can by now relatively easily pick what I came here for, that time of my day. Some times I'm looking for a quick but wise humor so I look for so and so, at times I'm in the mood for heavy drama so I look for those who write it well, some clicks I have 5 minutes to switch gears so I choose a musical clip ... It's not about Love or Hate really, it's about what the reader/user comes here for.

I don't know how long you've been visiting iranian.com. Over the years that I have been reading this site, I have identified and therefore I can ignore those participants who: cannot keep up with civilized rules of sharing, cannot tolerate variety of individual experiences and opinions and finally those who are so dysfunctional that no matter which topic they choose to comment on, their toxicity, often related to their political or religious views, comes out in hateful messages and ugly worded accusations. The latter group has decided on that defense to protect themselves from the other realities in their lives. I feel compassion for them too, especially if I knew a bit about their backgrounds. I admit that if I found myself in a compassionate mood I would read their pieces too, OK so even those hateful guys give me something to mentally and emotionally chew on, if I need it.

The community that JJ has created, resembles an open family- system with very similar dynamics. You can identify each contributor by their style and tone. Depending on your mood and reason(s) for being here at that particular time, can choose what you want to read, just skim through or heavily sit with... 

I love this site!


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What's in a name?

by Anonymous New Post (not verified) on

{Some registered users left and never came back.}

My personal opinion (I don’t have statistics): Nobody has successfully left iraniandotcom yet. It is true that some registered users no longer use their registered usernames to post, but they continue posting comments as unregistered users. It’s due to the dual nature of posting options that it is now more appealing to some people to participate in discussions under unregistered anonymous names. I’m not advocating one type or another, just to say that the way things are some people have chosen not to have one known persona. A point of balance is reached for now, in my opinion. Whether that's good or bad is for another argument.


David ET

and

by David ET on


javaneh29

Its all part and parcel of IC

by javaneh29 on

In any community or famly or system there are going to be a few 'rebels' and attagonists, those that question, disagree, use sarcasim, some of us are happy,caring ppl and some of us are not and everything inbetween .... but we all still use the site, registered or not. So IC has something for everyone it seems, as Irandokht says below.

I think some ppl take it too far sometimes using obscenities .. its just not necessary especially when we know children also log into the site, but I guess those ppl cant express them selves well. Its a shame. Thats all part and parcel of such a diverse group.

I too vote for love

  Javaneh


IRANdokht

Hate or Love?

by IRANdokht on

Dear Paymaneh

You explained our situation accurately and thoroughly when you wrote about our reasons for visiting iranian.com. We have more in common than meets the eye. We're also passionate and very opinionated people by nature. Lets look past the occasional nastiness (that I believe is probably caused by a very few number of people under different handles) most arguments are ideological, not personal. It's a shame that they become personal sometimes, it stems from frustration due to the cultural "need" to win any and all arguments! but I tend to believe that we all enjoy this website, we enjoy discussing issues, expressing ourselves, being entertained and learning from one another... why come here if we didn't? 

Thanks for bringing this up! We have to put our hang-out in perspective frequently, before we forget what's really bringing us here. I vote for "Love"

IRANdokht