Thread by @GodlessNZ

(1) Some New Year thoughts about war, peace, and freedom fighters at home and abroad.

(2) Here in New Zealand it's late afternoon on a sweltering summer's day, January 2, 2018. I found myself feeling incredibly sad and not being able to immediately pinpoint why. I have so much to be grateful for, esp relative to others, eg Iranians today.

(3) As I tried to figure out what had tipped me into a low mood I remembered that today I've seen photos and read words about the current suffering of Iranians in particular, which got me thinking about victims of injustice everywhere.

(4) Unlike most of those on the Left I started following the Iranian uprising 5 days ago, and knew it would get more deadly and go on for a long time. One of my online friends said today it could be a few months before victory over the regime.

(5) However long it takes, I am rooting for Iran's freedom fighters. I became politically aware as a 10 year old, in 1980, but never really looked into the struggle for freedom in Iran, because the situation there seemed so hopeless to me.

(6) In recent days I've read a bit about the Shahs of Iran, the last Shah's journeys from country to country without proper relief as he slowly died of cancer, and Jimmy Carter's pathetic failure to assist him. I learned the mullahs massacred 30,000 political prisoners in 1988.

(7) I learned there is an Iranian opposition movement in exile and they have a heroic leader, Maryam Rajavi, based in Paris, and groups of expats all around the world. I can't imagine the suffering they bear, unable to free their countrymen for all this time.

(8) I've been disgusted beyond words by the heartless, dishonest, self interested attitudes of the Iranian regime's enablers in the West. I'm not naive, I know there are evil people in the world. It just sickens me when their treachery is in plain sight.

(9) I have full confidence in those world leaders who have expressed their commitment to support the Iranian freedom fighters morally and in every other way they can. President Trump's recent statements align with his whole foreign policy to date. He means what he says.

(10) It is clear to me that many Iranians have reached that desperate point where they are willing to risk their lives, as America's revolutionaries did, and as people have throughout history. I had almost forgotten what events like the nominal end of the Cold War were like.

(11) At high school & college I was taught that the end of the Cold War had relegated communism to a sporadic, vestigial country/region level problem.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

(12) Since my own redpilling and (permanent) Left to Right shift in 2016, I've concluded that the Cold War did not end in the late 80s/early 90s.

Freedom still fights tyranny. Liberty fights slavery. Capitalism fights communism.

(13) Arguably, the greatest success of communism has been to persuade susceptible individuals in the West that it's really nothing to worry about. Those lulled into this false sense of security call it many other names.

(14) Scratch one of these & you may find a communist: progressive, liberal, social democratic, democratic socialist, intersectional, feminist, neo-Marxist, anti imperialist, pro human rights, pro-UN, globalist, Jihadist, terrorist. Confusing? Not really...

(15) Of course, I'm "pro human rights," but there are people who say they are too, while ignoring the plight of the Iranians at this time.

(16) Over the last year I've felt a lot of anger and rage about the clusterfuck that has been allowed to occur in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen and other places. Especially given the Obama admin's role and attempts to conceal their crimes.

(17) I am confident that justice is coming, in one way or another. What an immensely positive contribution the USA has made to the world, thanks to the Founding Fathers, and everyone who has maintained the Republic all this time.

(18) I live in a privileged, ungrateful little country that, at best, ignores the suffering of oppressed people the world over. I guess, today that made me feel sad for a while. My challenge is to patiently await freedom in Iran and justice in America.

END