Saturday, February 18, 2006

Iran

There has been a thread on indymedia with over 40 comments, and a sensible intelligent debate. I know I almost fainted from the shock (but then I read this thread, which made me want to go out and strangle a kitten or two, and I realised that indymedia is still indymedia). The bit I wanted to respond to is this bit:

The point is not that I think that Iran is a nice place for trade unionists (see the article Dave linked to for more on the repression of the left by the mullahs), or that I think building nuclear weapons is the best use of a country's resources, but that I think that Iran has the right to pursue a nuclear programme, up to and including the building of weapons, without being subjected to sanctions, covert destabilisation, and invasion by the US and US allies like Israel.
I think Iran has a right not to be subject to sanctions, covert destabilisation, and invasion, but I actually don't think that has anything to do with the 'right' to build nuclear weapons (which I don't think anyone, or any country has).

What bothers me most about Scott's formulation, is that it implies that the only reasons Iran shouldn't be treated in the way he lists, is because they have a right to nuclear weapons. Even if Iranian politicians are doing something they have no right to do (like invading another country, or killing kittens) then that doesn't mean the US has the right to attack Iran.

My opposition to the US attack is completely independent of the pretext for that attack.

4 comments:

  1. Hi Maia, don't know how to link to it but I've replied to you at:
    http://readingthemaps.blogspot.com/2006/02/irans-right-to-nukes-mad-idea.html

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  2. Anonymous6:13 pm

    of course indymedia is still indymedia! YAY! and it will always be - well, at least for as long as we can be bothered dealing with dk and vegans without a class analysis... or meat eating class strugglers ;-)

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  3. Maps this post wasn't about our disagreement about nuclear weapons, just the idea you put forward that unless you support Iran's 'right' to nuclear weapons you're supporting sanctions.

    I was explaining why I find them entirely seperate.

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  4. Anonymous1:34 pm

    I find it surprising that Scott and others are worried about Green 'leadership' (whatever that might be, during the invasion of Iraq it meant a bunch of stickers and banners, the occasional speech, and some good work by activists who would have been active regardless of their membership...but I digress) of the anti-war movement in NZ, because of their stance that it's not a good idea for the Iranians to have nuclear weapons.

    And yet they are completely happy for the Iranian state to have nuclear weapons (which seems a mite more serious) - with no reference that I've seen whatsover to what Iranian leftist and progressive groups actually want. Let alone the general Iranian populace or perhaps even 'the Iranian working class'.

    Does the Iranian government somehow unlike every other government act in the interest of its people and not its elite? Do we have the fabled benevolent state-run utopia we've been promised since 1848 appearing before our very eyes?

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