Iran was actually one of the most advanced nations in the middle east until the the Islamic revolution. Iran itself is not a bad place... only the ruler. Of course, many could say that about the united states... but those same type of people usually equate all Americans to cowboy's with pickup trucks, five credit cards, and abnormally fat. Clearly, it is a relative notion influenced by biased media and propaganda. Darn those imperialists.

But Persians are actually very nice people on the whole. Students are largely (at least in the media) portrayed with pro western sentiment and are very open to western ideas. Persian women also enjoy more latitude than some other Arab countries... though they are a little bit more repressive in some areas. Its more the Islamic 'old guard" that's the problem.

Does Iran suck? No.
Does the repressive government running Iran suck? Yes.
Are we Imperialists? sure... why not.

check out my video

it is when i went to iran
YouTube - A trip to Iran Part 2

Interesting video. Don't agree with a few statements... but still interesting. I don't know about the various generalizations though. Seems very partial rather than objective.

it was very partial

i didn't want to make a real documentary

i just wanted to video tape stuff i saw

did you see his speech a few minutes ago

I did actually. It seemed liked the same old spiel he always spats out. "America is at the end of it's ropes" and what not. Apparently, he is on an unusually low key visit compared to the last one.

LoL i saw the portests in columbia

that was funny, on youtube people were gonna denounce their citizen ship because of ahmadenijad

He's not such a bad guy.
After all he likes soccer!

He's a radical political leader who uses religious fundamentalism to cultivate hate which serves to blind his followers from reality and keep those followers fanatically faithful. He's very much like George W. Bush in the US.

If you like Bush, Ahmadinejad should appeal to you, and vice versa. The only real differences are geographic location, religious preference and extent of authority.

Albeit a tad late on this discussion, I must echo the truth of what Vid's saying here. I had the rare opportunity to spend a great deal of time with Iranis some time ago. By and large, you'll find them singularly charming (as opposed to typical middle-eastern stereotypes). Concurrently, they have as many nutcases running around as the western world does.

I'm not sure anyone's been particularly guilty of this; but my inner Captain Obvious wants to restate we shouldn't ever equate the views of the loud radicals to that of the people of whom they're associated. Everyone should travel and get a real sense of the very people we tend to pigeon-hole.

<dismounts soapbox>