[Reader-list] Reply to Vijay Prashad's thoughts on facebook/twitter

[Naeem Mohaiemen]

A follow-up exchange w/ Vijay on FOIL-->

1. From Vijay:
I quite agree that *Iranian twitterers* continue to impact the
conjuncture in Iran. My sentence was about *us* which is to say those
of us who are located in the US Left. Now there are some who are
intimately related to the struggle in Iran, as exiles for instance,
but their role is different. The entire essay is not about those in
Iran, per se, but about the attitude of internationalist solidarity.


2. From Naeem:
I did perceive that your "us" was meant possibly as "US Left", but
within that is also possibly at least a portion of Iranian diaspora.
Within my networks, they are the ones who first started flooding my
Facebook wall with Iran alerts (even before the election). So I
privilege their cyber-activism, both in terms of it's level of
understanding (although you can argue it's over-representative of
westernized Iranians) and impact. I know that you are separating those
exiles out in your note below, but I was placing them within the
networked messaging phenomenon.

Also, although Counterpunch is styled as US Left platform to some
degree, articles from it are often cited/forwarded by some within the
Bangla Left (itself quite fragmented). So when I see a piece on there,
I see it addressed to a larger-than-US audience.

Then I would also say the impact of a Pakistani blogger on this issue
would have a different impact, because it could not be as easily
dismissed as "western propaganda".

There's some amount of posturing within the internationalist
solidarity with Iran, but I see that more on the center/center right
of political forces, and within mainstream media.

My quibble wasn't with the essay, but the portion related to
hyper-networked social media.


3. From Vijay:
Firstly, I am conscious that CP is read elsewhere, but I did try to
flag right through the essay that this was intended for a certain
audience (in particular at the end, on Honduras, where this is made
very clear, I think). Now the mailing address is the US Left, but it
can certainly be intercepted and read elsewhere, but with the
conscious presence that the "us" is intended as a certain audience.

Second, the Iranian diaspora plays an important role in this, no
doubt, particularly the exiles. But they are conduits of information
as much as anything. This seems a rather home-run affair, and not
driven from Berlin or Toronto, or even Los Angeles. And the
Iranian-American component of the left has not produced a view that I
have yet seen; there is celebration or caution, but nothing that helps
us understand what the US Left should do in terms of Iran. The most
that I have seen is the caution against intervention.

Third, CP posted a very nice piece on social networking today, which I
commend. It will help give us the context we need, as to the utility
of these methods and their drawbacks. I spoke to a friend in Tehran
who is close to the bus drivers union, and he tells me what I
anticipated, which is that the unions are quite old-fashioned in how
they move to the streets. So there is that. There is a class component
to this form of mobilization, as we see in the US as well. One of the
things to come to terms with is that as globalization renders large
numbers of people into the informal sector, it is often the middle
class and the merchant classes (often organized into federations) that
are capable of organizing themselves, whereas the unions have not
taken up the challenge of organizing the informal workers. For the US,
there is an excellent discussion in the new Left Turn, a summary of a
round table from the Left Forum in New York.
Best, Vijay.


On Thu, Jul 2, 2009 at 11:12 PM, Venugopalan K M<kmvenuannur at gmail.com> wrote:
> This seems to be the most plausible viewpoint on the relevance of
> social networking ;
> looking forward to see unlimited expansion of this space to add weight
> to the critical mass, and to shape this as a tremendous vehicle
> carrying the ideas of peace and justice; as a formidable challenge to
> the unjust order, created by the convergence of informed  opinions
> everywhere.
> Regards,
>
>
> On 7/2/09, Naeem Mohaiemen <naeem.mohaiemen at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Vijay Prashad wrote in this op-ed "Made for Revolution: Iran and Us"
>>
>> http://www.counterpunch.org/prashad07012009.html
>>
>> I agree with most of the op-ed, except this sentence-->
>> "Our Facebook updates and Twitter squeals do not contribute to their
>> debate."
>>
>> My response to this specific sentence, which I also sent to Vijay-->
>>
>> I disagree that Iranian twitterers, inside Iran and in the diaspora,
>> don't have an impact on the crisis. To suggest otherwise would be to
>> denigrate the achievement of twitterers like PersianKiwi, who sent
>> updates for two weeks, until being allegedly arrested by security
>> forces.
>>
>> Yes, there's tremendous amount of chaff on Twitter, but there's also
>> precious data.
>>
>> I stand by my original op-ed from June 17
>>
>> "The Revolution Will Bypass Your Filters"
>> http://unheardvoice.net/blog/2009/06/17/iran-filters/
>>
>> This crisis has been different precisely because of the critical mass
>> interlinking of social media. News, photos and video has leaked out in
>> such large volume precisely because of the existence of Twitter,
>> Twitpic, Youtube, Twazzup, Facebook, etc.
>> _________________________________________
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>
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>