Last week, I wrote An Iranian Kossack's Perspective On Iran about my conversation with my father after his three week trip there, a period which included the election and the four days that followed.
To briefly recap - I have dual citizenship and am of 100% Iranian ancestry, from a secular family that is not associated with either the Islamic revolutionaries or Pahlavi monarchists - my father made some interesting predictions that contradict the general assumptions (including my own at the time). One was that the theocracy falling would actually be a bad thing, because it would be very bloody, as history shows that the best change is peaceful and gradual change that occurs over long periods of time, and that internal revolutions are inevitably disasterous. The subsequent discussion in the comments examining the pros and cons of internal revolutions throughout history was fascinating, and my father has (to my surprise) asked for a link so that he can read the diary; I will be following up with Part 3 in the coming days after I get his reaction.
In the meantime, though, I wanted to add the following important points regarding the future of Iran:
First of all, the conservatives in America who are pushing for a stronger and stronger response from Obama against Iran are NOT appreciated by Iranians and Iranian-Americans.
We are not fools.
You guys wanted to nuke all of us, to usher in regime change by force, to have a massive ground invasion if you had your way; if everyone had listened to you, all the people who you are cheering for - who you are so inspired by, who you want so badly to rush to the rescue of - would be dead right now.
We are an educated and informed people, and we have not forgotten.
The fact that you look at your terminally sagging poll numbers and the American electorate's support for the Iranian people on the streets, and conclude that you should glom onto us as defenders after you tried to kill us is repugnant, offensive, putrid, and does not go unnoticed.
But it is even worse; the neocons who are coming to our defense are only using as an excuse to continue pushing for the invasion and permanent occupation of Iran that they've wanted all along; it's absolutely nauseating.
We see you, we know what you're up to - we get it.
My only consolation is that you, GOP - along with your friend in all international affairs, Senator Lieberman (IDIOT - CT), are such an insignificant and ridiculed group in our political landscape that the protesters at the forefront of fighting for their freedom in Iran are simply too busy for your jackassed rhetoric to cut through and demotivate their hopes for a new relationship with America, the West, and the idea of democracy itself.
They are too busy fighting for freedoms that you can never enforce from outside with a gun, freedoms you have taken too much for granted if you have forgotten this basic truth; they are too busy fighting for their freedom, alive only because you weren't allowed to kill them.
Finally, one last point which bears repeating is that I sometimes hear the claim that Iranian society is much more conservative than us, and too religious to want to abandon theocracy; while Iranian society might be more conservative on America on a random given issue like, say, gay adoption, our peoples are actually far more alike than is known. In both America and Iran, major demographic changes based in great part on youth and technology are flipping the national consensus, and isolating what amounts to about 25% of the country - the hardliners - who could have sworn they had represented majority opinion until just a few minutes ago. However, all that said, I think the argument that ultimately takes down the theocracy in the long term is not one that seeks to fight Islam, but one that defends Islam; someone very bright and eloquent in Iran will have to come out and speak the simple truth, which is that the only way to respect Islam is to respect that it can draw in believers by choice - instead of implying that it cannot. Putting Muslim tradition into government law suggests that people will not follow Islam willingly, being forced to do so under threat of punishment by the state, and since only those who follow Islam willingly are true believers, such a state is detrimental to the Muslim faith, not helpful; in the years since the Revolution, religion has primarily become a lexicon for the young to get ahead in politics, while their true feelings about religion become more and more cynical, and the amount of devout believers in Iran has only declined. The only way to respect Islam is to respect that it can draw in believers by choice - instead of suggesting that it cannot.
(This installment was posted yesterday, but it was lost in the shuffle to the point where a front pager actually complained in the comments section that it hadn't been rec listed, so I thought it was appropriate to post it one additional time - if it is deemed repetitive by the community, I will delete immediately)