How many Irans make a Right? (comedy)

(Sammy Obeid) How many Irans make a Right? | standup comedy

Morality Patrol kills woman for immodesty

Ashley Wells, Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly; IranWire.com

Protests erupt in support of young Iranian woman killed by morality police (LA Times)

Her hijab (enforced modesty head covering) was not worn correctly, so police killed her

• The Story so Far: What Happened to Mahsa Amini at the Detention Center (iranwire.com)
• VIDEO: Riots: Iran's morality police kill woman
• Purity Police BLAST Wisdom Quarterly

What happened to Mahsa Amini, 22, in police detention?

You will respect religious authority!

(IranWire) Anguish and outrage are rippling across Iran [and the unIslamic world] at news of the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who was hospitalized in a coma two hours after being abducted off the streets of Tehran by the so-called “morality patrol.”

The young woman from Saqqez was on holiday with her family when the van pulled up beside her and her brother Kiarash, shortly past 6:00 pm on Tuesday night. By all accounts she was in good health at the time.

Let's put her in a coma first, brothers, for God (NYPost)

Hours later, she was braindead. What happened between the moment Amini was pulled away from her brother and taken for “re-education” at a police station in Vozara Avenue, and when she was rushed from that place to Kasra Hospital, remains an unknown quantity.

Below is what IranWire understands to have happened so far, based on information provided by multiple sources.

Code Blue (Code 99)

"Code Blue" is hospital talk. But pink is...

“Code 99, tell Kasra.” This was the message related by a Tehran Emergency Services paramedic on the radio at 7:25 pm on Tuesday, September 13.

[It sounds an awful like the customary American euphemism used in hospitals known as Code Blue.] “Code 99” is the code used by doctors and medical staff in Iran to indicate a patient is near death. More

• CODEPINK: Radio (KPFK.org)

Riots: Iran's morality police kill woman (video)

Iran protest over 22-y.o. woman’s death in police custody turns violent

(Bloomberg Quicktake: Now) Sept. 20, 2022. Violence erupted in Iran’s capital over the death in custody of a 22-year-old woman who had been detained by authorities that police how women dress.

• Morality Patrol kills woman for immodesty

Riot police used a water cannon and fired tear gas to disperse crowds after hundreds of demonstrators skirmished with oppressive "security" forces in Tehran on Monday, amid anger sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini last week. Newest channel: Quicktake Explained.

American morality failing: Florida police chief caught in prostitution sting

UPDATE: the Female YouTube shooter

Editors, Wisdom Quarterly  UPDATE, April 4, 2018

I don't look like Eddie M. or Freddie M.

It seems everyone wants to be famous now. As the original TV "Wonder Woman" (Latin American superstar Lynda Carter) was finally getting her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, two other women were up in arms.

• VIDEO: What not to do when mad at YouTube

Little reported yesterday was the story of a female shooter who murdered a family man in Los Angeles. The reason is unknown, and the suspect escaped by car with many witnesses, who were kept against their will by police and interrogated. It all happened in front of a laundromat. Police have suggested that the man had "gang ties," so we surmise the female was sent to shoot him. In any case, he is dead, the kids have no father, the female killer is on the loose, and all of our attention is on San Bruno, California, south of SFO (San Francisco International Airport).

There a woman, Nas, 38 (a day short of her 39th birthday), disappeared from San Diego, where she lived supporting herself via YouTube's revenue sharing program. YouTube got what she thought it deserved for cheating her of money and fame with the corporation's new algorithm that tries to silence some voices while exalting others, to deprive some partners while enriching the preferred ones.

I'm jaded, negative Lauren Sivan reporting...

For instance, Nas has a very tame workout video (see it and others on KABC journalist's Lauren Sivan's twitter feed). It was flagged as being inappropriate for younger viewers when it is much tamer than Nicki Minaj's videos, which though inappropriate for children get hundreds of millions of views with no age restrictions. Who is trying to filter and censor Nas? Probably not the people she shot and shot at, but the company has been struck at its heart.

Eddie Munster and Mr. Woof-Woof

How did she get in? She drove up and went to an outdoor area where employs congregate. She began shooting. Then an older employee on an electric skateboard, responding to an evacuation notice "fire alarm drill," rode over and saw one man shot and another man, presumably also an employee, yelling, "Come at me, come on shoot me!" Nas was behind a pole, and the employee on the skateboard turned around, raced away, and warned other employees evacuating the building for the "fire drill" that there was an "active shooter!" turn around. They did, potentially saving many lives.

Real vegans kill neither animals nor humans

When the mother was asked for comment, she said Nas was a very kind person, citing her veganism and animal rights (anti-vivisection) activism in a lame attempt to refute her gun ownership, her anger issues, and the fact that she went to a gun range earlier to practice her aim.

