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Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

1843magazine.com

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Re: Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

#161
post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only person in this thread talking about gender is you. Everyone else is talking about her with the context of her as an individual human. You are the misogynistic one in this conversation.

We've banned this account for repeatedly using HN for flamewar and ignoring our requests to stop. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Wait, Am I banned or the other person? I'm confused by the wording and context. You replied to me, but warned them in another comment.

Also I don't think I've ever been warned before.

Re: Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

#162
post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note how nothing at your 'source' has any evidence that MEMRI tends to mistranslate quotes or provide them out of context. When it comes down to it, it seems the complaint is that the people Sourcewatch quotes don't like MEMRI's alleged politics, and therefore we should ignore all evidence. IMHO, an ideological echo chamber is bad for the mind.

Easy enough to find, here's an editor of the Guardian calling out the President of MEMRI for just that: "The fact is that you gave evidence to Congress claiming that Gallup had found "a large majority of the Arab world" who believed the September 11 attacks "were the work of the United States government itself and/or a Jewish conspiracy". What you said is untrue, and Gallup has confirmed that. I trust you will now ap…

In that exchange, both sides agree that Carmon was referring to a poll whose details - even at the time of the exchange - were not publicly available on the net. Given that such finding would not contradict other polls of the time, it's quite possible that this is in fact what the poll found. So I'm not sure this exchange establishes what you think it does.

I do agree that readers should take into account possible biases of their sources.

Re: Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

#163
post #60

The writer seems to exhibit copious amounts of Stockholm syndrome for his captors. From that standpoint it was a successful intelligence operation on their part. Iranian intelligence can likely count on him as an asset to answer questions over the phone for them in the future for some time.

> The writer seems to exhibit copious amounts of Stockholm syndrome for his captors.

Or, perhaps, he knows his own feelings better than random commentators on the Internet?

Re: Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

#164
post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy enough to find, here's an editor of the Guardian calling out the President of MEMRI for just that: "The fact is that you gave evidence to Congress claiming that Gallup had found "a large majority of the Arab world" who believed the September 11 attacks "were the work of the United States government itself and/or a Jewish conspiracy". What you said is untrue, and Gallup has confirmed that. I trust you will now ap…

Hmmm... looks like it was a Pew poll and indeed, most citizens of Arab nations don’t believe Arabs were responsible for 9/11. When asked who was responsible, they said “America or Israel”[1] So while MEMRI’s statement is not factually correct (it wasn’t Gallup and they didn’t ask the question of who did 9/11 to everyone), it’s not that far off base. [1] https://newrepublic.com/article/94546/middle-east-radical-co...

> [the] statement is not factually correct

"not factually correct" is a sickening euphemism for "a lie".

Re: Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

#165
post #60

The writer seems to exhibit copious amounts of Stockholm syndrome for his captors. From that standpoint it was a successful intelligence operation on their part. Iranian intelligence can likely count on him as an asset to answer questions over the phone for them in the future for some time.

> The writer seems to exhibit copious amounts of Stockholm syndrome for his captors. Or, perhaps, he knows his own feelings better than random commentators on the Internet?

Drawing empathy from the victim is a common technique in interrogations such as this. The victim is wholly unaware it's happening. This is clearly the case here, the author makes no mention of being self-aware of these techniques.

Re: Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

#166
post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmmm... looks like it was a Pew poll and indeed, most citizens of Arab nations don’t believe Arabs were responsible for 9/11. When asked who was responsible, they said “America or Israel”[1] So while MEMRI’s statement is not factually correct (it wasn’t Gallup and they didn’t ask the question of who did 9/11 to everyone), it’s not that far off base. [1] https://newrepublic.com/article/94546/middle-east-radical-co...

> [the] statement is not factually correct "not factually correct" is a sickening euphemism for "a lie" .

Not sure is call something 90% true “a lie”.

The fact is is that his core statement is true.

Re: Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

#167
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah yes, that's something that always annoys me too. Sorry for that. But I think the implication in the direction anti-semite -> anti-zionist is pretty strong, so for this particular question I think that surveys about antisemitism provide a good basis for discussion. I'd assume that anti-zionists form an almost perfect superset of anti-semites. edit: or maybe not, you could imagine someone who really doesn't like Jew…

Please reconsider this position.There are large numbers of Jewish anti-Zionists, whose motivations range from religious to Palestinian solidarity to just not wanting to be seen or treated as an extension of Israel. As well, there's a great many people who don't mind the existence of Israel as such but object strenuously to its expansionist settlement policy, including a large number of Israelis. As well as that, ther…

I'm a former anti-Zionist Jew, I still have many close Jewish family and friends who are heavily involved in anti-Zionist activism, with JVP and if not now, etc..

On the low end of polls I've read in the past few years a Gallup review of US Jews found "about nine in 10 American Jews are more sympathetic to Israel than to the Palestinians" and "95% of Jews have favorable views of Israel, while 10% have favorable views of the Palestinian Authority."

Polls of how many American Jews are Zionist are not generally conducted, since no one agrees on exactly what constitutes Zionism. For instance I oppose settlements and Bibi, but call my self a Zionist because I believe Jews and Palestinians should have the right of self determination in there respective states.

While I will not attempt to pin down a definition of Zionism, I think we can all agree a Jew who has a overall favorable view of Israeli is not going to identify as an anti-Zionist. I have met almost all the actively anti-Zionist Jews in a small city at numerous rallies and Sabbath dinners and not once have any of them expressed that their view of Israel is favorable.

In theory anti-Zionism is not antisemitism, however if someone told you they were not anti-black they just disliked black people who did not vote for Trump, what would you call them?

It is tragic that I had to write this from a throwaway, but I do not want my career to be damaged by a public association with Zionism.

Re: Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

#168
post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've banned this account for repeatedly using HN for flamewar and ignoring our requests to stop. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Wait, Am I banned or the other person? I'm confused by the wording and context. You replied to me, but warned them in another comment. Also I don't think I've ever been warned before.

I warned the other account rather than banning them because, even though they've broken the site guidelines badly on more than one previous occasion, we hadn't warned them before.

We've banned your account because you've broken the site guidelines badly on many occasions and because we've asked you more than once to stop.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20271284

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20098782

Re: Trapped in Iran: My Summer as a Guest of the Revolutionary Guards

#169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is plenty to criticize about Mohammad Reza Pahlavi's reign. You however are not expressing a 'critical' position. You are merely echoing propaganda. What misrule? (Curious as to the lengths and depths of your studies of modern Iranian history.) During the 50 years of Pahlavi dynasty, Iran went from being a basket case toy of England and Russia to a nation that was actually posing strategic problems for Western…

Again, one does not have to defend the actions of any guerrilla or terrorist organization, in order to lament the brutality of Pahlavi rule. Furthermore, it is ridiculous to cast him as a victim of Western imperialism, rather than another Fulgencio Batista or Ngo Dinh Diem who overplayed his hand and failed to carry out the sufficient land reform to appease the working classes and the peasantry.

Again,

When I introduce Mr. X to an audience, I may choose a distinguishing characteristic.

To claim that the 'distinguishing' or 'characteristic', or 'essential character' of Shah of Iran was "tyranny" or "brutality" is egregious. Historical facts simply do not reflect that.

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