Posted on 01/23/2007 5:17:59 PM PST by Free ThinkerNY
Interesting points and discussion.
Do Muslims blame the temptress more than the sinner? I have noticed this theme seems rather consistent vs christianity where the sinner blames his/herself.
I attended undergrad at a small Southern Baptist school and knew more than a few Missionary kids (MK's), Preachers kids (PK's), and others who came from a sheltered/strict homelife who had little to no self-control with their new freedoms. From my observations, more of these kids had problems with binge drinking, sexuality, and other social behaviors that most kids seemed better equipped to control due to familiarity. My observations are in no way scientific but I think this is a fair statement.
Many Islamic students who come to America come from a similiar background and homelife as do MK's/PK's or other fundamentalists. The "shock" of our culture was most pronounced in MK's who had lived overseas in a sheltered environment similiar to what is described by D'Souza.
My wife and I both saw enough of this to realize that we do not want to shelter our children from the world so much that they are unprepared to confront it on their own making wise choices along their way.
We live in a liberal culture where almost anything goes and some of them come from a strict culture where anything outside the norm can get you killed or beaten. I am sure for many of them it is jealousy but I can see how a few of them would be filled with self-hatred for their desires and transfer that hatred to our culture. Throw in the poverty, funadmentalism, and lack of perspective/education on top of these perceptions and I don't wonder that we are the Great Satan in the eyes of many.
I still believe their religion will never allow them to totally accept liberal culture. But, it is important for Americans to understand the threat our liberal culture presents to the culture of Islam just as it is important to understand the point you more ably made about the differences in Mosaic Law.
As others have noted is there are large numbers of them who come from a more progressive "Western" backgrounds who like American culture (music/movies etc) but we should all understand those who lived under the Taliban, in the fundamentalist ghetto's/villages, or other strict Islamic environments are ill equipped to understand our culture and predisposed to hate it. This is their main recruiting pool and it will not run out anytime soon.
There are also those who despite their education (or even familiarity with our culture ala the British terrorist) become twisted religious kamikaze's who feel convinced it is their religious duty to kill us.
We will have to fight both.....
We must understand the "why" if we are going to win this war and this author provides good insight into a small part of why they hate us.
Understanding "why" should help us realize why we must prosecute this war to the death until the radicals are gone for good because I don't believe we can co-exist and I don't think we will win their hearts and minds.
It took us over 40 years to liberalize our culture to the point that individual freedoms outweighed our social sensibilities. While I don't like all the changes from a socially conservative point of view..... it's not going to change. The MSM and our leaders need to understand that we don't have 40 years to liberalize them to the point where they accept us. It's not going to happen so where does that leave us?
kabar -
Thanks for your insight and I believe you are correct about the many reasons the Shah fell in Iran. I still think Carter made a fundamental miscalculation that is costing us dearly today but I agree that there are many reasons for what happened.
I also agree there are many reasons for what exists today and in no way do I (or probably any others on this thread) think this subject is the ultimate explanation for the conflict.
It is a small part of the "why" and I think we should all endeavor to understand it. If we understand what D'Souza points out we can better understand the fundamental differences between our culture and theirs. My hope is that the sooner we understand that the sooner we will realize that we are not going to "Americanize" them.
You must have had a unique group of students. The only "hatred" I have observed related to the US involvement in the 1953 coup involving the overthrow of Mossadegh. The idea that these students just learned of American culture when they came to the US is nonsense. As I indicated, there were over 70,000 Americans in Tehran. American culture and influence abounded. I have no idea what constitutes depravity, but there were nightclubs and bars in Iran. There were prostitutes and other such vices. Iranians were free to travel with many of them being educated in the West. American music was everywhere along with women dressed in tight jeans. There was untrammeled access to information.
I was present in Iran after Khomeini took over. Iranian women were forced to wear chadors overnight. Women went from one of the freest, most liberal societies in the Muslim world to one of the strictist. The Mullahs hijacked the Revolution and enforced their rules in much the same way as the Taliban. The current unhappiness with the current regime in Iran comes mainly from the students.
