It is almost everyday for us “Persians” to want to scream our lungs out after reading the news, but after the wrath fades away, well, we realise there is not much we can do after all. The sad part is that apparently the rage, the reactions and the post depression hardly ever gets customary.
It is like a fear source is implanted in you forever. Even after several years living outside middle east in the western world, every single time I see a policeman or a police car, my heart trembles inside, I quickly try to sit up and see if I look genuinely presentable and of course, check for ID.
Although I have always wanted to be a doctor, you know, the kind that helps people, but I guess I was destined to become one of the other kind, in Engineering. Unlike human sciences experts, Engineers are usually sharp and blunt. That is why their longest meeting barely takes half an hour.
I was never political; never tried to engage in any discussion of that sort. However, I can say I always had an ear for politics. I could never help but to overhear people talking politics and often smirk internally while sometimes only wanted to shout at them out loud. I sincerely suffer by the ignorance of people, especially my own people. Oh blimey! ... I hate it how, every now and again, they make me wish I was not one of them.
The fact of the matter is that I always believed politicians to be “professional liars” or better said, politely, “master manipulators of speech”. And also always justified their deceptive behaviours by some twisted or deformed values such as patriotism, pride, tyranny, dignity, morale or self-esteem. Stupid me, aye! I am proud to say that after all that have happened to my country and literally the world and all the thoughts I spared trying to reason and explain to myself: why?! It is now quite obvious to me that perjury is just a choice to a politician and not a necessity. Well, you might say I tried too hard to state the obvious but to be frank, a middle eastern politician is somewhat different from his mainstream western counterpart. Only natural born liars are in the list of candidates. For those of you who live “relatively” in peace in the western world or a developing country and have no affiliation whatsoever to a country like Iran, Syria or Iraq, only that your neighbour's son served in middle east for a year or so and either was stupid enough to come back with PTSD as souvenir or at most, successfully upgraded his rank in the local police department; what I scribble is just a joke that raises to laughs. Nonetheless for us, whose biggest achievement in a day is that to introduce ourselves as “Persians” rather than “Iranians”, maybe just to remain unknown instead of being known as possible threats, some topics would never become boring.
For us who wish to have a democrat government, secular or whatever they call it these days, just like Canada or Australia, oh, wait, no.... Turkey or Malaysia, nah, what the heck, Uzbekistan is more than enough, it gets difficult to think of anything but politics. The reason that we always have an opinion, somewhat unrelated, every time a remotely political topic comes up, and furthermore we tend to push it too hard every single time, is not a cultural defect, lack of education or a genetic disposition; my guess is that it is due to chronic trauma and anguish imposed to our last three generations. For us that up to some three decades ago, leaned on 2500 civilised years of culture, backed up by the cylinder of Cyrus The Great as world’s first human rights relic, or by the Persepolis where Darius The Great used to greet more than 5000 heads of states every Nouroz, or by Avicenna, the father of modern medicine, Razi the pre-eminent pharmacist and numerous other “firsts”, whose names are tangled to the name of Iran, becoming abandoned like this with all our dignity burst over night with the hope of obtaining divinity, is difficult beyond words, even for us second-generations, born after the revolution. The reason that many prefer a government that is free of radical affiliation or a lot more would actually demand a “secular” regime is that, Khomeini proposed “Nationalism is against Islam”, and yes, he actually said and believed in that. Thus eliminated all those values that once we were proud of. Somehow, not only did he crush our spirits, but at the same time diminished all the ethical principles of a whole nation. The staggering question that knocks me out every single day is that: how on earth we felt for that!? Was is the spirituality he blend with his doctrine that forbade people from questioning him? Or did they sincerely put their trust in him? Then how about his successor, Khamenei? It is over twenty years that his autocrat empire expands everyday. His dictatorship is far beyond the sustaining phase. It truly amazes me... The only viable vindication, in my eye, is that he has been cleverly and senselessly taking good advantage of the majority’s overall lack of education. I perceive education as the fundamental element in a nation’s survival. There are a lot of middle easterners living in western countries and are, generally speaking, exposed to a minimum level of education and a reasonable cultural standard. I believe there are a few million Iranians only in the US. The average level of education of those few millions is surprisingly, master’s degree. We have Iranians in every aspect of modern life from high academic organisations like MIT, NYC and so on, successful corporations like google, ebay etc. and businesses to NASA and Beverly Hills’ City Hall. Thus we are not short in intelligence, money or talent. The problem is that normal Iranians only include 20 to 30% of the actual population and the rest are those who vote.
