Re: Why do people hate Iran and North Korea?
[quote=dig72]
How has Iran affected the world, in what way?
quote]
I'll tell you what dig72...
I always find it cute when people like you who live in nations that clearly benefit from democracy and capitalism jump on the bandwagon to sympathize with nations that are fundamentally opposed to those principles and are also more brutal and less restrained than the US.
Australia is an ally of the USA. Your society is capitalist at its core. In spite of all of its problems, you derive a lot of benefit from relations with the US and with the fostering of capitalism since World War 2. If the power held by the USA was in the hands of Iran or North Korea, you would be much worse off than you are.
Call me naive or biased, but I do think there is a fundamental moral difference between the USA and nations like North Korea and Iran...and it's also evident in past history if you look at the Soviets, the Germans, etc. This is not to excuse America, or say that it hasn't done horrible and unjust things. Every nation has. But America, for all of its faults, hasn't intentionally starved millions the way Stalin did when he wanted to collectivize the Ukrainian farms back after WW2. And America hasn't gassed Jews by the tens of thousands the way Germany did. And, despite America's military interventions (including Iraq),
America likes things in their self interest, no doubt. It seeks the spread of capitalism, seeks to stop forces that oppose it, seeks access to resources, etc. But America does not actually attempt an authoritarian conquest of many nations, as did Russia, Germany, and Japan in this century. And this is notwithstanding what is going on in Iraq and has gone on in other places...terrible as those situations are, it's not like when Hitler went all out.
I think that Iran and North Korea have many more similarities to Stalinist Russia and Hitler's Germany than to the USA. Both of those nations routinely brutalize their own citizens. North Korea is a police state that prioritizes its military over its millions of starving citizens. Neither nation has regard for basic freedoms that you enjoy, such as freedom of expression, separation of church and state, checks and balances, innocent until proven guilty, due process, etc.
Even worse, both nations have rhetoric that suggests that they wouldn't be any more restrained to the outside world if they had nuclear weapons. Iran especially doesn't seem to recognize the notions of compromise and restraint inherent in a secular society where basic freedoms are allowed. Their politics, along with most every other aspect of their society, is heavily influenced by an uncompromising and fundamentalist religion.
Will you really feel safer when nations like that - nations that talk about annihilating other nations, nations prone to such authoritarianism and religion zealotry, nations that regularly swap money and munitions with global terrorist organizations - have nuclear weapons? As bad as America may be, I would fear much more for the world if America's wealth and power rested in their hands.
You should think carefully about this before sign up as their inadvertent supporter. You personally will stand a LOT to lose if nations like Iran and North Korea can put a bomb in your back yard.