As for the reasons for the student influx at the time of the Shah's fall, I can only point out that the numbers support my point: Iranian students--many of them totally unfamiliar with America and even with the English language--came to this country in droves in the years immediately before the Shah's fall. Were they afraid of the Shah? Well, that may be why they put bags on their heads at demonstrations against his regime!
You linked the influx [using just a three year span] to increased oppression by the Shah. In fact, the increase you point to occurred during a period of less repression, at our urging. Those years were marked increasingly by demonstrations, strikes, electricty cut offs, and bombings of movie theaters. Life in Iran in 1978 became increasingly uncomfortable and dangerous. I am sure that some of those students came here to escape just that.
As I mentioned, there was a coaltion of groups that opposed the Shah and wanted him replaced. The students in the US came from fairly well off families. They were not the children of the poor and uneducated. Carter's human rights policies played into the hands of those wishing to overthrow the Shah. There was a significant Iranian exile population in the US who helped foment demonstrations in the US. Many like Yazdi, went back to Iran, after the Revolution to become part of the new government. Eventually, the mullahs got rid of them, including by executing them.
Of course the demonstrators were afraid of the Shah and Savak. But they shouldn't have been because Carter and Vance had put them on a short leash. We essentially greased the way for the ousting of the Shah and the takeover by Khomeini. Carter's human rights policy cost us valuable listening stations on the Caspian that were monitoring Soviet nuclear tests and allowed the current world's biggest state sponsor of terrorism to infect the world with militant Islamic fundamentalism.
The Iranian Revolution was all about power, not hatred of American "depravity." I am sure if they took a real poll in Iran today, most of the people like and respect the US and want us back.
Thanks. I think it is incorrect to make too many generalizations about Islam and the way it is practiced. I have lived a total of 9 years in three Islamic countries--Iran, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia. And I have visited many more. There are significant differences from country to country. Also, many Muslims are not that devout nor do they adhere to the practices of the religion. There are more gradations than just traditional and radical. D'Souza presents too simplistic an explanation. Perhaps it is spelled out more in his book.
In terms of Muslim populations by country, Indonesia is the largest and India is the second largest. Approximately 13% of India is Muslim, which equates to about 140 million Muslims.
I agree with you. I've had similar experiences in the Muslim world. The stink coming from Western popular culture is driving otherwise moderate Muslims towards the radicals.
Just as we were greeted with flowers as the liberators of Iraq. I don't know what services you rendered to the US in Iran, but I sure hope it was not intelligence.
We were greeted with flowers in most of Iraq. And most Iraqis don't want us to leave immediately. It seems as though you would rather believe a biased MSM that generally never leaves the Green Zone than our military personnel and others engaged in the reconstruction of the country.
Do you believe we are the liberators of Iraq [and Afghanistan]? You seem to base your knowledge on Iran on your brief encounter with some small number of atypical Iranian students who seem to have derived their contempt for America based on their experience here. I say they are atypical based on interviews and studies done by USIS and others in our Embassies. We have found that the visitors programs, exchange programs, and students are the best way to strengthen our relations with countries. Almost universally, they return to their home countries with a far better understanding and appreciation for America than what they had before the visit.
Your gratuitous insult reflects more on you than me. Your ignorance is only exceeded by your arrogance.
I agree. Many of the Iranians that I met when I was in the Navy in the mid-1970's and when I went to college in the late Seventies to mid-eighties seemed pretty darned westernized to me, and I was very good friends with more than a few of them. They harbored no hatred of the USA that I could see, and seemed to enjoy being in the USA, and enjoyed trying to figure out the cultural differences, often in quite comedic ways.
I knew of two Iranian students who were rather angry and sullen guys. I disliked them both, and perhaps those two fit into the mold others in this forum describe.
