"Underline everything, I'm a professional in my beloved white shirt."
0. Why is it that whenever I post something here, I always want to do it very late at night? :P
1. I finally sent that letter I mentioned two weeks ago to my parents last Friday. That night my mom and I had an awkward but productive conversation about it. Today (technically yesterday) she reminded me that she was looking for a doctor for me and my dad, one that could probably recommend us some good psychiatrists, psychologists, and/or therapists. It's a very good sign, and I have every reason to be optimistic. :D
2a. As many of you already know, this past Tuesday was my 21st birthday (and for those of you who wished me a happy birthday on Facebook or LJ, thank you!). Not much happened that day; my dad's mother came over to visit, as well as my aunt and uncle in Hamden and my mom's old work friend and her husband, and my dad, in lieu of cake (which I don't like -- way too sweet for my tastes), bought some pizza, stuffed breads, and antipasti salads from a local Italian take-out for all of us to have for dinner, which was very good as always. Everyone also left early, probably because they had Other Things™ to do or whatnot. Not like I mind; the conversation between everyone that was there got boring very fast, and I don't really treat birthdays as anything special -- to me, they're just another day, really. (Of course, it didn't help that this past week was unseasonably cold; temperatures were only slightly above 60F/15C, and with the rain and thunderstorms it felt kinda miserable, actually. At least things should be returning back to normal next week.)
The fact that I'm 21 (and therefore old enough to drink legally in this country) still hasn't quite sunk in yet. I don't feel a day over 15, after all. :P
Anyway, here's what I made out with:
2b. And today (technically yesterday) was my dad's mother's birthday, so we visited her for a while, but we also didn't stay long because there wasn't really much to do, and we had to go out to dinner instead.
3a. Tomorrow (technically today) my mom wants us to go to the New Britain Museum of American Art, because they offer free admission in the morning (not like the two Yale-affiliated art museums closer to home are free all the time, but apparently we're just conveniently forgetting about that), and because it's one of the few interesting places in the state that we haven't been before. I kinda don't want to go, mostly because I'm in one of those I-don't-want-to-go-anywhere-or-do-anything moods I get sometimes, but we'll see. If I do go and actually enjoy myself, you'll all know sooner or later. ;-)
3b. And my dad is supposed to start taking me out driving tomorrow too. Again, kinda reluctant to, but I should pick it up again pretty quickly, and I definitely need to get my license by the end of this summer. We've waited far too long to get it.
4. Today is the one-year anniversary of the contested presidential elections in Iran that led to the rise of the Green Revolution, the movement seeking to overthrow Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the current autocratic Islamic Republic, and promote liberal democracy and social justice in their country. I know I haven't posted about it for a good six months, but that was because I heard nothing filtered to me through ontd_political or other news outlets I usually go to for information about the protesters or the movement in that time (if I had heard anything about Iran, it was either about the political oppression in the country, now given more attention thanks to the protests, or about sanctions and deals regarding their nuclear program, which I find both silly and hypocritical, but that's neither here nor there); the Wikipedia link I've given should be a good recap of what has gone on in the past year. Anyway, seeing that this it has been one year on, here's a quick linkdump of what people have written so far:
Reza Aslan: "Iran's Revolutionaries Are Winning"
I'm not quoting anything from this article, because IMHO the whole thing needs reading. If you read nothing else in this linkdump, read this. Aslan is an amazing writer, and I really want to read more of his work.
Of course, there are people who don't agree:
--Con Couglin (The Daily Telegraph [UK]): "Iran's Green Movement has been betrayed by its leaders" (on ways the movement didn't succeed as much as commentators last year hoped -- if by "success" you mean "near-immediate change")
--Geoffrey Robinson: "Iran's Hero Was a War Criminal" (on Mir Hussein Mousavi's involvement in the mass murder of political prisoners in 1988)
But where do we go from here?
Michael Singh (The New York Times): "Remember When Iran Won?"
In the face of such unrelenting oppression, the Iranian people have received little in the way of international support.
While official expressions of concern in Western capitals have gradually mounted, international action has largely been confined to human-rights forums, while the focus of high-level diplomacy has remained squarely on Iran’s nuclear program.
This is not to say that the emphasis by Western governments on preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear arms has been inappropriate. Rather, it is the bifurcation of policy itself - with nuclear weapons as the strategic issue, and human rights as the moral concern - that is misguided.
Support for the Iranian opposition should not be a matter of altruism. In the effort to press the Iranian regime to change its course and moderate its relations with the world, we have in our hands no instrument - whether sanctions or military action - which troubles the regime as greatly as the discontent and activism of the Iranian people, or which holds as significant the potential for bringing positive change to Iran.
