Oh here goes

Balatarin
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ComedianMehran
by ComedianMehran
20-Feb-2010
 

In response to Jahanshah Javid's "Gay Times" blog. I will be performing with Tissa Hami, Amir Malekpour and Max Amini in "There are no Gays in Iran" night of comedy in San Francisco on March 12.

The issue isn't whether homosexuality is right or wrong.  The issue, rather, is where does any one person find the delusional authority to limit or call for the limitation of the civil liberties of consenting adults?  Should I elect to dress as a chicken for the rest of my days, feathered from eyelashes to balls, and host the filthiest soirees at my apartment where I wag my fowl penis at an enclave of cognizant, excited and willing masturbating geriatric patients, then more power to me. If that is, at the end of the day, what my soul needs, then I fulfill my life's calling to see it actualized.  We should all be so lucky.

With regard to pedophilia, the distinction MUST be made clear that it is a crime of power and fear and a crime that exploits the presence of mind of a sexually immature life.

Before we go persecuting homosexual men, it should be mentioned that 80% of molestation sex crimes are committed against girls.  Additionally, in 1992, the Children's Hospital of Denver did a thorough analysis of all the child molestation cases that passed through its doors for a year.  They found that of the 269 reported incidents, only TWO of the perpetrators could be identified as gay or lesbian.  This placed the incidence rate for adult homosexuals committing acts of pedophilia between 1 and 3.1% and the likelihood that such an act would be carried out by a heterosexual male or family member was 100 times greater. (Carole Jenny, Tom Roesler, and Kimberly Poyer, "Are Children at Risk for Sexual Abuse by Homosexuals?," Pediatrics, 94(1), July 1994, pp. 41-44)

I think the greatest source of harm in this world comes in the making wrong of natural urges.  Repression is a cancer to the spirit.  When you pressure people into the suppression of their consensual sexual inclinations and create a culture where they are trained, at a very early age, to judge, compartmentalize and feel shame for impulses that can not be empirically demonstrated as moral or immoral, you create a fertile bed for self-hatred, confusion and, in a great many cases, violence and abuse.  What is missing in these cases, and in almost all arguments about homosexuality, is the fostering of mutual respect, compassion and understanding for what is fundamentally human.  Conversation isn't being had.  There is no safety or trustworthiness being created to encourage essential candor that could facilitate a healthier, more informed dialogue about sexuality in general.  Questions aren't being asked.  Impacts are not being objectively assessed.  Nothing is kind, polite, sophisticated, scholarly or wise.  It is all blanket assertion, superiority and condemnation.  This is, in a word, unintelligent.

What's nasty in the above post is that Jahanshah is being called homosexual in a disparaging way.  As if the very state of being homosexual is fundamentally pejorative.  When we take a step back, we can see that any and all sexuality could ostensibly be criminalized-- and not too long ago in our own history, it almost all was.  Think of the picture from Abu Ghraib where the female soldier was mockingly pointing at a hooded and shackled inmate's genitals.  That could be any of us.  What if we did the opposite?  What if, instead of shaming eachother, we created a realm of possibility where no one had to feel shame for their sexual selves?  What if, instead, we pointed and laughed at the people who felt the need to belittle others?  They're really not so tough.  Rather, their weakness and shame is transparent. Seriously, how disastrous must their own sex lives be that they feel compelled to label other people's sex and sexuality as indecent?  I promise you, their sex lives are awful.  Happy, sexually actualized, sex-positive people don't run around condemning people.  They're too busy living happy lives.

Take me, for example.  I have terrible sex and I took the time to write this commentary.  Seriously, gay or not, my sex life needs improvement.  Any takers?  Men only need apply.

Love, Mehran

Balatarin
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Monda

Anonymouse,

by Monda on Tue Feb 23, 2010 09:10 AM PST

That's right, you saw Mehran Live in Boston with Maz, right?  You luckeee!


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Anonymouse

For a country that has no gays we sure have a lot of names 4'em!

by Anonymouse on Tue Feb 23, 2010 09:08 AM PST

When you go to the show listen to Mehran's English translations of what we call gays in Persian.  I think that is going to be one of the best part of the show! 

Everything is sacred.


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Monda

Mehran jan, Well-said!

by Monda on Mon Feb 22, 2010 11:02 PM PST

I can't wait to meet you in person!  You sound as bright, grounded and fascinating as I thought you'd be.


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Jahanshah Javid

You said it all

by Jahanshah Javid on Sun Feb 21, 2010 10:39 AM PST

Thank you Mehran. Could not have been said in a more logical, human, way. Indeed what it comes down to is that societies are criminalizing and belittling natural urges in -- and between -- adults. And you are absolutely right, there is no intelligent discussion based on facts, rather only groundless accusations and expressions of fear based on self-doubt.

