To You, the new Iran ‘expert’
several says:
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Amplify’d from travellerwithin.blogspot.com
To You, the new Iran ‘expert’
Who only heard of Evin prison when Roxana Saberi was there(Roxana who?)Who’s changed your Facebook profile picture to a green rectangle saying “Where’s my vote?” even though you don’t actually vote in Iran
Who actually thinks that Mir-Hossein Mousavi is a secular
And that his election means that Iran will give up its nuclear claimsAnd allow you to visit Tehran for Christmas
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5 Comments
5 Responses
Eric Goldstein June 18, 2009 6:45 pm
I went to the source and read the post and just don’t see the logic. I’m certainly not an expert in Iran and i don’t know all that much about the players involved. But what i do know is that people are being beaten and in some cases killed and it is happening without the benefit of media coverage because the government wants to beat and kill in privacy. Despite not being an expert, i am positive that i am against that. It is for that reason that i proudly and without equivocation have changed my profile pic on twitter to include a shade of green.
several June 18, 2009 6:57 pm
Oh I don’t think he’s saying not to show support or even saying not to tweet, blog etc.
(I’ve had a green border around my twitter profile pic since monday and note how many of my tweets this week have #iranelection tags
Note this chunk of the post:
-=-=-=-=-
Yes, you are entitled to an opinion, to formulating it, to blog it, and to discuss it. I do that too. (this my blog after all).
But do everyone, and you first and foremost, a favour.
Learn from the people who know a thing or two about the issue at hand.
Be selective about you read, listen to, and watch. A simple way is to follow an Iranian friend’s updates and the links they put up.
(Even the State Dept is reading tweets from Iranians.)
Ask questions more than you volunteer answers.
-=-=-=-=-
To me the post is just saying to keep a sense of humility and not to pretend to know things we don’t know. There is an annoying amount of pretense happening and I like the way he calls it out.
Eric Goldstein June 18, 2009 7:20 pm
Fair point…i definitely appreciate what you’re saying. But i think sometimes people react emotionally when their gut instinct moves them to and when happens in a mass movement like this and the general cause is for freedom, i am all for it…even if it isn’t always logical or backed by expertise.
arif June 18, 2009 7:48 pm
I’m staying out of this “technical” revolution because I know I won’t be virtually protesting all the other revolutions in the world when their time comes. I will protest what is relevant to me directly but it makes no sense to join people from distance especially when it is convenient.
Eric, you make a good point about censorship and privacy but its happening at lot of other places as well and I don’t see twitter trending topics on such issues.
Eric Goldstein June 20, 2009 2:11 pm
Arif, hopefully the awareness that’s being generated will apply to other places and future issues. I simply can’t take that approach that since i/we don’t protest everywhere we shouldn’t protest now. My hope is that this is a seismic shift in people’s awareness and desire to be heard…we are no longer controlled or dependent upon the major media companies…thanks to camera phones, text messaging, YouTube, Twitter, etc., the media is everywhere - it’s a new paradigm and just maybe one that we’ll never turn back from.