The Fix Is In in Iran

It doesn't matter how smart they are - once they have set up an authoritarian state they have dug a pit for themselves: they will fall into the same patterns as their predecessors in the long record of human governmental tragedy.

 

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How do you know they are much smaller? Ahmedinejad is much more popular in the countryside than he is in the city so how can you gage which group is larger or smaller. I say let it play itself out and let the people ultimately decide what is what. Its not for us to assume what Iranians want for themselves. It wouldn't be the first time Iranians rid themselves of an oppressive regime, the Shah was oppressive and corrupt and they sent him packing.

 

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Iran is shooting people, blocking websites, arresting and beating people, taking pictures of the demonstrators so they can be picked up quietly later... It's far from free.

 

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No north Korea isn't free. I would say that these people felt free to go out in the streets in huge numbers, I am not saying that the government isn't interfering with this or isn't behaving like a, dare I say it, state. During seattle protest 500 demonstrators were arrested, many were beat up by police officers, pictures were and are taken of all protest organizers and under the patriot act anyone can be picked up quietly. I am not saying the government isn't reacting to this, I am saying the government doesn't yet have tanks on the streets like the Chinese did. I am saying that the reaction of the government isn't unique to Iran nor to so called free societies.

 

It has been a while and my memory is clearly not what it used to be, but I am dead sure that it was way longer. If memory serves it was almost two months when students started to gather there up to the point when the military came in. Three days is not even close.

 

No way. Two months? You don't actually believe the chinese government would have allowed all of Beijing, and it was all of Beijing, to come to a standstill for two months do you? The student movement began before the gathering but the actual clash between government and people didn't last that long at all.

 

Hey, it was almost like you dodged the question Which Side Are You On? Lucys know.

 

Sigh. Go read a history book or something.

 

No if you think I am wrong show me where and how and I can correct or re-think it but telling me to 'go read a history book' is hardly helpful in a discussion like this is it? You don't prove anything by saying that.

 

I have little interested in spoon-feeding you education if you're too lazy to even, say, read the wikipedia article, which explains in detail how long the large-scale protests at Tiananmen Square lasted.

 

What do you mean by that? Right now I am sitting left of center of my mother's dining room table. Does this help you?

 

Ok. Very good, very helpful. Nice discussing this with you. Good Day, now back to Iran.

 

Please, No! It's dangerous back there! Let's talk about Shaghayegh.

 

Hahaha

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First, the protests on tiananmen square took a bit less than two months. Just read it up. However it appears that in your mind it was a Beijing-wide protest, which is wrong. It is called Tiananmen square protest for a reason. It was mostly confined to the square and later the area around it. Also, it was mostly a student's demonstration, later joined by workers, but again, a statement of "it was all of Beijing" is a bit ignorant, given the size of the city.
To give a rough dateline, protests started in April, martial law was declared a month later, in June the military rolled in.

A difference to Iran, of course is that there the protests are embraced and enacted by a larger slice of the populace, whereas the protests in Tiananmen square were mostly enacted by students, but with the general support with the populace. But IIRC they had less of an active part in it (except by supplying the protesters with food and water, for instance).

 

Take a look at chapter three (sorry chapter 2) and tell me if you think this was contained to the park. It also disproves your claim that this (tiananmen) was an isolated affair of only students.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tankman/view/

 

YOu can apologize for assuming I'm a complete dolt later

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Sorry chapter 2

 

I cannot watch the movie here, however I pretty sure that students and workers together were well under a million. I would have to check how much it expanded, however I recall the fighting were in the area around the square (and remember, Beijing is bloody big).
What you may be confusing is the fact that there were similar protests around the country (I recall at least a big one in Shanghai) but they were not all in Beiijing. In Beijing, however the bulk of the protesters were students, joined later on by workers. I do not believe (but maybe I can check the vids later and may be proven wrong) that there was actually a general strike in Beijing (but I think there was a call for it in Shanghai). As such I do not think that Beijing was at a standstill during the protests. At least not up until martial law was declared. Also, are we in agreement that the protests took longer than three days?

 

Tens of millions. There were people all over the streets of Beijing, in the city in the suburbs not just in the square and yes there were protests all over china, it was not just a student demonstration.

Anyway watch the video when you get the chance its quite interesting.