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August 21, 2004Top * Serious lack of self-worth Oh for God's sake, will you PLEASE stop pestering everyone with your obsession over the Persian-versus-Iranian debate once and for all? [A new language?] THis obsession of yours is idiotic a psychological imbalance! Look, the name of the country is Iran. It is NOT Persia. We Iranians have called it Iran for centuries. If the Europeans called it something else, that's their problem. People who want to change the name of Iran to Persian in order to impress foreigners by maintaining a tenuous association with 2000 year old past of the Persian Empire have a serious lack of self-worth. You don't protect your own culture by denying your own country's true name, or by over-emphasizing one side of it. Second, the name of the language of Iran is Farsi. It is NOT Persian. We IRanians don't call it "Persian" either so why should anyone else. And don't give me that crap about maintaining our culture by being associated with the Persian Empire. My culture - the culture of Modern Iran - is not a museum piece in Iran Bastan museum, its not a bunch of broken stone sculptures which hasn't changed since the days of long-dead Empires and has been kept behind a glass display window. And that's a GOOD thing. The name of the Persian Gulf is the Persian Gulf. And no, it wasn't the IRI who "encouraged" the Arab states to use that name, nor has the IRI been particularly accomodating in the use of that false name. In fact the IRI has been quite aggressive in the Persian Gulf: witness Iran's assertion of its rights over the three islands. So stop trying to justify your obsessions by bringing the IRI into it. Look, I appreciate that you feel proud of the Achaemanid Empire and the Sassanid Empire and the Parthian Empire etc. in a world where as an Iranian, you feel deprecated. There is a great deal to be proud of too. But everything has its limits. This desparate obsession with all things "Persian" will not resolve your feelings of a lack of self-worth in Western eyes. Instead, go accomplish something that will make you proud of YOURSELF, and the rest of us "Persians" proud of you too. |
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