Don't you know the government bans websites that opposes it?
Iran and the Nazis
- Thread starter Pardalis
- Start date
Don't you know the government bans websites that opposes it?
DC
Banned
- Joined
- Mar 20, 2008
- Messages
- 23,064
jhunter1163
beer-swilling semiliterate
Do not personalize your arguments.
Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic Posted By: jhunter1163
A'isha
Miss Schoolteacher
I didn't say they weren't Islamic. I said they weren't Islamist. Islamism is a specific (and specifically Sunni) religious political movement. The only Islamist groups in Iran are considered terrorist groups by the Iranian government.
One of these Islamist groups, Jundallah, was actually just declared a terrorist organization by the US last month, after years of Iran accusing the US of supporting Jundallah's attacks within Iran itself.
Toontown
Philosopher
- Joined
- Jun 9, 2010
- Messages
- 6,595
The term is not "IslamIST-fascism". The term is "IslamO-fascism".
Oh, the pedantic semanticism of it all...
"Pedanto-semanticism"
Last edited:
Really, what difference does it make if it's Sunni or Shia? Islamism is about Islam being at the center of a country's political and social life, and the implementation of Sharia.
Doesn't Iran's political system revolve around its clerics? Yes or no?
Toontown
Philosopher
- Joined
- Jun 9, 2010
- Messages
- 6,595
Oh, the pedantic semanticism of it all...
Do you realise what you're saying? No? Well, I do. You're saying the Nazis didn't invent racist, nationalistic Facism. The Iranians did.
Hmm...
"Islamo-fascism"
Captain.Sassy
Master Poster
- Joined
- Sep 14, 2009
- Messages
- 2,236
DC
Banned
- Joined
- Mar 20, 2008
- Messages
- 23,064
A'isha
Miss Schoolteacher
Before 1935, the country had two names. Westerners, especially the British, called it Persia. The inhabitants of the country, however, called it Iran, and had been calling it that for a long time.
On 21 March 1935, Reza Shah Pahlavi issued a decree that everyone, even foreigners, ought call the nation by the same name. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs sent a communique to all the foreign embassies in Tehran, requesting that they stop using the name Persia, and henceforth refer to the country as Iran, the name Iranians themselves used for the country.
The "official change" was merely to ask other countries, via diplomatic channels, call the country by the same name the Iranians used and always had used to refer to their own country, in future diplomatic communications.
Understand now?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran#Name
The term Iran (ایران) in modern Persian derives from the Proto-Iranian term Aryānā, first attested in Zoroastrianism's Avesta tradition.[25] Ariya- and Airiia- are also attested as an ethnic designator in Achaemenid inscriptions. The term Ērān, from Middle Persian Ērān (written as ʼyrʼn) is found on the inscription that accompanies the investiture relief of Ardashir I at Naqsh-e Rustam.[26] In this inscription, the king's appellation in Middle Persian contains the term ērān (Pahlavi ʼryʼn), while in the Parthian language inscription that accompanies it, the term aryān describes Iran. In Ardeshir's time, ērān retained this meaning, denoting the people rather than the state. The name Iran is a cognate of Aryan, and means "Land of the Aryans".[27][28][29]
Notwithstanding this inscriptional use of ērān to refer to the Iranian peoples, the use of ērān to refer to the geographical empire is also attested in the early Sassanid period. An inscription relating to Shapur I, Ardashir's son and immediate successor, includes regions which were not inhabited primarily by Iranians in Ērān regions, such as Armenia and the Caucasus."[30] In Kartir's inscriptions the high priest includes the same regions in his list of provinces of the antonymic Anērān.[30] Both ērān and aryān come from the Proto-Iranian term Aryānām, (Land) of the (Iranian) Aryas. The word and concept of Airyanem Vaejah is present in the name of the country Iran inasmuch as Iran (Ērān) is the modern Persian form of the word Aryānā.
Since the Sassanid era the country has been known to its own people as Iran; however, to the western world, the official name of Iran from the 6th century BC until 1935 was Persia or similar foreign language translations (La Perse, Persien, Perzie, etc.).[9] In that year, Reza Shah asked the international community to call the country by the name "Iran". A few years later, some Persian scholars protested to the government that changing the name had separated the country from its past, so in 1959[11] Mohammad Reza Shah announced that both terms could officially be used interchangeably. Now both terms are common, but "Iran" is used mostly in the modern political context and "Persia" in a cultural and historical context. Since the Iranian Revolution of 1979, the official name of the country has been the "Islamic Republic of Iran."