The international community cannot, and should not presume to try, to control or even influence Iran’s dissidents. This is no great feat. The Green Movement’s objectives, which include restoring the civil rights of the Iranian people and repairing Iran’s relations with the outside world, comport with the desire in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere that Iran comply with its international obligations and end its campaign to destabilize the Middle East.
Greg Sclobete (Real Clear World): "Be Careful What You Wish For"
For years, the primary U.S. interests in Iran were getting it to drop support for Hezbollah and Hamas and to ensure that its civilian nuclear program was not surreptitiously used to manufacturer a nuclear weapon. In Senator McCain's speech to the National Endowment for Democracy, from which the above is taken, there is no discussion at all as to what the Iranian people's goals are with respect to those American priorities. He does not argue that a democratic and free Iran would abandon Hezbollah or would forswear nuclear weapons. Both things, mind you, are possible (especially, I think, ditching nukes), but it seems strange to me that we are told to treat as one American and Iranian interests without evidence that they actually converge.
[...]
If I were an Iranian protester observing American political discourse since the Green movement began, what would I notice? During the last 12 months, the voices who claimed they want to see democracy take root in Iran were vastly more concerned with the foreign policy of a free Turkey than an unfree Saudi Arabia. I would notice that the voluminous output of anti-Semitism in Saudi Arabia was ignored, while the demagoguery of Turkey's leaders was treated as evidence of a nascent Islamist rogue state and regional competitor.
I would conclude that the same voices professing solidarity with my cause are less concerned with political freedom than with geopolitical orientation.
Meanwhile, AccessNow.org has recently uploaded never-before-seen videos of last year's biggest protests. Newsweek also appears to have some here, though I haven't checked if they're the same as those on the AccessNow.org site.
Of course, not all is doom and gloom, as Andrew Sullivan is keeping hope alive. Here's video of rooftop chanting that took place Thursday night.
Keep an eye out on Iran within the next few days; who knows what might happen. And of course, if you come across anything interesting and Iran-related, please let me know so I can read it and share it with everyone. ;-)
1. I finally sent that letter I mentioned two weeks ago to my parents last Friday. That night my mom and I had an awkward but productive conversation about it. Today (technically yesterday) she reminded me that she was looking for a doctor for me and my dad, one that could probably recommend us some good psychiatrists, psychologists, and/or therapists. It's a very good sign, and I have every reason to be optimistic. :D
2a. As many of you already know, this past Tuesday was my 21st birthday (and for those of you who wished me a happy birthday on Facebook or LJ, thank you!). Not much happened that day; my dad's mother came over to visit, as well as my aunt and uncle in Hamden and my mom's old work friend and her husband, and my dad, in lieu of cake (which I don't like -- way too sweet for my tastes), bought some pizza, stuffed breads, and antipasti salads from a local Italian take-out for all of us to have for dinner, which was very good as always. Everyone also left early, probably because they had Other Things™ to do or whatnot. Not like I mind; the conversation between everyone that was there got boring very fast, and I don't really treat birthdays as anything special -- to me, they're just another day, really. (Of course, it didn't help that this past week was unseasonably cold; temperatures were only slightly above 60F/15C, and with the rain and thunderstorms it felt kinda miserable, actually. At least things should be returning back to normal next week.)
The fact that I'm 21 (and therefore old enough to drink legally in this country) still hasn't quite sunk in yet. I don't feel a day over 15, after all. :P
Anyway, here's what I made out with:
- $21 in rolled pennies. Apparently my aunt and uncle saved one penny for every week since I was born (excluding Christmas and New Year's), and waited until my 21st birthday to give them all to me. In other words, a gift 21 years in the making. Creative? Definitely. (They also sent me a sexually explicit birthday card. Nothing too bad, but......yeah. They're that kind of relative. XD)
- A DVD boxset of the last season of Monk, because my parents were really disappointed that I never got to see the finale when it aired, and they knew I liked the show, so why not? (Yeah, I realize it's hugely problematic in its portrayal of a character with OCD. And while I really enjoyed it for a while, eventually I figured out it followed a strict formula, and eventually that formula became very boring and tiring. But I still like the show, and it's good to have at least some episodes on hand I missed out on when they first aired. ~_^)
- Three books: R.H.P. Mason and J.G. Caiger's A History of Japan, Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake, and Tim Wise's White Like Me (finally! I can't wait to get into that one!).
- Money, of course, but I won't disclose how much. 8D
2b. And today (technically yesterday) was my dad's mother's birthday, so we visited her for a while, but we also didn't stay long because there wasn't really much to do, and we had to go out to dinner instead.