And thanks for sharing statistics on criminal sexual behavior towards minors as a solid example of hard facts which reject constant labeling of gay men as pedophiles. To Iranians in general, a "hamjens baaz" is almost the same as a "bacheh baaz".

But I'm so glad attitudes are changing. I'm so glad there's the internet to let us discuss issues that could never have surfaced in mainstream media, especially in Iran. And of course I'm most grateful for the freedoms we enjoy outside Iran that allows homosexuals (and all people who are wronged for who they are or what they believe) to assert themselves and demand respect and acceptance.

I am really looking forward to to meeting you and enjoying your wit and wisdom at the SF comedy show.


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Anonymouse

Mehran jaan don't badger your image. Do u think they'll get it?

by Anonymouse on Sun Feb 21, 2010 08:37 AM PST

Why are you haggling? If someone thinks s/he should be holier than thou and pass judgement and rules of engagements for gays, then why do you think anything you say will make a difference?

Bee kari? Let them be and don't bother with them.

Everything is sacred.


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Nur-i-Azal

Teleology of Nature & Ego-driven modernity

by Nur-i-Azal on Sun Feb 21, 2010 02:46 AM PST

The problem with modernist discourses on individual liberty qua homosexuality is that it divorces such discussion from universal teleology (i.e. design and purpose). In the natural world we observe that there is usually either only one gender (most plants) or all species occur in a paired, female/male, coupling. Polarity or dualitude is the functionality of nature on all levels and how each species (sans the plant kingdom) manages to propagate its species into an indefinite future. That in the sexual behavior of species anomalies often occur side by side with the general teleological norm, does not then entail that such anomalies are innate or instrinsic within the overall design. We don't need to wax religious or moralistic to see that homosexuality is precisely such an anomaly in the universal teleology.

Now modern industrial culture being a civilization of quantitative (rather than qualitative) consciousness, it is natural that such an issue as homosexuality would exercise such an inordinate obsession with so many on all sides. And because this modern industrial civilization inhabits a space of disenchantment from the seeds of Life and the Natural World, it is ipso facto obvious why sexuality (of all varieties) would often exercise such exclusive focus of attention over everything else. It is also a testament that a civilization disenchanted and divorced from its Natural source(s) will tend to descend down into a reflexive egocentricity about its senses and biology, and especially where the sense of "pleasure" is concerned. So it seeks and seeks and seeks within the senses, and never quite satiates itself!

That said, I submit that behind the primal sexual impulse in every human being stands the impulse for transcendence and integration into the Center of all-things. Masters of many Wisdom Traditions have repeatedly pointed out how the human orgasm is actually the hardwired symbol (or reminder) within the human being to spiritual awakening and enlightenment. Looked at from this point of view, these issues of heterosexuality/homosexuality start to take on a whole different hue of understanding. It does not matter whether you are an atheist or a believer, at orgasm you are momentarily experiencing a fragment of the already-always Bliss of Eternity (sat-chit-ananda/being-consciousness-bliss)!

In a situation where the Sacred (the true Sacred) is restored to its proper place within the universal norm, then the teleology of rights is likewise restored within a natural, ever-present order of things. Until we get there, and we will, there is almost no adequate final resolution to the question of individual rights (esp. on questions of sexuality) vs the normative social order and its demands. However Traditional social structures and relationships offer the kind of lifelong security, integration and cohesiveness which their absence does not. It is important to respect people's biological rights and psychological needs. But it is probably more important (as the West is beginning to learn the hard way) to safeguard and nurture certain innate structures in society such as the traditional family that ensures, in best case functional scenarios, the long-term wellbeing of each individual who inhabits the greater whole -- and hence the wellbeing of the greater whole. Frankly, I do not see how the gay rights movement in the West and its militant antagonism to such things is accomplishing this.

Finally, in every Indigenous and Traditional civilization sex and magic are deemed to be synonymous if not complementary energies. This is why such societies needed to construct such elaborate taboos because, as these societies innately understood, magic can be both salutory and creative when harnessed correctly as well as negative and destructive when chaotic and undisciplined. The modern West seems to have chosen the second option and look where it has gotten itself at the foundation level...


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bomannyali

Before you expect change from us

by bomannyali on Sat Feb 20, 2010 10:13 PM PST

Since you are very open minded, I don't think you should have a problem video taping perhaps your relatives and especially your parents telling us how they believe homosexuality is so normal.

Before you expect us to change our views, please don't quote rather post a video tape of your parents on this subject.  We wish to see the joy on their faces as they discuss how God blessed them with a gay son.

I hope that is not too much to ask.  After all, you are asking the readers for a whole lot more


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