It is not fair to us to have a president so frightfully unsightly. I hate to judge a book by its cover but it has become apparent to me that human body is the mirror of its soul. I mean, even “Shrek” or “Ugly Betty” whom are meant to be defined by their unattractive looks, have a rather soft and pleasant side. I just cannot comprehend how a human being, let alone a president, whose job is to present, as a premier and head of the state, can be so much appallingly vile. Even so, what knocks my hat off a light year away is how the gentleman lies. ... I, honestly, with my lack of skills and experience in writing, would never be able to describe, in words, the severity of the matter. It is, most definitely, beyond outrageous... sickening... absurd. I mean it wrenches my guts. His “pauses” between sentences, allows the pain to settle in deep in your mind. I say he is most definitely a pro! One cannot simply become so calmly masterly without prior practice. At first, I suspected him being a kook, another nutcase like so many other extremist “Basijis” who falsely become admitted to government universities with no assessment, contrary to only the 10% of eligible general public applicants who are lucky and smart enough to pass the annual entrance exam after months of intensive studies; but I am now absolutely convinced that he is not just an expert but “the expert”. I am sure he is one of a kind in the history of man kind. If Caligula is the sexual psychopath, he is the mendacious psychopath. The funny part is that he cannot care less about the people. People who he treats as enemies rather than his own people. People who did not vote for him the second time and he only showed them the finger. It is like his mind plays trick on him and he actually believes in what he says. Otherwise I have not a clue of how he puts his head to rest every night. Seriously the guy has no brakes. Nobody seems to know whose side he is on?!
Let us look at some of the goods and bads of the world leaders in history: Gandhi, Hitler, Lincoln, Mao, Queen Elizabeth, Khomeini, ... . I am not an expert in leadership but intuitively, all of them have one thing in common and that is they believed in their actions. None of them, even the villainous rulers, preached anything unless they were utterly convinced that it is the absolute truth. Everyone is trying, I would like to say their best, to topple this ridiculous regime; the west imposes sanctions so that maybe the pressure forces the regime to step down or perhaps the people become restless enough to do something. Some suggest that West needs to boycott Iranian oil so that more than 80% of the regime’s financial supply cuts off; but then again, I doubt that neither the world is able to afford losing Iran’s oil even temporarily and nor the regime is shameful enough to act on it. As a matter of fact, they are actually fully ready to sacrifice as much citizens as possible, cutting government wages and services, just to survive; it does not matter how red in blood their hands are, as long as they have them around “our” country’s neck.
What makes me sick in my stomach, shockingly, is how such behaviours becomes epidemic. How easily his nasty habits passes along. When Obama was elected, I, as well as everyone else, was excited and thrilled. After critics started bombarding him, I thought to myself that no one is perfect after all. Frankly, he was successful in some fronts and eh.... not so good in some others, but hey! who am I to judge, huh?! I am not only, no yankee doodle, but also am a bloody black-headed middle-eastern (I was so generous with myself with “mid-eastern rather than “Arab”, but honestly us Persians are NOT Arabs, please.... after all the suffocation, I assume we deserve that much); yet it burns my heart to see how Obama is feeling safe “Lying” just because he thinks he deserves to or he can get away with it. Please believe me America. I have been lied to all my life. Initially it starts with a little big lie just as they believe they have been honest and faithful enough that the nation would let one little bitty tiny miny “fib” to slip away. President Obama, the Commander in Chief, of the most expensive, biggest army in the world, with state of the art equipment and most advanced intelligence service in all the universe ....
follows a clue to the whereabouts, oh no, wait... the exact location, of America’s most wanted man for a decade or so, because of whom they had to spend a sum of 13 figures of world’s strongest unit of currency to capture a couple of countries and ... oh where was I, please excuse the very long sentences, but I am afraid I could not find a better way to say it... yes, President Obama with all that .... after all, issues the capture command, where they engage in a shooting spree, and who knows what else, maybe a fist fight?! killing and injuring a few civilians including women, only to kill Mr. Osama who was sipping tea watching BBC’s the “weakest link” to improve his western knowledge for future attacks and shocked and surprised that whether they finally killed him or not! sliding his body in the ocean and most ridiculous of all, maker of the movie “Titanic” failed to recover it.
The only justified reason I can possibly think of, is that President Obama has been too closely following his extra sweet and sexy Iranian counterpart that he picked up one of his stooges, only to practice it on America. Or maybe it was the dominant and glamorous appeal of the Iranian president that seduced the Commander in Chief and made him another victim of his charisma. What do you think? If you ask me, even if you just forget about all the betrayal and unrecoverable damage and deterioration he inflicted on his own people and country, he is indeed a rotten influence in between the world leaders.
To sum it all up for now, I remember he met with the Russian President Medvedev a couple of years back, when the president asked him: “How are you?”. He replied: “Yes”. “Happy New Year” the president says and then again he goes: “Yes”. Honestly name one head of state whose English knowledge is utterly “zero”. At least he is one of a kind...
Saman
May, 2011
But true charismatic leaders, they do not kill unless it is the only means to their ultimate goal or they truly have to. Take Iran-Iraq war for example, Saddam easily used chemical weapons and left thousands Iranians dead or as good as. Khomeini could have just as easily done the same but he chose not to. Mohammadreza Shah of Pahlavi just as easily opened fire to his own people protesting in the streets on many occasions. Something after thirty plus years you see again in the same streets just because the leader up there also lacks charisma and fears from his own shadow. I mean it is the exact same psychology, same symptoms, only the names have changed. It is interesting how history repeats itself in only three decades. And surprisingly people have not yet learned nothing.
