< HOME  Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Divide & Conquer, with cartoons

Yet again, someone uses the most powerful weapon in the world to stir divisive emotions.
Iran closed the state-run Farsi language newspaper Iran and detained its chief editor and cartoonist on Tuesday for publishing a cartoon that showed a cockroach speaking Azeri and suggested that ethnic Azeris are stupid.

"Today, they (the U.S. and its allies) are hatching plots. They want to provoke differences, divisions, disappointment ... to prevent the Iranian nation from achieving all of its rights," Ahmadinejad told thousands of people in Khorramshahr in southwestern Iran.

* * *

Other Iranian officials were also quick to stress the nation's unity in the standoff with Washington, which accuses Iran of seeking to develop nuclear weapons.

"It is clear that the evil hands of foreigners are making efforts to provoke tribal, ethnic, and religious differences under the present circumstances," State Public Prosecutor Ghorban Ali Dorri Najafabadi was quoted Tuesday as saying by state-run media.

Hundreds of Azeris marched on Monday in the northwestern city of Tabriz to protest the cartoon. Some broke windows at the governor's office, and police had to use tear gas to disperse the crowd, witnesses said. The violence was also reported by an independent news agency, ILNA.

Azeris, a Turkic ethnic group, are Iran's largest minority, making up about a quarter of Iran's 70 million people, dominated by ethnic Persians. Azeris speak a Turkic language shared by their brethren in neighboring Azerbaijan.

The cartoon, which ran May 12, showed people from different walks of life - including an athlete and a tradesman - trying to teach the cockroach and he always answers, in Azeri, "What do you mean?"

There was no explanation why the protests broke out more than a week after the cartoon.
Sound familiar?
A January article in The New Yorker magazine reported that U.S. military operatives were already working in Iran, making contacts with anti-government ethnic minorities and gathering intelligence. Defense Department officials said the article was filled with mistakes but did not deny its basic point. Iran denied that any U.S. agents had entered its territory.

* * *

On Tuesday, Interior Minister Mostaf Pourmohammadi warned that opportunists were working in Iran to inflame trouble.

"Some are misusing the situation. Others outside (Iran's) borders are trying to propagate protests through their satellite channels," he said in reference to U.S.-based Iranian opposition television channels.

"We should preserve our vigilance, especially the media ... and not allow, under the current very important situation the country is in now, others who pursue certain intentions to misuse the situation," he said.
Never forget the power the media has to influence minds. The media can be our worst enemy.

7 Comments:

At Thursday, May 25, 2006, Anonymous Anonymous said...

One of the greatest feat of the west’s divide and conquer tactics was setting india against china, "I fail to see that it is not in the Australian interest to see the Chinese and the Indians at each other's throats."

and who was the one who started it but good ole
uncle sham

 
At Thursday, May 25, 2006, Blogger qrswave said...

denk,

Thanks for these excellent links.

There seems to be something new and ugly to be learned about Western politics everyday.

 
At Thursday, May 25, 2006, Blogger Red Tulips said...

Miss Wave,

I am sorry, you know I love you, but this is a pathology at this point.

You blame cartoons that appear in IRANIAN media on the US???

WHEN will you just take something at face value and STOP WITH THE SAME TIRED CONSPIRACY THEORY??????

The world is not conspiring to kill us all in the way you think it is. If I believed what you did, I would probably end my life this instant! (I am not saying you should end your life - that would devastate me and especially your family - au contrare - I want what is best for you!)

I am just saying that your thoughts, as I know well, are making it hard for you to sleep at night. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE calm down a minute and STOP thinking there is a boogeyman behind every corner. I have news for you...there isn't!!

 
At Thursday, May 25, 2006, Blogger Red Tulips said...

One more point I must make.

When the Arab media is filled with anti-Jewish hate/lies/propoganda, you both make zero mention of it, and I would have to assume do not think this is "planted by the West."

When the Arab media contains a cartoon that is anti a non-Jewish minority in the Middle East, you assume it is planted by the West.

Does this mean that you think it is legitimate to spread hate/lies/propoganda against Jews, though not against non-Jews, and hence the legitimate hate must be "home grown?" Please reconcile these two conflicting viewpoints.

Can you at least acknowledge the possibility that the Iranian cartoon was the product of a disparaging thought that someone within the newspaper has against the Turkish minority in Iran?

Does literally EVERY bad thing in the world have to be the product of some sort of Western/Zionist conspiracy theory?

 
At Friday, May 26, 2006, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Qrswave,

I wouldn’t dare to say that the east has a higher moral value than the west.
The trouble with the usa is simply that absolute power corrupts, if you are capable of doing whatever you like without fear of reprisal, you tend to abuse that power. Wasn’t it Madeline Albright who declared “what’s the use of having this fine military if you never make use of it ?” …and boy how uncle scam made good use of that fine military .
If one day china become the sole super power , there’s no guarantee that it wont follow the same path. But right now, usa is the 900 lb gorilla, and the yanks are doing all the plundering and killing.

Miss r,

Have you ever wonder why the “terrarists” always seems to shoot themselves in the foot
, the next time the terrarists strike, its wise to ask , “qui bono” (who benefits)…


[btw, just to prempt any misunderstanding, that hk part in my email address was a mistake, could be due to a slip during the registration with yahoo.]





http://www.krysstal.com/democracy_whyusa02.html

http://www.prisonplanet.com/112103greatestally.html

 
At Friday, May 26, 2006, Blogger qrswave said...

Denk, thanks for your comment. Of course, neither East nor West necessarily acts better than the other. The question is not one of location.

Absolute power corrupts, agreed. However, people who believe in God, NEVER assume that they have absolute power. Therefore, total political power does not necessarily mean absolute power. A leader who fears God, vis a vis how he leads and treats people, is qualitatively different from one who does not.

Indeed, they cannot be compared. The former is a blessing, the latter can be a curse, if they see no other reason to treat others well.

 
At Friday, May 26, 2006, Blogger Red Tulips said...

*laughs hysterically*

You do realize that BOTH Bush and Ahmedinajad believe in god and believe they are doing god's bidding?

I would say the EXACT OPPOSITE.

A belief in god is a belief that whatever they do is backed by a fairy tale creator, and thus they can do no wrong. There is much to fear from a ruler who invokes god all the time - and this is not even accounting for the obvious concerns of how such a ruler treats those who do not believe in the god they do.

History begats this. Some of the worst wars in the world have been fought over religion - and both rulers thought they were doing god's bidding.

A ruler that believes in rationality and secular humanism is one I have far greater "faith" in.

 

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