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self-rule by sanctioned male public officials. So, repression against political protestors or opposition candidates is not really surprising in Iran, certainly not worthy of an all caps subject line. And, given our government's hostility to Iran--which has at least some form of self-rule, however limited, compared to, say, Saudi Arabia, whom we absolutely adore, and which is run by tyrannical sultans--and given our lying, disinformationist, corpo/fascist press, we have every reason to distrust both the facts and the gist (or spin) of news reports on Iran.
I've become quite good at "reading between the lines" of reports by the Associated Pukes and the other corpo/fascist 'news' monopolies (New York Times, Washington Post, Rotters, AFP) on the Latin American Left--especially on Hugo Chavez--and have taken the trouble to find alternative sources and to thoroughly research the facts, and I can say, without equivocation, that they lie through their teeth on these subjects, as to both facts and spin.
So-o-o, when I read an AP article, or a NYT article, or any other corpo/fascist 'news' source, I know what I am reading. I know not to trust it. I have seen it demonstrated before my very eyes that they are unreliable (--as we all have on the WMDs that weren't in Iraq, or that some of us may have noticed on particular subjects that we know a lot about). And I've also become familiar with their different writers on Latin America--who is the most rabidly fascist, who is more subtle and sneaky--and their various journalistic tricks for trying to make a news article sound like an objective report and not an editorial or flat-out brainwashing.
I can apply these hard-earned lessons to any corpo/fascist 'news' article. But throw Twitter at me--in caps, no less--and I don't know how to judge it. That's all I was saying. It's not disinterest in Iran. It's, a) suspicion (well-deserved, I think), and b) not knowing the news source (its history, its owners, its self-interest, its writers, its past spin, its reliability index).
Of course I'm interested in "what's happening in Iran." Up to a certain point, our government was bent on killing a lot of people there and even poisoning the country forevermore--if not large swaths of the Middle East--with nuclear radiation. All because Iran wants to join "the nuclear club"--the only countries that get listened to, and that can't be easily bullied or invaded. That gets my attention more than sullied elections in Iran. Hell, WE have sullied elections--and I mean really sullied. We also have prison rape as a common hazard of getting convicted of anything. And we have tortured thousands of people. This does not mean that I am unconcerned about such things happening in Iran. It just means that I am resisting our government's and our corpo/fascist 'news' monopolies' obsession with Iran, and relative disinterest in the same crimes perpetrated by or in the US. Do we see any sympathy from the press for protestors here (except tea-baggers)? For prisoners here? For the many people we've tortured and the hundreds of thousands we have slaughtered? How many people has Iran slaughtered (aside from when Iraq invaded them)?
It's a matter of perspective. I'm sorry you think I don't care--or DUers in general don't care. But I feel I have good reason to be suspicious of hysterical reports about Iran (in all caps, or not--the steady drumbeat of anti-Iran stories in the corpo/fascist press), and I feel more responsible for what my government has done, here and abroad, and by proxy in the countries that we lard with military funding (like Colombia), and also what my government might be intending to do, in other countries, than in the actions of a government I have no control over. I think I understand why Iran is the way it is--and our government played no small role in that, as well--installing and supporting the horrible Shah of Iran who preceded the mullahs. We set Iran back a hundred years by doing that. Could the CIA be doing the same thing again? Possibly. They are experts at internal destabilization of governments that the US wants to overthrow.
So, I am interested, yes. But I don't believe much of what I read in the corpo/fascist press. And Twitter reports are even less vettable for bias.
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