For those who live in Iran

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doodlebug

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Assalam alaykum

I watched a documentary last night about Iran and although I can wrap my arms around the anti-American graffiti that I saw, two things shocked and saddened me:

1) It showed boys on their first day of school (don't know if it's the same with the girls or not) and the very first thing they did before entering their first school experience was to chant "death to America, death to America, death to America". Then they went into the school building.

Does this really happen or was it just for the tv's benefit? (this was a Discovery channel documentary)

2) It showed that in the mosques, after prayers are completed, the people chant this same "death to America" chant as they leave the mosque.

How is that Islamic? I am reading about the life of our Prophet, saw, and the things that I see in this Islamically ruled country called Iran are so off the wall I just can't understand it. Our prophet, saw, would never condone this type of behavior so I have to wonder how Islamic this country called Iran truly is.
 
I think you'll find that in most cases, these chants and protests against America are organized by the particular regime. It is useful to deflect attention from the real problems facing that country. It has been used repeatedly by countries like Syria, Iran, North Korea, etc. If you can lay all the problems at the doorstep of the big mean superpower, people will start to blame that big superpower for their lack of an economy, their decaying healthcare systems, their infant death rate, and on and on.
 
That is certainly part of it.

Then the US plays right into that assigned role, as the hostile bogeyman out to destroy the people of the given country. The threats ("axis of evil" etc) and attacks on other countries by the US certainly solidifies the out-to-get-you image in the minds of the populace.
 
doodlebug said:
Assalam alaykum

I watched a documentary last night about Iran and although I can wrap my arms around the anti-American graffiti that I saw, two things shocked and saddened me:

1) It showed boys on their first day of school (don't know if it's the same with the girls or not) and the very first thing they did before entering their first school experience was to chant "death to America, death to America, death to America". Then they went into the school building.

Does this really happen or was it just for the tv's benefit? (this was a Discovery channel documentary)

2) It showed that in the mosques, after prayers are completed, the people chant this same "death to America" chant as they leave the mosque.

How is that Islamic? I am reading about the life of our Prophet, saw, and the things that I see in this Islamically ruled country called Iran are so off the wall I just can't understand it. Our prophet, saw, would never condone this type of behavior so I have to wonder how Islamic this country called Iran truly is.
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Sad to say, that these kinds of threads are always barely discussed. Why? Because it is always hurtful to accept the truth and most look away.
I admire your courage as beeing a muslim and having the guts to denounce these facts. It is a step in the good direction.

But back to topic: Yes, I believe what you say about those graffities and paroles they teach kids already in their youngest age. I saw plenty of uncut videos how kids are raised to become suicide bombers, load weapons, trained to kill people. I still have the links but I will not post them because I guess, I will be banned for exposing that.
 
guyabano said:
Sad to say, that these kinds of threads are always barely discussed. Why? Because it is always hurtful to accept the truth and most look away.
I admire your courage as beeing a muslim and having the guts to denounce these facts. It is a step in the good direction.

But back to topic: Yes, I believe what you say about those graffities and paroles they teach kids already in their youngest age. I saw plenty of uncut videos how kids are raised to become suicide bombers, load weapons, trained to kill people. I still have the links but I will not post them because I guess, I will be banned for exposing that.
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We must be careful. Most of it is no doubt propaganda. I seriously doubt kids go to school every day and chant "Death to America", let alone learn how to load weapons. Remember, it is also in the Iranians advantage to display themselves as determined, strong and prepared.

When I was there 10 years ago I saw frequent public displays and drawings condemning the US and Britain. Yet among the population it seemed everyone was talking about the movie 'Titanic' and about pop music.
 
KAding said:
We must be careful. Most of it is no doubt propaganda. I seriously doubt kids go to school every day and chant "Death to America", let alone learn how to load weapons. Remember, it is also in the Iranians advantage to display themselves as determined, strong and prepared.

When I was there 10 years ago I saw frequent public displays and drawings condemning the US and Britain. Yet among the population it seemed everyone was talking about the movie 'Titanic' and about pop music.
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Did you not read Aziz's post? He is from Iran and just confirmed that what I saw on tv was true.
 
Pygoscelis said:
That is certainly part of it.

