by Cheryl Abraham
Iran is a nation with many problems, many issues and peopled by human
beings not so different than you or I. Iran is a nation where clergy
exercises policy control over the political landscape, where the police
and the courts practice brutality and inequality, a nation in which
women are systematically oppressed, a nation that commits heinous acts,
a nation led by a president that embarrasses its people, and a nation
whose media is controlled and censored. Does this sound FAMILIAR??
All this should sound familiar because we here in the U.S. have many of the same issues, issues that many people are working hard to change and in Iran there are also movements of people working hard to change Iran’s landscape. These activists then become targets of the Iranian government, subject to arrest or worse and continually vilified as traitors for their views – this also should sound familiar to any American who’s paid attention to the present political landscape of the U.S.
The Bush Cheney propaganda machine has cranked up the volume of threats against Iran over the last few weeks, and Iran in turn has pushed back in defiance.
Caught in between are the people of Iran, and George Bush and a host of other politicians would rather you not think of the Iranian people as human beings, they’d rather you think of the Iranian people as terrorists, hate mongers, and a people ready to nuke somebody to hell. Part of Bush’s attempt to sell a war with Iran is to dehumanize the enemy, a war/propaganda tactic to make it easier for people to stomach the annihilation of the “enemy”.
So, are the Iranian people a bunch of crazy terrorists with their finger on the proverbial button and who believe everything that President Ahmadinejad says, or are they a whole hell of lot like you and me?
Watch these videos and you decide:
Let’s thwart George Bush’s plan by learning a little about this so called “enemy’:
Take the No Attack on Iran Pledge!
We will do everything possible to stop a war on Iran.
We pledge to bring business as usual to a halt if the US bombs Iran.
We will draw forward many others to act.
We pledge our resistance now because the world cannot wait.
Cheryl Abraham is a member of World Can’t Wait from the Seattle area and a regular writer for the World Can’t Wait web site.