[softy54534]

I'm not Iranian, but here's a quick explanation of what they are talking about:The Iranian people weren't happy under the Shah of Iran either, (This is Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the ruler of Iran before the islamic takeover) He was sort of a puppet dictator propped up by the United States and, more influentially, the British. That is why a lot of western values were represented in this culture. However, it was a bit of a gilded age for the country. Under the Shah's control was a group of secret police who would kidnap and torture people instigating rebellion against his people. When an inevitable uprising occurred, it was very easy for an extremely organized religious zealotry to blame the human rights violations on western influence-and thus that ALL western culture should be rejected, and seize power. This of course led Iran to an even worse and more dangerous government then they had had before. It's important to remember, and learn from this however, that the Western habit of seizing governments does not help us win the more important cultural war. Had the Iranian people been allowed a democracy which we didn't interfere with, or had we not allowed a tyrant to be in power simply because he was OUR tyrant, then it would have been much harder for Iran's extreme religious branch to win the hearts and minds, however briefly of it's rebelling public. Or to be more precise, the "freedom-loving" West is JUST AS responsible for the state of Iran as the religious fundamentalists who run it now, perhaps even more so, as we did not live up to the ideals we claimed to be supporting. With most of our interactions in the persian and arab worlds, I think, we still don't.