That is a long spell of anger to drive up from San Diego, sleep in her car, be found and interviewed by police, who then called the family and told them not to worry because their 38-year-old daughter had been found in fine condition.

Freddie Mercury of Queen

The tight-knit family asserts that it warned police that Nas was mad at YouTube and should be watched. The police shrugged it off but miraculously claim they made it to YouTube HQ in two minutes, almost as if they had advance warning of a mass shooter somewhere in the area.

We ignore LA but focus on SF, where no one but the shooter died, which would be a story except it was by a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the chest. Perhaps her heart hurt from what she perceived had been done to her and, worse, what she had done in response. The baby went out with the bathwater, and she took a permanent solution to a temporary problem, very sad. It's a Sick Sad World just like Daria always suspected it was.

• YouTube shooting: Woman identified as Nasim (losangeles.cbslocal.com) Following the shooting at YouTube headquarters, one female suspect was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound and three people were transported to local hospital ... A law-enforcement source had earlier told CBS News the wounded male was believed to be the suspected shooter's boyfriend. 
• Woman wanted in fatal shooting outside Lynwood laundromat (msn.com) A man was shot to death right outside a 24-hour coin laundromat. Kandiss Crone reports. 
• Police searching for woman who gunned down Compton man... 
• Body found in burned-out car after fire in Bell Gardens parking lot

Hating IRAN: "The Shahs of Sunset" (video)

Wisdom Quarterly

Blame Ryan Seacrest, the bane of American media, for the drumbeat of war to come.

Did you ever want to go back in time to bomb Italy -- or pull up to the present and bomb the Jersey shoreline -- while watching Snooki make a revolting spectacle of herself?

On the heels of MTV's successful Italian (Roman) scripted "reality" TV show comes Seacrest's copycat Iranian (Persian) spectacle. The only problem is that this motley crew is a little harder on the eyes than the gavones on MTV. Good luck, Bravo Network. The show is bound to make an American war on Iran more likely.

• Ryan Seacrest, executive producer of “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” has teamed up with “Real Housewives” franchise creator Andy Cohen for “Shahs of Sunset.” The docu-soap is said to follow a group of young Persian-American friends [living in Beverly Hills...] More

Loving Iran
(Optimum Releasing) "The best Iranian film of all time!" - Wisdom Quarterly

"Persepolis" is the poignant story of a young girl coming-of-age in Iran during the Islamic Revolution. It is through the eyes of precocious and outspoken 9-year-old Marjane that we see a people's hopes dashed as fundamentalists take power -- forcing the veil on women and imprisoning thousands.

Clever and fearless, she outsmarts the "social guardians" and discovers punk rock, decadent Scandinavian ABBA, and Iron Maiden. Yet when her uncle is senselessly executed and as bombs fall around Tehran in the Iran/Iraq war, the daily fear that permeates life in Iran is palpable.

As she gets older, Marjane's boldness causes her parents to worry over her continued safety. And so, at age 14, they make the difficult decision to send her to school in Austria. Vulnerable and alone in a strange land, she endures the typical ordeals of a teenager. In addition, Marjane has to combat being equated with the religious fundamentalism and extremism she fled her country to escape.

Over time, she gains acceptance, and even experiences love, but after high school she finds herself alone and horribly homesick. Though it means putting on the veil and living in a tyrannical society, Marjane decides to return to Iran to be close to her family.

Watch non-English version free

After a difficult period of adjustment, she enters art school and marries, all the while continuing to speak out against the hypocrisy she witnesses. At age 24, she realizes that while she is deeply Iranian, she cannot live in Iran. She then makes the heartbreaking decision (persepolismovie.co.uk).

This is Not a Film and A Separation
(Documentaries News) "This is Not a Film" directed by Jafar Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb. "Turn Censorship into Art" (IndieWire).

This clandestine documentary, shot partially on an iPhone and smuggled into France in a cake for a last-minute submission to the Cannes Film Festival, depicts the day-to-day life of acclaimed Iranian director Jafar Panahi (Offside, The Circle) during his house arrest in his Tehran apartment. While appealing his sentence -- six years in prison and a 20 year ban from film making -- Panahi is seen talking to his family and lawyer on the phone, discussing his plight with Mirtahmasb, and reflecting on the meaning of the art of film making.

(ArtificialEyeFilm) As the stand out film of the 2011 Berlin Film Festival and winner of the Golden Bear, "A Separation" is a suspenseful and intelligent drama detailing the fractures and tensions at the heart of Iranian society.

Winning the Academy Award guarantees attention for this film. Written and directed by Asghar Farhadi, the film boasts a range of superb performances from the ensemble cast who collectively received the Silver Bears for both Best Actor and Best Actress at the Berlinale. The compelling narrative is driven by a taut and finely written script rooted in the particular of Iranian society but which transcends its setting to create a stunning morality play with universal resonance.