Then the US plays right into that assigned role, as the hostile bogeyman out to destroy the people of the given country. The threats ("axis of evil" etc) and attacks on other countries by the US certainly solidifies the out-to-get-you image in the minds of the populace.
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You mention the axis of evil.

What do you think of the phrase "the Great Satan", that they developed in the late 70's?:?
 
> Do you realize there are muslims in America?

1. Rectifying the misunderstanding:
Death to America means Death to the wrong US policies not Americans"
2. We are not anti-American Muslims+non-Muslims who oppose the policy of occupation+aggression ,
but anti-American + non-American Muslims who love the white house more than the black-stone.
3. We are peace to the peace-loving people regardless of their faith, color+race but hell to the war-mongers no matter where they come from.
_____________
Peace+Flowers
 
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AzizMostafa said:
> Do you realize there are muslims in America?

1. Rectifying the misunderstanding:
Death to America means Death to the wrong US policies not Americans"
2. We are not anti-American Muslims+non-Muslims who oppose the policy of occupation+aggression ,
but anti-American + non-American Muslims who love the white house more than the black-stone.
3. We are peace to the peace-loving people regardless of their faith, color+race but hell to the war-mongers no matter where they come from.
_____________
Peace+Flowers
Click to expand...


Do you realize how the chant "death to america" makes you look to the rest of the world? It does not make you look as though you are wishing for peace... I love the white house and everything my government and country stands for, I may not agree with everything the white house does but what it stands for gives me great pride to be a part of my country. America is not a nation of warmongers, it is those we fight who are warmongers
 
AzizMostafa said:
> Do you realize there are muslims in America?

1. Rectifying the misunderstanding:
Death to America means Death to the wrong US policies not Americans"
2. We are not anti-American Muslims+non-Muslims who oppose the policy of occupation+aggression ,
but anti-American + non-American Muslims who love the white house more than the black-stone.
3. We are peace to the peace-loving people regardless of their faith, color+race but hell to the war-mongers no matter where they come from.
_____________
Peace+Flowers
Click to expand...

Ok....your posts are a little hard to follow but I'm starting to understand I think.

How do you differentiate between a muslim American who loves the white house more than Allah? I mean how would you know out of the millions of us who exist, which one loves anything over the One God? Does your country have a list of who's who and how we voted or something?

See that's my whole problem with generalizing. We are all individuals and currently we are headed by a leader who just could care less what we think. When a certain Democrat was asked what they will do when Bush vetos the bill that will lower funding and make the troops pull out of Iraq, this Democrat said that they will pass another bill, and another, and another. The point is that the majority of Americans want this to stop but we happen to have a leader that's just on a power trip.

Getting back to the OP though, how on earth are we ever to have a dialogue between our two countries when you teach your kids to shout "death to America"? :?
 
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MTAFFI said:
Do you realize how the chant "death to america" makes you look to the rest of the world? It does not make you look as though you are wishing for peace... I love the white house and everything my government and country stands for, I may not agree with everything the white house does but what it stands for gives me great pride to be a part of my country. America is not a nation of warmongers, it is those we fight who are warmongers
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Well I have to disagree here......Bush is making our nation look like we're war mongers. And I"m almost positive that you don't love the white house and the USA over your love for God right? That is his point (I think..)
 
doodlebug said:
Well I have to disagree here......Bush is making our nation look like we're war mongers. And I"m almost positive that you don't love the white house and the USA over your love for God right? That is his point (I think..)
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You are correct, I love my God over my country. To some Bush may make us look like war mongers, but those that we are fighting against in Iraq (not just an average citizen, but an actual terrorist) are far worse than the US could ever attempt to be. To me people that shout "Death to America" seem like war mongers, I dont think I have ever seen a rally in the US with people shouting "Death to Iran" or any other country for that matter. It is very insulting and quite frankly it is very provoking.

(Was the show you watched called Iran: The Most Dangerous Nation)
 
AzizMostafa said:
> Do you realize there are muslims in America?

1. Rectifying the misunderstanding:
Death to America means Death to the wrong US policies not Americans"
2. We are not anti-American Muslims+non-Muslims who oppose the policy of occupation+aggression ,
but anti-American + non-American Muslims who love the white house more than the black-stone.
3. We are peace to the peace-loving people regardless of their faith, color+race but hell to the war-mongers no matter where they come from.
_____________
Peace+Flowers
Click to expand...

