From: ghbr@fmg.bt.co.uk (Hossein Bagherzadeh Rafsanjani)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.iranian
Subject: Re: What to read at sci
Date: 28 Jul 92 16:34:03 GMT
Organization: British Telecom

In article <-nmm+ph.bavafa@netcom.com> bavafa@netcom.com (Hooshyar Naraghi)writes:

[Note:  I had no intention of continuing this thread, but as you posed some
serious questions, I felt I should respond.]

> Let's be formal and professional here and not play sarcasm to convey a point.

> You are not required by anyone to do something good for 'my' religion.  

Correct.

> You
> are not required to ridicule 'my' religion to get a point across either. 

I have no intention of ridiculing ANY religion.  But I cannot help it when I
hear someting ridiculus, be it religious (like physical miracles) or not.  It
may not look ridiculus to you, but it does to me.

> It was not NICE, you know!  

I am sorry, if I have offended anybody.  I won't be offended if you find
something ridiculus in my "religion".  It is one of the effective ways to
discredit ridiculus ideas, and help people get rid of them. 

> BTW, 'shomA keh vakil vasiy-e bandeh nistid.'

Shakk-i nist.

> >Kamran is certainly an
> >effective preacher, but alas his line of arguments may work better in Sangsar
> >than in SCI!  It seems to be the second time I am picking on him.  The first
> >time was on the magic figure of 1000+260 Hejri Qamari.  (Sorry, Kamran.  In
> >both occasions I was prompted by your comments, and not by your name.  It just
> >happened that on both occasions, the remarks came from you.)

> Thanks for revealing to us what your line of thinking is.  But doost-e aziz
> I am not in that league.  So this game you have to play by yourself :-)
> What's left is just few technical questions from you, if I may.

> How did you determine that somebody 'is' 'certainly' a preacher, 

My impression from what he is doing on the net.  He is trying to preach
something, isn't he?  You may call it something else, but it wouldn't matter.

> while it
> seems his line of argument may work better in Sangsar?  

Because there is less chance of him being ridiculed over there, when he talks
of physical miracles.

> Again, are you
> serious here or that's another sarcasm?  

A bit of both.

> Next question is how much do you
> know about Sangsar town and its AhAli?  

What is it?  A test?  Anyway, my answer is:

That it is like any other small town in Iran, with a difference that it has
(had?) a bigger share of Baha'is in it.

> Again, are you rediculing Sangsari
> people or this is another sarcasm.  

NO!  No ridiculing of PEOPLE on my part.  Never.  I may only ridicule
(ridiculus) IDEAS.

> Finally, since when you have chosen to 
> speak for SCI?  

Never.

> How do you know SCI is too hard to digest these lines of
> arguments.  

From the level of discussions on the net.  Mind you, there may be still people
on the net who would buy these miracle stuff.  But not on the scale you would
expect in Sangsar, say.  I hope you (and ohters) won't get me wrong.  I have
nothing against Sangsaries.  I love them as much as I love any other of my
hamvatans - no matter what their beliefs.  It is just the level of education we
are talking about - a fact of life (or more accurately, social
injustices/ills).

> Please note these are simply questions to understand how you
> go about making global statements.  Nothing more and nothing less.

I hope I have made myself clear.  (Indeed, I didn't think I needed any
clarifying.  But your points prompted me to do so, as one has to take account
of the siege mentality too, and the likely effects of your interpretations in
this sort of environment.)

For the sake of brevity, and helping to close the discussion, I skip from
responding to the rest of your comments and questions (which were less serious,
anyway).  After all, I am not preaching, am I?

-hossein

PS.  No sarcasms in this posting, except obviously the last sentence!
Newsgroups: soc.culture.iranian