With its inception a month ago, the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans has marked a new era for Iranian American politics in this country. The Public Affairs All
iance of Iranian Americans (PAAIA) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, nonsectarian, independent organization that represents the domestic interests of the Iranian American community before U.S. policymakers, opinion makers and the American public at large. PAA
IA seeks to achieve its mission by focusing on three major areas of activities: community building, image building, and influence building. They plan on utilizing research and media outlets to combat the negative stigma that has been placed on Iranians through the media today. They have a very well put together executive level team that is comprised of researchers, analysts, and various other leaders. The most notable of all is their Director of Public Affairs Rudi Bakhtiar, who hails from CNN and Fox News.
I look to this organization with great hope for what they can do for our community here in the United States. The time has come for a group like this to finally emerge and to act as a formidable voice for the Iranian American community. From the little that I have seen from the PAAIA I believe that they can be that strong voice. I just have a few concerns regarding our community as a whole, the first and foremost concern being that of consensus. In my experience it has been increasingly difficult to create a sense of consensus among a group of Iranians. This happens in all different kinds of groups, but I have just been privy to seeing it more in groups of Iranian Americans. If the PAAIA can actually get a consensus of the issues and needs of all Iranian Americans then we as a constituency group can advance forward in being represented within the engagement process. This leads to my second concern, the process by which to gain equality. As most of citizens within the past eight years have learned, politics is a very dirty business. One usually has to sell their soul or the soul of the demographic they represent in order to be put on a level playing field with decision makers. This makes me wonder if PAAIA will be able to achieve this without sacrificing any face or needs of the Iranian American community. Personally, I do not think they should have to, considering all of the amazing contributions that countless number of Iranians have made to the social, economic, and cultural fabric of the United States. Given, we as Iranian Americans know this, however the infrastructure which we operate within does not and thusly requires seducing. This pro
cess of “seduction” is one of the largest deterrents I have encountered when doing any kind of work within the political system. Logic unfortunately does not dictate the formulation or the implementation of policy. Money and influence does. I know that as a community here in the U.S. we are vastly wealthier in the former than the latter. As a result I am curious to see how PAAIA will fair as far as enhancing our public image will go.
As an individual Iranian living in America I know there are plenty things I can do as single person to enhance this image and assist PAAIA in achieving their objectives. The first and most important thing to remember is that being an Iranian is not all of who we are, it is merely a facet of who we are. I’m not saying it’s not a huge and dominant facet, but it’s not everything that we are. Keeping this in mind, we must continue to be the industrious, courteous, and intelligent without ever losing sight of everything that we have been blessed with. I also think that when people begin to stare at us because it is clear we are of Middle Eastern descent, that smiling as widely as possible at those people can’t hurt. For when you smile when you are around, no one will ever think you are a threat.
