An Imperialist Poll

A recent article in MRZINE about a public opinion poll that was carried out by WorldPublicOpinion.org introduces how Iranians are satisfied with their goverment.

There is a profound ideological implication in the form of these questions.

First of all by querying an affirmative statement abstractly (Do you TRUST the national government in Iran to do WHAT IS RIGHT? etc.) the interviewers direct the subjects to shy away from negative answers. Together with this crafty manipulation and Iranians' well-founded suspicion that there could be covert government investigation beneath this sudden interest about their opinions, it is not surprising that this pseudo-poll has reached its original goal. The deduction here is not a critique of Western imperialism in the sense that how it misleadingly depicts Iran that fits their imperialist intentions. Surprisingly, this scientific pool perfects the imperialist propositions: The danger with Iran is not merely about its undemocratic, antiquated, oppressive and unpredictable regime like our politicians used to represent. But there is also an ossified trauma, an internal evil haunting the mentality of this monster: Although the Iranian regime is an utter outrage, the citizens are somewhat contended to be a part of it.

As I said, the questions are arranged to repress the negative responses. Let us apply something else that entirely removes the possibility of a negative response and completes the perfection of ideological manipulation. Let us compel Iranians to give concrete affirmative answers. For instance, instead of asking whether they are satisfied of Iran’s economy, let’s ask them to enumerate the positive developments in economy in recent years, or ask them to give tangible examples of the improvements in the social life, etc. Only by this way, only through forcing the subjects to neglect the negative option which is already repressed in social life, it is possible to reveal the ironical humiliation in the Iranian regime. Let Iranian people creatively fabricate lies about their reality. Their answers might reflect the immensity of the oppression that they are dealing with.

There is a wonderful passage in “Bob Dylan's 115th Dream” that perfectly depicts how people creatively lie about an unpleasant reality. (The caps are mine):

"Well, by this time I was fed up
At tryin' to make a stab
At bringin' back any help
For my friends and Captain Arab
I decided to flip a coin
Like either heads or TAILS
Would let me know if I should go
Back to ship or back to JAIL
So I hocked my sailor suit
And I got a coin to flip
It came up TAILS
It rhymed with SAILS
So I made it back to the ship"