Tolerance is wonderful, as far as it goes, but too many people stretch it out of shape to the point where all cultures are considered equally good, and this is obviously not true. No one would say that the culture of, say, Sweden, was not morally superior to the culture of Nazi Germany. Sometimes the way a culture does things is wrong, by any objective standards. This is not bigotry. Bigotry is dislike of a culture, race, or religion for no rational reason.

And maybe Iran was not the best example of an "unwashed, illiterate" culture (for the record, Muslims are obsessed with cleanliness--no piece of cake in a desert--and the Iranian literacy rate is somewhere between 60 and 90 percent), but I don't think anyone here believes that the Taliban's way of life, for example, was something one would recommend, especially if you were female.

What makes you think they don't enjoy riding their camels..tucking their kids in bed at night, laughing in the marketplace?

I dare say more Iranians drive cars than camels, which is why they aren't the best example here, and I note that many Arabs tend to ditch their camels and ancient ways of life quite cheerfully when given the chance to move to an air conditioned apartment. But yeah, when it gets down to basics, people are a lot more alike than different.

Remember, there's also a certain amount of snotty arrogance in the idea that "unspoiled" people in primitive conditions ought to live just the way they do in order to preserve their "culture," and shouldn't aspire to the "corruption" of Western ways.