3a. Tomorrow (technically today) my mom wants us to go to the New Britain Museum of American Art, because they offer free admission in the morning (not like the two Yale-affiliated art museums closer to home are free all the time, but apparently we're just conveniently forgetting about that), and because it's one of the few interesting places in the state that we haven't been before. I kinda don't want to go, mostly because I'm in one of those I-don't-want-to-go-anywhere-or-do-anything moods I get sometimes, but we'll see. If I do go and actually enjoy myself, you'll all know sooner or later. ;-)
3b. And my dad is supposed to start taking me out driving tomorrow too. Again, kinda reluctant to, but I should pick it up again pretty quickly, and I definitely need to get my license by the end of this summer. We've waited far too long to get it.
4. Today is the one-year anniversary of the contested presidential elections in Iran that led to the rise of the Green Revolution, the movement seeking to overthrow Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the current autocratic Islamic Republic, and promote liberal democracy and social justice in their country. I know I haven't posted about it for a good six months, but that was because I heard nothing filtered to me through ontd_political or other news outlets I usually go to for information about the protesters or the movement in that time (if I had heard anything about Iran, it was either about the political oppression in the country, now given more attention thanks to the protests, or about sanctions and deals regarding their nuclear program, which I find both silly and hypocritical, but that's neither here nor there); the Wikipedia link I've given should be a good recap of what has gone on in the past year. Anyway, seeing that this it has been one year on, here's a quick linkdump of what people have written so far:
Reza Aslan: "Iran's Revolutionaries Are Winning"
I'm not quoting anything from this article, because IMHO the whole thing needs reading. If you read nothing else in this linkdump, read this. Aslan is an amazing writer, and I really want to read more of his work.
Of course, there are people who don't agree:
--Con Couglin (The Daily Telegraph [UK]): "Iran's Green Movement has been betrayed by its leaders" (on ways the movement didn't succeed as much as commentators last year hoped -- if by "success" you mean "near-immediate change")
--Geoffrey Robinson: "Iran's Hero Was a War Criminal" (on Mir Hussein Mousavi's involvement in the mass murder of political prisoners in 1988)
But where do we go from here?
Michael Singh (The New York Times): "Remember When Iran Won?"
In the face of such unrelenting oppression, the Iranian people have received little in the way of international support.
While official expressions of concern in Western capitals have gradually mounted, international action has largely been confined to human-rights forums, while the focus of high-level diplomacy has remained squarely on Iran’s nuclear program.
This is not to say that the emphasis by Western governments on preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear arms has been inappropriate. Rather, it is the bifurcation of policy itself - with nuclear weapons as the strategic issue, and human rights as the moral concern - that is misguided.
Support for the Iranian opposition should not be a matter of altruism. In the effort to press the Iranian regime to change its course and moderate its relations with the world, we have in our hands no instrument - whether sanctions or military action - which troubles the regime as greatly as the discontent and activism of the Iranian people, or which holds as significant the potential for bringing positive change to Iran.
The international community cannot, and should not presume to try, to control or even influence Iran’s dissidents. This is no great feat. The Green Movement’s objectives, which include restoring the civil rights of the Iranian people and repairing Iran’s relations with the outside world, comport with the desire in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere that Iran comply with its international obligations and end its campaign to destabilize the Middle East.
Greg Sclobete (Real Clear World): "Be Careful What You Wish For"
For years, the primary U.S. interests in Iran were getting it to drop support for Hezbollah and Hamas and to ensure that its civilian nuclear program was not surreptitiously used to manufacturer a nuclear weapon. In Senator McCain's speech to the National Endowment for Democracy, from which the above is taken, there is no discussion at all as to what the Iranian people's goals are with respect to those American priorities. He does not argue that a democratic and free Iran would abandon Hezbollah or would forswear nuclear weapons. Both things, mind you, are possible (especially, I think, ditching nukes), but it seems strange to me that we are told to treat as one American and Iranian interests without evidence that they actually converge.
[...]
If I were an Iranian protester observing American political discourse since the Green movement began, what would I notice? During the last 12 months, the voices who claimed they want to see democracy take root in Iran were vastly more concerned with the foreign policy of a free Turkey than an unfree Saudi Arabia. I would notice that the voluminous output of anti-Semitism in Saudi Arabia was ignored, while the demagoguery of Turkey's leaders was treated as evidence of a nascent Islamist rogue state and regional competitor.
I would conclude that the same voices professing solidarity with my cause are less concerned with political freedom than with geopolitical orientation.
Meanwhile, AccessNow.org has recently uploaded never-before-seen videos of last year's biggest protests. Newsweek also appears to have some here, though I haven't checked if they're the same as those on the AccessNow.org site.
Of course, not all is doom and gloom, as Andrew Sullivan is keeping hope alive. Here's video of rooftop chanting that took place Thursday night.
Keep an eye out on Iran within the next few days; who knows what might happen. And of course, if you come across anything interesting and Iran-related, please let me know so I can read it and share it with everyone. ;-)