Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by lupusreal 781 days ago
Their government says that America is an evil spiteful bully. The apparent truth of that claim has now been demonstrated to any Iranian who plays Minecraft. You think the result is more Iranians questioning their government? I doubt it.
1 comments

There are plenty of Iranians alive today that were around before the current Iranian government. Iranian youth are also much more "aware" of global politics than any generation before them...

I think it's difficult for most Iranians to not be aware of their government's decisions and actions around the globe...

Besides - what alternative would you propose? Just pretend everything is ok and business as usual? Bomb their government instead of using sanctions?

I would suggest creating sanctions that hurt those in power, meaning mainly old bearded men who probably don't play Minecraft. Ordinary people have no power to change anything over there, they get shot if they try.
> I would suggest creating sanctions that hurt those in power

People in power remain in power by keeping the population under control. If the population is indifferent to consequences of the power-class' decisions, then everything can keep rolling along as-is. When the population is impacted negatively by the power-class' decisions - then civil unrest happens. With enough of that, the power-class loses power...

This[1] video does a decent job of highlighting the careful balancing act that's required to remain in power... it also highlights the difficulties of changing the status-quo even for a benevolent dictator that desires to remain a dictator - ie. they have to appease all of the powers-that-be under them.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs

By that same rule, they are also aware of other governments' decisions and actions around the globe.

Concretely, the Reddit user is clearly aware of why this is happening and is blaming the USA government, not his.

Sure - but it would be ridiculous to expect the world to continue business as usual with a nation that has dedicated the past few decades to being as big of a nuisance as possible.

Given our administration's current views on Iran, and the Obama administration's similar views, it would have been trivial for Iran to be welcomed back into the international community.

Yet... they once again chose the opposite. So, today, that means no more Minecraft. Perhaps one day the population of Iran will have had enough of their government and make changes.