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Iran abolishes morality police

hindustantimes.com

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Re: Iran abolishes morality police

#241

Post by busterarm »

implements wrote: post #173
busterarm wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is also worth noting the Iranian supreme leaders (there have only been two) are not Ayatollahs. I see these terms falsely conjoined many times in the comments here. Comparatively the Ayatollahs, or specifically the Grand Ayatollahs, are quite moderate compared to the fundamentalists In political power. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ali_Khamenei Yeah..."Mr Death To America" Himself is a moderate... I see why yo…

I’d told that “Death to X!” is a cultural hyperbole better read as “Down with X!” - sounds terrible to westerners read literally, but isn’t actually that strong.

Except when you advocate for political violence people are apt to take your words seriously. And this is literally Iran we're talking about here: #1 in state-sponsored terrorism.

Intelligence has confirmed that Khamenei has been aware of terrorist plots before they were carried out, such as the Mykonos restaurant assassination.

So yes, keep telling us all what a moderate he is.

Re: Iran abolishes morality police

#242

Post by DaiPlusPlus »

Vespasian wrote: post #239
DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ranked-choice voting (STV, IIRC?) was rejected by referendum in the UK because (words to the effect of) “it’s too complicated for the average voter to understand”, according to the Keep FPTP camp. It’s a dumb argument for sure, but now (i.e. post-Brexit referendum) I can’t help but think it’s a valid dumb argument…

I don't think British people are inherently dumber than the people here in Germany. Here you get two votes (one for the candidate of your district and one for the party. The second vote determines the number of seats while the first one makes sure a local guy gets one if them). This is much more difficult than just listing candidates in the order you like them and "make sure you include anyone you can somewhat stomac…

Mixed-member proportionate representation requires a constitutional overhaul though, which is why it's a very, very hard-sell without a prerequisite revolution, war, and/or guillotining of the malign parts of the aristocracy...

Re: Iran abolishes morality police

#243

Post by dragonwriter »

paulryanrogers wrote: post #67
booleandilemma wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ha, your comment got me thinking: is there a chance Democrats and Republicans will ever be voted out?

The party system in the US does feel rigged to entrench the two remaining parties in the US. My hope is dropping first past the pole and adding ranked choice will help break up the duopoly. Still, there are glimmers of hope now and again. Like Ross Pero running as independent or the Bull Moose party.

> Like Ross Pero running as independent or the Bull Moose party.

The thing is those things either don't work (as in those examples) or they do and just replace one of the major parties in whay becomes a new, generally stable 2-party alignment.

To get out of that, you need to weaken the electoral system elements reinforcing duopoly, the most direct way being to adopt some form of proportional representation (e.g., STV), at least for most (e.g., all state and the federal House of Reps) legislative elections.

Even the commonly offered proposal of ranked ballots methods in single-member districts doesn’t really address the problem (PR, whether by STV or other mechanisms, also destroys the ability to significantly distort by gerrymandering.)

Re: Iran abolishes morality police

#245

Post by kamaal »

enkid wrote: post #79
einpoklum wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if you've been following Iranian elections you might reach the opposite conclusion... Now, I'm no fan of the Iranian regime, but I doubt you can make trustworthy conclusions about what the public wants from sampling posts on social media. (I wouldn't say that even elections are the end-all of what "the public wants".)

Isn't the entire elections system built to reinforce regime legitimacy? All of the candidates have to be approved by the Guardian Council which is controlled by the Supreme Leader, so it's not like they have any threat to the regime itself. It's a way to appear willing to reform without actually reforming.

Thats a very nice way of saying of they have a decentralised power/political structure. Very much like Chinese. This is some what also similar to what the US itself has.

The reason why any geopolitical player would not want their opponents to have this is because it makes it very hard to take out decentralised structures, its not easy to do a coup, and even if you manage to do a color revolution, you can at best remove the head of government- Which is the president and his cabinet(who are nothing more than managers) which really doesn't change much given the next team will have to live with the same decentralised structure, and they too will have powers no more than being managers.

Iranians and Chinese are a tough nut to crack for this reason. The head of governments, really aren't all that powerful. Protests don't change much.

Re: Iran abolishes morality police

#246

Post by midoridensha »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #221
socialdemocrat wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a variant of the US system, rather than the rich picking the candidates who can run, the priests do. Sorry, I am teasing but I want to highlight that the problem with pre-selected candidates is a widespread problem undermining democracy in many places. Same applies to Hong Kong were China heavily influenced candidate selection.

That's a ridiculous exaggeration. People vote in the primaries as well. Except for Thiel, rich people were uniformly against Trump being nominated.

It isn't universally that way: Trump showed how to subvert the system. But the 2016 election showed how the powerful elites in the Democratic party subverted the people's will and installed an extremely unpopular candidate they wanted. Then of course the people spoke in the general election that they didn't want her, and disaster ensued.

In most elections, the candidates were ones the rich elites wanted there. But there have been exceptions.

Re: Iran abolishes morality police

#247

Post by midoridensha »

Waterluvian wrote: post #65
booleandilemma wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ha, your comment got me thinking: is there a chance Democrats and Republicans will ever be voted out?

The Whigs did so it’s possible! ;)

This shows exactly how party change comes in a 2-party system (enforced by Duverger's Law due to first-past-the-post voting). One of the two main parties implodes for some reason, so the other party gets all the power. But that can't be sustained because there's different factions within that party, so the big party breaks in half, and you're right back to a 2-party system.

Re: Iran abolishes morality police

#248

Post by einpoklum »

Denvercoder9 wrote: post #78
einpoklum wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if you've been following Iranian elections you might reach the opposite conclusion... Now, I'm no fan of the Iranian regime, but I doubt you can make trustworthy conclusions about what the public wants from sampling posts on social media. (I wouldn't say that even elections are the end-all of what "the public wants".)

I wouldn't attach any meaning to an election that didn't allow most candidates to run, had the lowest turnout in history, and still ended up with a significant amount of blank/invalid votes, despite that being explicitly forbidden.

That's basically my point actually. Anecdotally sampling a bunch of tweets has a very low level of validity.

Re: Iran abolishes morality police

#249

Post by einpoklum »

kamaal wrote: post #245
enkid wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't the entire elections system built to reinforce regime legitimacy? All of the candidates have to be approved by the Guardian Council which is controlled by the Supreme Leader, so it's not like they have any threat to the regime itself. It's a way to appear willing to reform without actually reforming.

Thats a very nice way of saying of they have a decentralised power/political structure. Very much like Chinese. This is some what also similar to what the US itself has. The reason why any geopolitical player would not want their opponents to have this is because it makes it very hard to take out decentralised structures, its not easy to do a coup, and even if you manage to do a color revolution, you can at best remo…

I think you meant "multi-polar" rather than "decentralized". The power structure in Iran is very centralized.

Re: Iran abolishes morality police

#250

Post by SpelingBeeChamp »

anothernewdude wrote: post #62
sfifs wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do realize I assume that in the whole of middle east, Israel and Iran are the only reasonably functional countries where people get to elect their government to some extent and the people leading the government actually change based on the vote? Maybe that's why the governments hate each other :-) Perhaps Lebanon as well but the country has been non-functional for a long time. Every other country including every…

Israel is corrupt and Iran is a dictatorship. If another party decides who can have power in the elected body - that party has power. That's what has happened to Hong Kong, and it's what happens in Iran.

>Israel is corrupt

How so?

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