Please now, let's not spare the invectives shall we?

Tell me what you really think!

Iran, as of 1998, had about ten million illiterates (age 15 and up) folks walking the streets of Teheran and elsewhere.

Those ten million can't differentiate between a 66 year old political cartoon about FDR and one drawn yesterday about Khomeni. Those folks CAN see that it looks like Khomeni is under the thumb of somebody - and that's it.

They would no more recognize FDR than Jack Kerouac.

It is snooty to point out this fact?
It is arrogance to point out that many of these nations harbor the highest levels of female illiteracy in the world in the 21st century, despite the efforts of the Shah and western influences to secure a better education for women in the region since the fifties?

That's a strange view of arrogance. It is not as if these regions haven't been presented an opportunity to read and for women to gain - but the masses and the religious fanatics have discarded western education as unnecessary and unwanted.

The phrase unwashed ignorance is appropriate when describing illiteracy and any manifestation of a nation's backwardness:

unwashed



adj 1: of or associated with the great masses of people; "the common people in those days suffered greatly"; "behavior that branded him as common"; "his square plebeian nose"; "a vulgar and objectionable person"; "the unwashed masses" [syn: common, plebeian, vulgar] 2: not cleaned with or as if with soap and water; "a sink full of unwashed dishes"

Source: WordNet ® 1.6, © 1997 Princeton University



My efforts, should be fairly obvious, and are not gratuitous condemnation of "plebeian masses," but rather to promote western-levels of literacy and especially global scientific literacy as well.

I have the greatest of compassion for the illiterate, but that does not mean I am going to let the culture, political leadership or religious doctrines which helped to foster this condition off the hook!

If this be snooty arrogance, than make the most of it!

;-)
SDAI-Tech1