1. confusing+hard+to+understand

"Death to America means Death to the wrong US policies not Americans"

Aha! Must be another one of those Farsi to English translation uncertainties.

"Death to America" is too concrete. Try "We wish to express our strong dissatisfaction with the foreign policy intitiatives of the government of the United States going back at least to the Eishenhower admsinistration, but we offer peace and flowers to the American people. XOXO"
 
Cognescenti said:
"Death to America" is too concrete. Try "We wish to express our strong dissatisfaction with the foreign policy intitiatives of the government of the United States going back at least to the Eishenhower admsinistration, but we offer peace and flowers to the American people. XOXO"
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Now THAT's an opening to dialogue!!!!!!

See how much easier and so not full of hatred that is???:D

I really don't recall our beloved Prophet, saw, ordering his companions to chant "death to the Quraish", "death to the Quraish".........
 
well im no fan of iran but their "death to america" is mainly a vocal chant - whereas it is america and its allies who provides death, torture and kidnap right across the world

i know i prefer someone chanting death rather than someone providing it :thumbs_up
 
MTAFFI said:
You are correct, I love my God over my country. To some Bush may make us look like war mongers, but those that we are fighting against in Iraq (not just an average citizen, but an actual terrorist) are far worse than the US could ever attempt to be. To me people that shout "Death to America" seem like war mongers, I dont think I have ever seen a rally in the US with people shouting "Death to Iran" or any other country for that matter. It is very insulting and quite frankly it is very provoking.

(Was the show you watched called Iran: The Most Dangerous Nation)
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I honestly don't know what shows I watched. I have "on demand" with Comcast and when I clicked on "top picks" they had an entire section on Iran and I watched about 5 or 6 Discovery specials dealing with the topic. I think 3 covered before, during and after the hostages were taken in 1979 and then one covered the Canadian journalist who was beaten to death for filming the outside of a prison while a demonstration was going on (very sad and they refused to send the body back to Canada and even forced her mother who stated as much on the documentary to sign something saying that she wanted her body to remain in Iran) and then the last one where Ted Koppel interviewed many of the citizens there. That last one is the one where they showed the school children being taught how to shout out "death to America" and where they showed the people inside the masjid shouting the same.

It was very interesting and I definitely can see how the people wanted a revolution in the late 70's but I still can't justify them kidnapping innocent people in the name of Islam. I mean they overthrew the government so they got their wish supposedly, though a few of the hostage takers were videotaped saying that the type of government that is in power now is not what they were aiming for. But even if they absolutely hated the US for what they did in putting the Shah in power, which I totally agree was very wrong to do, wouldn't it have been more "islamic" to pursue diplomatic measures to deal with the things they disagree on? Our prophet, saw, has given us many many examples of diplomacy and fairness in dealing with tribes that he disagreed with and who even were opressing him.......aren't we supposed to follow his example, per the Quran?


I also can totally understand the graffitti and the anger towards the US gov't but I cannot justify the religious leaders telling the people to shout out hatred in the masjids or in the Islamic schools. Grafitti is a form of expression from a person, in my opinion, who feels very strongly about a subject. But that person should come to his/her conclusions after careful contemplation looking at all sides of the picture. These poor kids don't even have a chance to make their mind up because they're so brainwashed from day 1!! And the most powerful people in their life, the religious leaders...people we should be looking up to for guidance, are telling them the same thing!!!

It's like a no win situation for any dialogue and without dialogue what is the other option? Sanctions? Obviously that's not working since other countries are giving them what we were giving them for 1/2 the price. The only other option, unfortunately is war.
 
Chechnya said:
well im no fan of iran but their "death to america" is mainly a vocal chant - whereas it is america and its allies who provides death, torture and kidnap right across the world

i know i prefer someone chanting death rather than someone providing it :thumbs_up
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Well so would I. That's not the point. The point is that this is supposedly an Islamic state and the leaders of this state are telling the people to shout hatred. How is that Islam?
 
Well so would I. That's not the point. The point is that this is supposedly an Islamic state and the leaders of this state are telling the people to shout hatred. How is that Islam?
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well its not an islamic state so the question doesnt really stand

as for shouting hatred, the leaders dont need to encourage anyone to shout hatred against the US - the US does a good job at creating that hatred itself
 

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