The US is always looking for ways to count coup on Iran and make them look mean, backwards or dangerous. Saber rattling type stuff just doesn't cut it lately. Plus it is good to give the social conservatives in the US a red herring, to keep them from getting involved with stuff of greater import. Also, it is nice to make the world a better place and help the suffering when one can. Is it possible all 3 goals could be accomplished at once?
I propose that the US offer mass political asylum to gay Iranians. The Iranian leader Ahmadinejad famously denied the existence of any gay iranians but of course they are there as everywhere else. Gay people have a bad lot in Iran and face systemic persecution. Certainly they could use help. Most will be working age and without children, so they will be easier and cheaper to assimilate than other refugee populations. By loudly and publically bringing the gay iranians to the US, we would offer them a better life and publicize Iran's shameful treatment of them while at the same time displaying our own open arms and open minds to the world. This would also outrage social conservatives in the US and distract them from weightier matters.-- bungston, Mar 11 2009 The plight of gay Iranians. http://en.wikipedia...LGBT_rights_in_Iran [bungston, Mar 11 2009] RCMP Fruit Machine http://en.wikipedia.../wiki/Fruit_machine [calum, Mar 11 2009] IRQR - IRanian Queer Railroad http://www.irqr.net/Toronto-based support network for gay Iranian asylum seekers. [jutta, Mar 13 2009] [ ] I agree with the theory (though not the category, such claims make them refugees, cultural clashes notwithstanding) but in practice wouldn't this also result in claims of homosexuality, real or not, to be equated to a "free pass" through immigration ?, easily discarded afterwards and such people are *not* plusses to society.
and while I'm not claiming that Iranians are terrorists, existing terrorists' tactics include hiding in dishonourable fashions (the video showing a male terrorist donning a niqab/burka to pretend he's a women)
Also, there's the question as to whether Iran's leader is excluding gay people from citizenship or excluding people's gayness from the culture.-- FlyingToaster, Mar 11 2009 [Flyingtoaster] makes a good point. i can't even imagine what 'proofs' would be listed as acceptable in the USCIS officers' field manual for determining gender preference of potential immigrants!-- k_sra, Mar 11 2009 Perhaps they could use any combination of(a) the RCMP's fruit machine, or(b) the classic "cold spoon on the tadger" test of playground lore.-- calum, Mar 11 2009 Wow. Where to begin...
The fruit machine story would be hilarious, were it not so sadly true.
And I can't help any. My "gaydar" was hooked up backwards. The guy who keeps buying me drinks and wants to get to know me better just seems like a nice fellow, until somebody clues me.
Whereas my coworker with the funny laugh, I'm CERTAIN he's gay until somebody clues me that I'm miles off base.
But the idea is just too much. Then we'd become a gay sanctuary, and while that would probably be good for my wardrobe, republican's heads would be exploding all over my clothes.-- normzone, Mar 11 2009 [FlyingToaster] makes several good points; not the least of which is: "how can you tell if they are REALLY gay?" (Surmised/Paraphrased)
Wouldn't, with Iran's ridiculously high birth rate - (read: young, unemployed people) - you expect that virtually ALL of them would "become" gay? Kudos, though [bungston], for your underlying motive, but... []
(By the way, who SAYS that Iran produces any gay people?! I'll have you know that the late Freddy Mercury (born Furuk Bulsara of Iran - [parents fled to Tanzania, than England] - of the Rock-Band Queen, might not concur...)-- Wily Peyote, Mar 11 2009 //Most will be working age and without children, so they will be easier and cheaper to assimilate//
If you take that stereotype and run with it, then we should further assume that they will harder to assimilate. The US jobs market won't be able to employ hundreds of thousands of additional fashion designers and reference librarians.-- Laughs Last, Mar 11 2009 I can't put my finger on it, but somehow I think gay iranians would find this idea very offensive.--- zeno, Mar 12 2009 there are no gay iranians, [zeno]. everyone knows that.-- k_sra, Mar 12 2009 //Ahmadinejad famously denied the existence of any gay iranians // If they don't exist, then they can't be being persecuted. Maybe it is something else they're doing?-- coprocephalous, Mar 12 2009 HA!-- k_sra, Mar 12 2009 I would hesitate to think that all gay Iranians would actually want to leave Iran for America, any more than all straight Americans would want to travel in the opposite direction.-- Aristotle, Mar 12 2009 Could this be used as a form of Gerrymandering? While the democrats are in power they purposefully allow in as many people likely to be more left-wing than the average american; like gays. Once the republicans are back they mass-import people more right wing than the avergae american; like, um, I don;t know who.-- Germanicus, Mar 12 2009 other iranians?-- k_sra, Mar 12 2009 I think that takes us back to sterotypes again.
Isn't there a republican gay group called the Log Cabin Republicans?-- normzone, Mar 12 2009 /I can't put my finger on it, but somehow I think gay iranians would find this idea very offensive.-/
I think that under the current system, with no changes, a gay iranian could make a valid petition for political asylum because of persecution in his home country. This proposal would simply encourage and streamline such petitions. I cannot imagine how such an offer could be offensive to a gay iranian - "if you feel mistreated and unwanted in your home country, we welcome you in ours."-- bungston, Mar 12 2009 Could they please be called Gayranians? No offence intended.-- xenzag, Mar 13 2009 Ahmadinejad just said that to deflect attention from his own gayness. Have you seen his beard??-- simonj, Mar 13 2009 random, halfbakery