When his wife (Leila Hatami) leaves him, Nader (Peyman Moadi) hires a young woman (Sareh Bayat) to take care of his suffering father (Ali-Asghar Shahbazi). But he doesn't know his new maid is not only pregnant, but also working without her unstable husband's (Shahab Hosseini) permission. Soon, Nader finds himself entangled in a web of lies manipulation and public confrontations. A Separation is the first ever Iranian film to be awarded the Golden Bear.

Happy Nowruz (New Year), Persepolis!

Wisdom Quarterly

If it is true as we suspect that the Buddha was born in Baluchistan/Gandhara (Lumbini on the ancient Indian border in what is now a tri-national hinterland or province of Iran-Afghanistan-Pakistan) not Nepal, more of his early life near Bamiyan (ancient Kapilavastu, near Kabul, modern Afghanistan) will make sense shedding new light on his career in India proper.

He traveled to the largest metropolitan areas of the day, taking up residence in Rajgir, Magadha. The famous Vulture's Peak and Jeta's Grove are there in and outside of the ancient city walls respectively.

Nowruz or something like it would have been what was celebrated in the land -- later to become part of the ancient Persian empire -- that would eventually give rise to Zoroastrianism (the Parsis in India) and many of the original traditions that were incorporated into missionary Christianity, which is an amalgam of beliefs and practices heavy on re-purposed Mahayana Buddhist Messiah (Maitreya) beliefs (which impacted early Judaism first through Kashmir, as research by H. Kersten has established).

The more we know of any culture, the closer we feel to it. And Iran is nearly a black box to us even in Los Angeles. But our hearts were drawn in, even to Iran's view of "God," through the heartwarming work of Marjane Satrapi and her graphic novel Persepolis. We re-watch it every year (appreciating the English version more than squinting to read subtitles). Thank you, Persepolis, and happy Nowruz!

Where was the Buddha really born?

The assertion that the Buddha was born in Nepal is a bluff, a denial of history perpetrated by archeological deception and modern Indian-Nepalese acceptance.

The Nepalese Bluff

Text by Dr. Ranajit Pal

Buddhism literally throbs with the history and geography of India. The relics from Sanchi, Ajanta, Bharhut, Amaravati, Gandhara, Mathura, and Thotlakonda link India with early Buddhism. The Indian tradition of tolerance and moderation goes beyond the 6th century B.C.E. And traces of primitive Buddhism are found in the Harappan era. Buddhist history is an [odd] mix of facts and fiction that baffles the discerning reader.

The Buddha grew up in ancient Kapilavastu, India, near modern Bamiyan, Afghanistan.

There were [24] buddhas before Gautama (Pali, Gotama). This implies that Buddhism was as old as Zoroastrianism. A detailed study reveals close links between early Buddhism with Hinduism, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism, which arose in the Bamiyan-Baluchistan-Gandharan area. The crucial fact that the Silk Road passed through the Buddhist heartland seems to have escaped the notice of historians.

Nepal is a beautiful country, but a Gautama from Nepal is a [terrible] fraud. Nothing in the art, archaeology, history, or literature of early Nepal has the faintest hint of Buddhism. R. Thapar affirms that Gautama was from Nepal, but this has no archaeological basis.

Christmas Humphreys laments over the stark ground reality, "The Lumbini gardens, where Gotama was born, lie in the difficult Nepal Terai, and Kusinara, where the Buddha passed away, has little to show."

Until 50 years ago, "India" included Pakistan. In ancient times Afghanistan was Buddhist Gandhara. Iran was Indo-Iran, the frontier.

The renowned Belgian scholar Edward Conze also flatly dismisses the fanciful text-based accounts:

"To the modern historian, Buddhism is a phenomenon which must exasperate him at every point and we can only say in extenuation that this religion was not founded for the benefit of the historians. Not only is there an almost complete absence of hard facts about its history in India; not only is the date, authorship and geographical provenance of the overwhelming majority of the documents almost entirely unknown...."

The way out of the chaos is shown by the British scholar T. Phelps, who has exposed the dreadful forgeries of archeologist Führer, who moved pillars and faked inscriptions and relics to falsely locate Lumbini in Nepal.

Gautama was a prince, but after he was abandoned in the wilderness of the Terai by the rogue Führer, his history went to pieces.

A strong rebuttal of the Nepalese [deception] about early Buddhism comes from the discovery of ancient Buddhist sites at Thotlakonda, Bavikonda, and Pavurlakonda near Vishakhapattanam. The name Thotlakonda resembles the name [the Buddha used for himself] Tathagata [the "Wayfarer"] of Gautama, and Pavurlakonda is a clear echo of Baveru or Babil. More>>

From the center expanding out by trade routes, Buddhism traveled throughout north, west, east, and south Asia with its message of the possibility of liberation from suffering. It reached the West watered down via Christianity through the travels of St. Issa from Jerusalem to India and back.

