America's Reception of Iran's President: a Brit's View

 Posted by Cockney Robin |   Damozel, caught up in the press of other obligations, emailed me today to ask me if I'd post a comment on the ongoing story of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to the U.S., kindly sending me a lengthy list of related links.  She wanted a "British perspective" on the U.S. reaction. 

This Brit's reaction is pretty much the same as usual:  bemused.  How do you lot find the energy to get so worked up on a daily basis about this, that, and the other random self-serving  symbolic gesture, I regularly ask myself, especially with the current unfolding of the very ominous events in Burma?  As noted by one of the commentators on the BBC news, Burma is one of the most unattractive regimes on the planet. They've reportedly already resorted to tear gas and billyclubs against the peaceable monk-led demonstrations. Will they next resort to bullets?  Horrifyingly, the answer seems to be, "Quite likely..."

...but of course, that's "elsewhere in the world."  Enough about them; let's talk about you!  Back to America and the Iranian President!  In Britain, The Independent asks a question that---for the discerning reader--- answers itself, The Big Question:  is America right to demonise President Ahmadinejad of Iran? 

He was greeted by headlines in the New York tabloids which screamed "The Evil has Landed" and "Madman Iran Prez". He gave his third address as president to the UN General Assembly last night, but only after a controversial meeting at Columbia University, whose authorities came under strong pressure to deny him a platform. [Independent]

At Columbia, he was treated with extraordinary rudeness even before he started saying things that were either very offensive/straight-up risible, depending on your personal point of view.  Is that a good thing or a bad thing? 

D.C. area Iranians, who "describe President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as a provocateur, a hypocrite and an embarrassment to Iran" were disturbed by the treatment he received: 

There are thousands of Iranian Americans in the Washington area, many of whom are exiles who fled after the Shiite revolution of 1979. They include surgeons, lawyers, developers and carpet importers. Some are monarchists who long for the return of the pro-Western Pahlavi dynasty, some are secular progressives and others are devout Shiites who think women should be covered in public.

But none of those interviewed yesterday expressed support for Ahmadinejad, 51, a layman with anti-Western views who was elected two years ago on a populist platform. (WaPo)

Most of those interviewed point out a fact that few Americans, including the President of Columbia University, who introduced him as "a petty and cruel dictator," have failed to take in :   Iran's president doesn't call the shots OR decide nuclear policy :

"I agree that Ahmadinejad is a despicable human being, but he is not a dictator. He cannot dictate anything," said Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, director of the Persian Studies Center at the University of Maryland....  

"Technically, he is a nobody in Iran's system, but he likes to make inflammatory comments," said Bijan Ganji, an Iranian-born law student at George Washington University. "He has nothing to say on the issues that really matter to most Iranians: human rights, the lack of political and social freedoms inside Iran. It's especially hard for us here, because we have to keep explaining why we have such a pathetically embarrassing president." 

Sam Khazai, a construction developer in Northern Virginia who moved to the United States from Tehran...like other emigres...said it was a mistake for several of Ahmadinejad's hosts and interviewers in the United States to present him with a "laundry list of charges made by the Bush administration," as if they were speaking for the government.  (WaPo)

Iranians would have liked a more productive response to their president, one that focuses less "on sensational issues such as Ahmadinejad's denials that the Holocaust occurred and that homosexuality exists in Iran" and more on  "issues that they consider more pressing to residents of Iran, such as the oppression of women, the quashing of political dissent and the suffocating social control exercised by the country's real powers in the conservative Shiite Muslim clergy." (WaPo)

Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council in Washington, said the hostile atmosphere surrounding Ahmadinejad's visit has been "very counterproductive because it enables him to play the victim card and present himself as a defender of freedom of expression. We need to have dialogue with Iran over serious issues, not the kind of exchange that fuels polarization and becomes a game of insults," Parsi said. (WaPo)

Or, as The Independent put it:

The president of Columbia University, Lee Bollinger, undermined his own case for freedom of speech in his insulting introduction in which he described the university's guest as exhibiting "all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator" and expressed the hope that Mr Ahmadinejad would not remain in office.

There are several problems with America's demonisation of Mr Ahmadinejad. Firstly, it confers on him a prominence in the Iranian power structure that he does not have in reality. It is not the Iranian president who wields the most power in Tehran: the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, calls the shots and decides nuclear policy. Secondly, scare-mongering has proved counter-productive by enabling him to portray nuclear power as a priority and a matter of national pride.

The personal insults aimed at the Iranian president during his New York visit could also end up increasing his popularity at home, rather than the reverse. [Independent]

 In response, Ahamadinejad has responded by "lashing out" at "certain arrogant powers" (see the video here) and vowing to resist U.N. sanctions.  The Independent says that a "scornful Ahmadinejad" has declared the issue of the Iranian nuclear programme "closed," remaining in consequence "on a collision course with western powers."

Many Brits are worried that the outcome of his visit will be to give aid and comfort to the position of American hawks, who have their own reasons (and it's not Ahmadinejad's views on homosexuality) for wishing to present Ahmadinejad as the face of Iran. [Independent]

And indeed a group of antiwar protesters have decried Bush's "demonisation" of the Iranian president (WaPo). Sadly,, they too seem to miss the nuances.  " They dismissed the criticisms this week of the Iranian president, saying the United States had criticized Saddam Hussein before invading Iraq."(WaPo) Which is, of course, quite true:  but the fact is that Saddam was exactly as bad as the Bush Administration represented him to be.  The fallacy lies in supporting a war against an entire nation because one doesn't care for its ruling person or party.   

In other words,  problem with "demonising Ahmadinejad" isn't that the U.S. is wrong about the sort of person Ahmadinejad is, but that Ahmadinejad is not in fact Iran.  Unfortunately, the Bush Administration has evidently  managed to convince the official representatives of the American public and the American media---all of whom, frankly, the rest of the civilised world wishes would grow up---that Ahmadinejad = Iran.   By demonising Ahmadinejad--or by permitting him to do so himself, I suppose--the Bush Administration may very efficiently succeed in demonising Iran.

I hope Americans will someday realise that there is nothing more dangerous than the belief that the world  is simpler than it seems and that one may therefore know an entire nation in the person of  one representative.

RELATED BN-POLITICS POST:  Uproar over Iranian Leader's Visit

LINKS

1. The Independent:  Burma:  The World Watches [Independent]
2. The Independent:  The Big Question: Is America right to demonise President Ahmadinejad of Iran [Independent]
3. The Independent, Scornful Ahmadinejad says issue of Iranian Nuclear programme closed (the Independent)
4. The Washington Post, D.C.-Area Iranians Criticize Reception Of Ahmadinejad (WaPo)
5. The Washington Post:  Ahmadinejad Lashes Out at 'Certain Powers' (video)
6. The Washington Post: At U.N., Ahmadinejad Is Defiant on Nuclear Efforts (WaPo)
7. The Washington Post, Antiwar Protesters Decry Handling of Iran (WaPo)

 

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