Iranian Protests

It's odd, isn't it? Protests aren't odd in Iran, of course, but they're not protesting America, the great satan, or whatever, they're protesting their own government. The same government that came into power after protesting the former government. And yet, it appears nothing was learned last time.

One of the big mistakes of the old government was to crack down hard on the protestors. This lead to deaths. In Iranian, or maybe it's a muslim thing, after 40 days there's a big to-do about mourning a death, which would lead to protests, which the government cracked down on and involved more deaths. It happened enough that finally most people rebelled.

Now, 30 years later, we see somewhat of the same thing, except it appears to be a little deeper in that the continuation of the protests does not need to be predicated by a death. It's as if, no matter what the government does, whether they crack down on their own people or not, the people want a change of government. They want their votes to count, sure, but is that all? Is this just about one failed election? Will acquiescence of that one issue, a re-vote, subside the protests?

In my American thinking, I don't think a re-vote would be enough as it appears that maybe it is just a pretext to much more prevalent problem at the heart of the government. Corruption.

When the current government took over, they gave themselves a lot of power. Their Revolutionary Guard may actually have most of the power, even though the ideology was for their top cleric to be the one calling the shots. It doesn't appear to be working that way though.

For some reason I'm thinking their Revolutionary Guard is going to try and crush them, but that it will eventually backfire. I'm not sure if you could call it a civil war, but maybe a second revolution, of sorts. It's hard to read them because their culture is so different, I'm not sure if the people would implicate the whole government or just parts. Ultimately, I'm not even sure it the people will really win unless they change the whole structure, which gives itself much too much power, which will always lead to corruption.

Anyway, it's just odd how history seems to be repeating itself so soon. Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it. Maybe the biggest thing that should be changed in Iran is the anger, because everything since the 70s from Iran appears to be motivated by anger. How about looking at the realities?

For instance, Iran currently blames the USA for all their woes under the Shahs. Why? Well, Madeleine Albright said (from wikipedia):

"In 1953 the United States played a significant role in orchestrating the overthrow of Iran's popular Prime Minister, Mohammed Massadegh. The Eisenhower Administration believed its actions were justified for strategic reasons; but the coup was clearly a setback for Iran's political development. And it is easy to see now why many Iranians continue to resent this intervention by America in their internal affairs."

Simply put, we wanted to develop Iranian resources, Massadegh didn't. So, at Britan's urging, we got rid of him. That was a different era, we clearly wouldn't do something like that today.

Unfortunately, forgiveness does not seem to have a place with muslims. I mean, they still hate people over things that happened 1500 years ago. They even still dress like people did 2000 years ago.

So, it would be foolish to think that their hate will ever subside. Even if Iranians form a new government, so what? Do you think it will suddenly be amenable to the USA? Well, maybe, but here's the catch... no matter what we do, no matter how much money we invest, no matter anything, the Iranians hate us, they always will, and anything you have with them, you better be prepared to lose it. Just say no, to trusting Iran. After all, look at how corrupt they are, they're near the bottom of the list.

No, don't get your hopes up. Things could change for the better, sure, and maybe it's good to hope for that and act in a way to encourage that... but don't expect it anytime soon. Maybe in another 3000 years, Iranians, or whatever Iranians are called then, will be less angry. Until then, watch the protestors and hope that things go right for once over there.