The term Iran (ایران) in modern Persian derives from the Proto-Iranian term Aryānā, first attested in Zoroastrianism's Avesta tradition.[25] Ariya- and Airiia- are also attested as an ethnic designator in Achaemenid inscriptions. The term Ērān, from Middle Persian Ērān (written as ʼyrʼn) is found on the inscription that accompanies the investiture relief of Ardashir I at Naqsh-e Rustam.[26] In this inscription, the king's appellation in Middle Persian contains the term ērān (Pahlavi ʼryʼn), while in the Parthian language inscription that accompanies it, the term aryān describes Iran. In Ardeshir's time, ērān retained this meaning, denoting the people rather than the state. The name Iran is a cognate of Aryan, and means "Land of the Aryans".[27][28][29]
Notwithstanding this inscriptional use of ērān to refer to the Iranian peoples, the use of ērān to refer to the geographical empire is also attested in the early Sassanid period. An inscription relating to Shapur I, Ardashir's son and immediate successor, includes regions which were not inhabited primarily by Iranians in Ērān regions, such as Armenia and the Caucasus."[30] In Kartir's inscriptions the high priest includes the same regions in his list of provinces of the antonymic Anērān.[30] Both ērān and aryān come from the Proto-Iranian term Aryānām, (Land) of the (Iranian) Aryas. The word and concept of Airyanem Vaejah is present in the name of the country Iran inasmuch as Iran (Ērān) is the modern Persian form of the word Aryānā.
Since the Sassanid era the country has been known to its own people as Iran; however, to the western world, the official name of Iran from the 6th century BC until 1935 was Persia or similar foreign language translations (La Perse, Persien, Perzie, etc.).[9] In that year, Reza Shah asked the international community to call the country by the name "Iran". A few years later, some Persian scholars protested to the government that changing the name had separated the country from its past, so in 1959[11] Mohammad Reza Shah announced that both terms could officially be used interchangeably. Now both terms are common, but "Iran" is used mostly in the modern political context and "Persia" in a cultural and historical context. Since the Iranian Revolution of 1979, the official name of the country has been the "Islamic Republic of Iran."
A'isha
Miss Schoolteacher
No, I'm saying that both the Iranians and the Nazis approached the same racist, nationalistic doctrine from different, albeit parallel, directions, coming from the same 19th century roots. They effectively "invented" that particular brand of it, racial Aryanism, separately.
The Nazis added a fascist element that the Iranians didn't have. Their ideology developed along different authoritarian nationalist lines.
Toontown
Philosopher
- Joined
- Jun 9, 2010
- Messages
- 6,595
Duuh...
That's the second sentence of my first post. The sentence came under heavy semantic attack, which continued unabated for two pages, and became the lynchpin for various claims that I had failed to support "my claim".
But at last, you have just agreed with every jot and tittle of the sentence.
Understand now?
Toontown
Philosopher
- Joined
- Jun 9, 2010
- Messages
- 6,595
Got it. You've now switched to pedantically arguing the definition of "Fascism". you're suggesting "Fascism" is not exactly authoritarian racist nationalism, but something else, which the Iranians didn't practice or agree with.
I disagree. I say "Fascism" is, essentially, authoritarian racist nationalism, irrespective of various small quirks the various Fascist countries may have indulged themselves in. And I say Iran was and is a hotbed of authoritarian, racist nationalism, i.e., Fascist.
A'isha
Miss Schoolteacher
The answer is complicated, and lies in the nature of Shia doctrinal development of Islam versus Sunni doctrinal development. Sunni Islam, following the split between the two sects over the succession to the Caliphate, become the dominant sect when Yazid I defeated and killed the successor that the Shi'tes preferred, Husayn ibn Ali. This basically made Sunni Islam the Islam of the govermental structure, while Shia Islam became the Islam of the smaller, powerless communities.
As a result, Sunni Islam became more codified and crystallized, focusing on a literal interpretation of the Qu'ran, with four major schools of shariah, which differed on points of interpretation of the law, but still considered each other to be fully valid. Sunni Islam became very formalized and tradition-bound, with individual interpretation of the Qu'ran discouraged, and the reliance on the traditional interpretation of a body of formal scholars without questioning their rulings, a principle called taqlid.