• Scientist to talk on contemplation
  Visiting professor of chemistry and chairwoman of her department at Bryn Mawr College Michelle Francl will speak on contemplative practices and teaching science at 4 p.m. Monday in Room 107 of the Center for Regional and Continuing Education at Chico State University. In 2008, she was selected as a Contemplative Practice Fellow by the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society.
• Lion dancers roar in year of the rabbit in Laos
  A traditional Chinese lion dance procession roared in the Chinese New Year celebrations at the Association Chinoise Vientiane and Chinese Embassy in Vientiane on Thursday, the first day of the year of the rabbit. Vientiane's Chinese community joined in a grand lion dance.
• Indus Civilization Geography
  The largest Bronze Age urban Indus Valley Civilization remnants have been discovered from as far south as Mumbai [Bombay], in Maharashtra State, India, and as far north as the Himalayas and northern Afghanistan. The westernmost sites are on the Arabian sea coast in Baluchistan, Pakistan, right next to the Iranian border.
• Obama has political stake in Egypt crisis
• Mubarak meets economic team as protests enter Day 12

New Buddhist History revealed

SPECIAL NOTE: WQ has no vested interest in the Buddha's birthplace being anywhere other than Nepal. (In fact, we prefer Nepal, a lovely and mysterious land which already claims the other biggest thing in the world). However, we do have a keen interest in the truth -- whatever it may be. We are therefore eager to entertain, explore, and question evolving scholarship on the subject.

Map of Greco-Indian Buddhism

Ranajitpal.com (excerpt)

...This new religion propounded by Gomata is Buddhism, which proves beyond any doubt that "Gaumata" was the true Gotama. There are many other references to Gotama in Persian and Jewish sources that have not been recognized. Tattenai (6th-5th century BC), who was the Persian governor of the province west of the Euphrates River (eber nari, "beyond the river") during the reign of Darius I, was Gotama, whose [self-referential title] was "Tathagata."

The Book of Ezra (V: 3,6) states that he led an investigation into the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem about 519 B.C. He sent a report to Darius, who responded with instructions to allow the work to proceed. Tattenai is cited in a cuneiform tablet of 502 B.C. A. Kuhrt refers to the "good Iranian name" of "Bagapa" the satrap of Babylon during Darius' reign and even considers the link with "Tattanu" but is unaware that "Tattenai" and "Bagapa" could be Gotama's [popular titles] "Tathagata" and "Bhagava."

The Book of Ezra also cites the names "Shether" and "Boznai," which agree with Gotama's [other] names "Shiddhartha" and "Buddha." The name "Shethar" occurs in the Book of Esther. The name Buddho-Dana of Gotama given by Al-beruni puts him in the same bracket as Daniel the Jew, who was a contemporary of Nebuchadrezzar-II.

It can be seen that Prophet Abraham was also from the abode of Gotama and Zoroaster. The startling discoveries of Sir Leonard Woolley at Ur in Sumer had such a dazzling effect on scholars that it was not realized that this could not be Ur Kasdim, the home of Abraham. W. F. Albright disagreed with Woolley but no one realized that Ur of Abraham was Urva, one of the sixteen good regions of the Avesta.

It is indeed uncanny that the patently absurd notion of the rise of Buddhism in Nepal has survived scholarly scrutiny for nearly a century. Sir Aurel Stein, whose untiring efforts established the material basis of Buddhism, found nothing in Nepal. The vanishing of Buddhism from India may be due to the fact that after Afghanistan and Seistan [map, also called Sistan, a border region between E Iran and SW Afghanistan, a part of the Persian Empire once called Drangiana before Alexander the Great's conquest] ceased to be parts of "India," Buddhism was seen as an extraneous creed.

R. G. Bhandarkar blamed the decline on the rise of the Mahayana, which weakened it from within. It is significant that Mahayana, from its very inception, was an essentially "foreign" doctrine. The Mahayanists were often hostile to the Bhakti cult and other forms of Hinduism. Yet, the generally tolerant approach of the Buddhists to other faiths resulted in the assimilation of Buddhism in a reformed Hinduism. In this sense Buddhism did not disappear from India.

• Gotama and Zoroaster in a Non-Jonesian Frame
• Nebuchadrezzar, Daniel, and the Antecedents of Buddhism in Baluchistan-Seistan

Gandhara-style Buddha (Western features, toga wearing), a Greco-Indian fusion, when India was an empire of much greater extent including Afghanistan and Seistan (Norton Simon museum)