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An incredible self awareness for you to write “There's also nothing inherently wrong with selling intelligence tools to a western government, Italy is not Iran

An incredible self awareness for you to write “There's also nothing inherently wrong with selling intelligence tools to a western government, Italy is not Iran or Zambia”. I wonder how Iran or Zambia feel about the west? The overthrow of their democracy. The colonial exploitations. Are those legit grievances in your eyes? Or are you a “take up the white mans burden” kind of person?

breppp 1y ago
I don't know how Iran feels about the west, but I for one am not keen about them hanging homosexuals on cranes, cutting hands of thieves, raping protestors in prison or taking random european tourist number 300 hostage in order to make finland cave-in on something. You might think the above is morally equivalent with whatever the state of Italy is doing, but I believe some governments and some cultures are better than others. Not because they are superior humans, but because human organizations and actions can be compared one to another, and there is at least for me, places I'd rather live in, and places I wouldn't
- DSingularity 1y ago
  Who said that? How is this style of discussion even productive? We can all go back and forth about which nations abuse their people the most. You can point to LGBT and someone can point to American prisoner counts. Why does it matter? Stay on topic?
woodruffw 1y ago
I don't think you have to believe Western countries are morally blameless to think that Iran's use of spyware would probably have materially worse effects for whoever they spy on. It's clear to me at least that the West can both be blamed for the effects of colonialism and that the victims of colonialism can do plenty of bad things on their own.
- DSingularity 1y ago
  Nobody is disputing that at all. That’s just a byproduct of zero-sum games and at least the fact that victims of abuse tend to grow into abusers themselves. The problem is the blanket statement which effectively becomes “the ordained group of humans can have these tools while the others we judge as less-than and prohibit”. The more they talk the more they reveal about their views which are either outright racist or extremely disingenuous when it comes to obvious historical contexts.
edanm 1y ago
If you're claiming that Iran's government is somehow morally equivalent to Italy's, you're massively wrong. It's not about "the white mans burden", whatever that means. It's about Iran's government not being democratically elected, being massively unpopular with its own populace that can't do anything about it cause it's not a democracy, enforcing religious laws on people that often don't want them, not respecting minorities. And oh, btw, investing billions of dollars in promoting terror all across the Middle East, with the stated goal of eradicating Israel (and, eventually, the US). So, I don't really care how Iran's rulers feel about the US - they're evil. If you can't recognize that, you've lost the plot.
- ipaddr 1y ago
  You realize that US removed the democratically elected government in 1953 in CIA-led coup that overthrew the democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh. Then the US government kept the Shah in power. He repressed the population and led to the 1979 revolution. Who's the one evil again? Those countries in the middle east that US considers an ally are not democratically elected either and they enforce religious laws like not allowing woman to drive. They do not respect minorites and they invest in terror in the area too. Turn off the tv and learn about the history of topics you want to shoot your mouth off in public about before you make a fool of yourself.
  - DSingularity 1y ago
    Unfortunately I don’t think he is capable of what you are asking him to do. Remember that the majority of the Israeli population think Israel hasnt gone far enough in Gaza. Yes that’s after starvation and murdering over 30k women and children. On top of that most Israelis see no problem with the Nakba which is the origin of the problem as it displaced the majority of Palestinians turning them into scattered refugees who were robbed of their land and property. Such mindsets would never allow for achieving peace with neighbors through any strategy that isn’t built around dominance through violence.
    - ty6853 1y ago

breppp 1y ago

I don't know how Iran feels about the west, but I for one am not keen about them hanging homosexuals on cranes, cutting hands of thieves, raping protestors in prison or taking random european tourist number 300 hostage in order to make finland cave-in on something. You might think the above is morally equivalent with whatever the state of Italy is doing, but I believe some governments and some cultures are better than others. Not because they are superior humans, but because human organizations and actions can be compared one to another, and there is at least for me, places I'd rather live in, and places I wouldn't

DSingularity 1y ago
Who said that? How is this style of discussion even productive? We can all go back and forth about which nations abuse their people the most. You can point to LGBT and someone can point to American prisoner counts. Why does it matter? Stay on topic?

woodruffw 1y ago

I don't think you have to believe Western countries are morally blameless to think that Iran's use of spyware would probably have materially worse effects for whoever they spy on. It's clear to me at least that the West can both be blamed for the effects of colonialism and that the victims of colonialism can do plenty of bad things on their own.

DSingularity 1y ago
Nobody is disputing that at all. That’s just a byproduct of zero-sum games and at least the fact that victims of abuse tend to grow into abusers themselves. The problem is the blanket statement which effectively becomes “the ordained group of humans can have these tools while the others we judge as less-than and prohibit”. The more they talk the more they reveal about their views which are either outright racist or extremely disingenuous when it comes to obvious historical contexts.

edanm 1y ago

If you're claiming that Iran's government is somehow morally equivalent to Italy's, you're massively wrong. It's not about "the white mans burden", whatever that means. It's about Iran's government not being democratically elected, being massively unpopular with its own populace that can't do anything about it cause it's not a democracy, enforcing religious laws on people that often don't want them, not respecting minorities. And oh, btw, investing billions of dollars in promoting terror all across the Middle East, with the stated goal of eradicating Israel (and, eventually, the US). So, I don't really care how Iran's rulers feel about the US - they're evil. If you can't recognize that, you've lost the plot.

ipaddr 1y ago
You realize that US removed the democratically elected government in 1953 in CIA-led coup that overthrew the democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh. Then the US government kept the Shah in power. He repressed the population and led to the 1979 revolution. Who's the one evil again? Those countries in the middle east that US considers an ally are not democratically elected either and they enforce religious laws like not allowing woman to drive. They do not respect minorites and they invest in terror in the area too. Turn off the tv and learn about the history of topics you want to shoot your mouth off in public about before you make a fool of yourself.
- DSingularity 1y ago
  Unfortunately I don’t think he is capable of what you are asking him to do. Remember that the majority of the Israeli population think Israel hasnt gone far enough in Gaza. Yes that’s after starvation and murdering over 30k women and children. On top of that most Israelis see no problem with the Nakba which is the origin of the problem as it displaced the majority of Palestinians turning them into scattered refugees who were robbed of their land and property. Such mindsets would never allow for achieving peace with neighbors through any strategy that isn’t built around dominance through violence.
  - ty6853 1y ago