Shia Islam, on the other hand, became a lot more fluid and freeform, emphasizing the role of individual faqih in interpreting the meaning of the Qu'ran, according to their own personal views (in Islam, this is called ijtihad). And where Sunni Islam focused on a direct, literal reading of the Qu'ran, Shia Islam favored a more esoteric interpretation of the "deeper meaning" of the Qu'ran beyond its actual words.
Though the analogy isn't exactly perfect, this doctrinal divide is best compared to the traditionalist, ritualistic, formalized and hierarchical Catholic Church, and the more freeform, individual-interpretation, and individual-worship-community of Evangelical Protestantism.
Islamism, as a Sunni principle, can point to their version of Islam as a guide to not just religion, but politics, thanks to the codification of their religious system. It's only usable as a guide for exporting and implementing a political system, in fact, because of that codification. Every Islamist government is to be set up the same way, following the same principles, and using the same set of laws handed down by the same set of fuqaha. Their goal is to unify the ummah under these rules.
But Shia Islam doesn't work that way. Iran doesn't work that way. Ayatollah Khomeini's founding ruling principle of veliyat-e-faqih, in fact, is the direct opposite of the ruling principles the Sunni Islamists want to apply. Shia Islam does not and has never had one interpretation of the Qu'ran, or established and traditional schools of shariah, or body of respected fuqaha to hand down rulings accepted by all.
And even though Khomeini's particular version of veliyat-e-faqih is all about a single person who gets to make religious and political decisions for a nation-state, it can't really be exported in the same way Sunni Islamism can, because of that fractious, personal-interpretive nature. If they try to export that principle, one of two things will happen: either the other Ayatollahs will refuse to accept the Iranian Supreme Leader's rulings (because to be a Shia Ayatollah is all about the ability to issue your own fatwa based on your own ijtihad, and they aren't likely to submit to someone else's interpretations), or each Ayatollah will set up their own polities using Khomeini's veliyat-e-faqih (in effect being rival Islamic Republics, where a ruling issued by one is not valid in another).
In short, Sunni Islamism is all about exporting a singular (or at least codified and regularized) form of political Islam in an effort to unify the entire ummah under a single rule, while any similar attempt by a Shia "Islamism" (even using Khomeini's specific form of veliyat-e-faqih) will produce exactly the opposite. [EDIT: In fact, Iran is probably one of the few places this would work, since their self-identity as Iranians inculcated by their earlier authoritarian ethnosupremacism made it easier for Khomeini to get the entire nation behind his one-man theocratic rule. The lack of any sort of unifying identifer above the local tribal/religious community level would make it a lot harder to unify, say, the various Shia groups in Iraq, for instance.]
That's why we need two different terms to refer to the two different systems of political Islam. Their goals and effects are just too different for them to be comfortably placed under the same label.
Last edited:
A'isha
Miss Schoolteacher
I have a friend. He's always called himself Charles, because that's the name his parents gave him. Everyone else, though, would call him nothing but "Chuck." One day, he said to everyone, "Look, stop calling me Chuck! My name is and always has been Charles!"
Has my friend changed his name, in your opinion?
EDIT: Actually, here's a better comparison. In Canada, there exists a First Nations tribe that has always called themselves "Inuit". Most non-Natives referred to them, however, by the name "Eskimo". A while back, they petitioned to have their Canadian government appellation changed to Inuit, to match the name they use (and have always used) for themselves, and this was done.
Now...has that tribe changed their name?
Despite your insistence, "Fascism" is not merely authoritarian, racist nationalism. See Umberto Eco's checklist, for instance.
Last edited:
Toontown
Philosopher
- Joined
- Jun 9, 2010
- Messages
- 6,595
It's close enough for me to be content to continue to use the term "Islamo-fascist" when referring to people like Ahmadinejad and his Ahahtollah puppeteers. And close enough for me to continue to see and perhaps occasionally comment on the current Iranian regime's fascistic tendencies, and to suspect that their long-term goal is to evolve into an Islamic version of the 4th Reich.
And, as I've long known and the Wikileaks have now confirmed, I am hardly the only one who sees them this way. It is apparently not for nothing that U.S. officials call Ahmadinejad "Hitler" and Arab countries are calling for air strikes.
So it looks like the Word Police and I won't be getting along.