"The marked increase in immigration can be explained through two important events. First due to the substantial wealth of the country prior to the 1979 revolution, many families and the government chose to send students abroad for higher level education. By 1977, Iran had more students abroad than any other country in the world at 227,497. By 1979 in the US alone, there were 51,310 college students, ranking first amongst foreign nationalities. Second, after the revolution in 1979, not only did many of these students opt to remain in the US, but many of their relatives also decided to join them, later becoming naturalized citizens (or residents)."
I guess the thing to keep in mind is...the viewpoint that Dinesh D'Souza is trying to convey is through the eyes of radical muslims, and those that sympathize with radical muslims, even if they are not radicalized themselves.
Good gosh, the radical Islamists regard everyone with contempt and hatred...no surprise there.
I am currently listening to a book called "Because They Hate: A Survivor of Islamic Terror Warns America" by a former Lebanese national named Brigitte Gabriel. It is a gripping and frightening portrayal of Islam. In the book she describes her native country, and how it was once a majority Christian country before the demographics changed due to a massive influx over open borders of poor, radicalized muslims with a much higher birthrate. They had lived for years in relative peace with their muslim neighbors until the early to mid-seventies, when the demographics took a swing and the radical muslims began taking over the country, driving out Christians everywhere they went. I am only a chapter or two into it, and she is making the parallel with what will happen in Europe and the USA if left unchecked. I highly recommend the book, as disturbing as it is.
I have to say...I have always enjoyed the Iranians who I had a chance to meet. I found them to be intelligent, thoughtful people with a well developed sense of humor.
The ones that I knew were grief stricken at what happened to their country, as was I.
I always kept in mind they were not part of the Arab world, and spoke Farsi rather than arabic. I still think that, although an entire generation has had to live under the hand of those moronic idiots who rule the country, and that generation has known nothing else. I wonder how much of the "Great Satan" rhetoric has stuck in their heads.
Thanks for the link...interesting read.
....maybe if we can get rid of the LIBERALS in this nation, including the ACLU, the NAACP etc etc, the Islamofacists just might stop waging war against us.
A disquieting yet intriguing thought!!
Oh, yeah, the Iranian students who were sent home after the takeover of the US embassy in their country were great ambassadors for American democracy! In truth, they created the Islamic state we face today. Where on earth do you get this stuff???
Well, at the very least, we could wage war on the Islamofacists without being undermined at every step of the way.
Many of them never went home. They stayed here asking for political asylum.
In truth, they created the Islamic state we face today. Where on earth do you get this stuff???
BS. Where do you get this information from? Anyone with an association with the US was suspect. The exiles who returned to Iran after the Revolution found themselves to be targets. The students who returned from the US were not the ones in charge of creating the Islamic state. How many Iranian governmental officials today were educated in the US?
I reiterate. The mullahs hijacked the revolution. They killed and assassinated anyone opposed to them. They didn't trust anyone with a Western connection, especially in the beginning. They were worried that the CIA and other US intelligence agencies would try to topple them. The poor and uneducated were/are the mullahs main constituency. They are the religious zealots.
When the Iranians overan our embassy on Feb 14, 1979, they put a former butcher in charge of the Mujadeen who occupied and looted the embassy compound. The Fadayian, a Marxist guerrilla group, also occupied our compound by setting up their operation in the Ambassador's residence. It took months before we got them out, only to see them return on November 4th and take our diplomats hostage for 444 days. The only real impact the Iranian students in the US had on the Revolution was to convince Carter and the US public that the Shah needed to be removed.
Very little. The mullahs have made a mess out of the economy and they are just as corrupt as the Shah ever was. The Iranians don't want to be a pariah nation. We should support regime change and offer real assistance to groups inside and outside Iran to remove the mullahs. We should not be negotiating with them and legitimizing a regime that is not supported by the majority of the people. The US has faded as the number 1 enemy, i.e., Great Satan. Much of the rhetoric coming out of Tehran today is a feeble attempt to create an external threat to divert people's attention from the problems at home.
You sound like you know of what you speak. Makes perfect sense to me.
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