Do you think that asking a simpleton gotcha question absent any further explication isn’t a contrarian and socially erosive rhetorical tack which suggests in context that you’d implicitly support any mass murdering sovereign incursion by the US so long they’ve convinced you that their target is a bad dude?

Cause it sure comes across that way, even if that’s not the case. And yes, I’m aware that their ayatollah was a revolutionary replacement of our shah.

Gas, mostly.

So long as the new governance is approved by Israel and The West. They better not try to democratically elect a leftist or socialist otherwise they’re gonna get a Western backed dictator forced on them instead.

It doesn’t matter whether a monster is killed by someone with noble intentions or a monster is killed by another monster.

It does matter. It matters. And it’s so, so important that people understand that it matters. This attitude of, “the ends justify the means,” is very dangerous. The Iranian nation has had their autonomy taken away from them, first by Khamenei and now by the US and Israel. They are powerless, subject to the whims of people more powerful than them. They don’t make their own decisions about their own nation, the decisions are made for them by people who have enough guns and strongmen to impose their will on them.

Edit: think of it like this: let’s say you’re living down the street from a family with an abusive father. The guy is just cruel to his wife and kids. So one day you decide to take matters into your own hands and you go and shoot the dad dead. That’s good, right? The cruel, abusive father is dead, so it’s good and justified, right? But you didn’t ask the wife or the kids if they wanted their father to be killed. You didn’t care what they wanted, because you didn’t do it for them. You did it for you. You did it because it was what YOU wanted. And if they get mad at you for it, you say oh they’re just ingrates. They don’t appreciate what I did for THEM. But, it wasn’t for them. It was never for them. It was for you.

Edit 2: so what would the alternative be? What could we do to stop this cruel father that doesn’t require us to take matters into our own hands? Law. We need the rule of law. What would any reasonable person in a modern society do in this situation? They’d call the police. That’s what we need: the rule of law. Not countries deciding unilaterally who lives and who dies, but laws. Laws that apply to all of us, equally.

I’m glad he’s dead, but the fear is that this creates an even worse situation.

Attempts to remove a dictator by force are usually not possible without a lengthy occupation. There’s no new government or leaders ready to form a new government that is better for the Iranian people. An occupation is also unlikely to have good results. This isn’t reforming Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan, this is something else entirely. I would expect the people of Iran to not respond well to aggressors occupying their country. This is at best Afghanistan 2, but likely worse

We don’t need to mourn the monster killed by monsters, but we SHOULD remember that even in this short time many innocents have also been killed in the process.

Libya should demonstrate that things can in fact get worse

The Iranians have not gotten justice. I don’t need convincing that he was a bad dude, but his death doesn’t cement freedom, and imo the attacks reduce stability and prosperity for Iranians.

Look to Libya and Afghanistan, they did not get better

The more things change, the more they stay the same. Boundaries shift, new players step in; but power always finds a place to rest its head.

This is not true. Shia islam does NOT have a leader. It’s not like Catholicism, there’s no pope or equivalent position. Shia islam, like sunni islam, is entirely based around scriptures. The Iranian supreme leaders gave themselves the title of ayatollah to give themselves religious legitimacy, as their revolution is a religious on. However, that makes their religious title more political than religious. The vast majority of shias inside Iran, let alone around the world, don’t recognize him as the leader of the religion.

they’re going back to work on Monday just like most Americans would.

right??

How fantastic would it be if elites just assassinated each other.

Uh… they tried that already?

yeah this has never gone wrong ever