World Views: Global Violence Revisited, Benghazi Report, and the Farzaneh Brothers (Dec 21, 2012)

One week after the devastating shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn., Suzette Grillot, Joshua Landis, and Rebecca Cruise revisit an earlier conversation about the global gun trade from August, after the deadly movie theater shooting in Aurora, Colo.

Grillot, the Dean of the University of Oklahoma’s College of International Studies and an expert on global security, says a mass stabbing at an elementary school in China on the same day as Sandy hook makes for an interesting comparison between gun violence in the U.S. and knife violence in China.

“This is not just an American situation," said Rebecca Cruise, a comparative politics expert. “In the past two-and-a-half years there have been 90 people attacked in China.”

Tuesday night, an independent panel released a summary that blamed failures in State Department leadership for security lapses at a U.S. consulate in Libya. Four people, including the U.S. ambassador, were killed in an attack on the consulate in September.

Joshua Landis, the Director of the Center for Middle East Studies at OU, said the onus directed at the State Department has raised the question of why few have criticized Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

"She is loved by the Democrats, but even the Republicans have really taken it easy," Landis said. "Somehow, you can feel her preparing herself for a Presidential run four years, and everybody is treating her with kid gloves because they don't want to get their name put down early here insulting her."

Mohammad and Jalal Farzaneh arrived in Oklahoma in 1978 from Iran to study architecture at OU. After earning bachelor’s degrees in 1981 and master’s degrees in 1984, the two combined their construction companies to form Home Creations, now one of the largest residential builders in the state.

The brothers became U.S. citizens more than a decade ago, and are actively involved in the Central Oklahoma Iranian community.

“When we graduated, it was barely after the hostage crisis was over,” Jalal Farzaneh said. “And together with the oil bust, we could not find a job as an architect anywhere in the state, so we decided to go out and create our own jobs. 7,000 homes later, we are still here.”

The Farzaneh family has spent the past 30 years trying to educate the public about the culture and way of life, and Mohammad Farzaneh said he hopes by befriending the people of Iran, U.S. policy will shift.

“We should not punish them with sanctions, or war, or missiles,” Mohammad Farzaneh said. “It's tough on people. The sanctions right now are really hurting the people of Iran. It's not changing any policy. I don't know if it does.”

The Farzaneh Family has donated more than $1 million to establish the Iranian Studies Program at OU, and endow a Chair of Iranian Studies in the College of International Studies.

“At the end of the day, I think we realized education is the solution,” said Jalal Farzaneh. “The best place is the university, because those are the young people that will eventually be influential in politics, or business, or whatever they do.”

INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS

Mohammad Farzaneh on life as an Iranian during the 1979 Islamic Revolution and hostage crisis

Well, there were many times we had to introduce ourselves as not Iranian. When people ask "Where are you from?" you sometimes hesitate to say where you are from, who you are and everything. So being 22-24 years old, and hiding your identity is just not comfortable. You feel ashamed doing that, but at the same time for safety reasons sometimes you didn't mention it, because there was hostility against Iranians or people the Middle East. [People] still confuse Iranians with Arabs, or Arabs with Iranians. Nowadays they do the same thing.

Jalal Farzaneh on attitudes towards Muslims in 2001

About 30 days after 9/11, one of my managers, in front of one of my staff, was asking if I had any problem since 9/11. And my staff just asked my manager, "Why should he have a problem?" And he said, "Oh, well because he's Iranian." And all of a sudden she said, "Oh my God, I didn't realize that." See, people do not realize what kind of religion you have, or what kind of national origin you have if they know you in person. They don't see you as a package deal. They just see you for who you are. We have been really, really blessed to be living in a society, and in a community in a place like Norman, which is very tolerant of everybody. This society has really given us so much.

Jalal Farzaneh on his hope to return to pre-1979 U.S.-Iranian relations

As an American-Iranian, we see how great a people Americans are, and how great a people Iranians are. And I do not see any reason why we should not be able to put both countries back together. For so long, there has been so much mistrust built and so much bickering between the two countries, that we got to a point where no one can trust the other person. And we just need to bring both cultures and both people together. And that's the hope that we have.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

SUZETTE GRILLOT, HOST: Mohammad Farzaneh and Jalal Farzaneh, welcome to the studio.

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Thank you.

GRILLOT: So, the two of you came to the University of Oklahoma, came to Norman back in the late 70's as students from Iran...

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Right.

GRILLOT: ...what brought you to the University of Oklahoma? That's a long way to travel. Why did you come here?

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Well, to be honest with you there was a friend of ours living in Oklahoma City. That was probably the main reason why we stopped by here. We were going to Texas, but the main reason we stayed here was because of the cost of living, and the cost of school. At the time, we came from Houston. We'd been there for a month, and coming from Houston, an apartment was almost $400 back then, in 1978. It was $270, $150 here...

GRILLOT: So it's an affordable place to be?

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: ...yes, much, much cheaper than Houston, Texas.

JALAL FARZANEH: Yes, at the time the University of Oklahoma's School of Architecture was ranked the fifth in the nation, so that was one of the best schools for us to attend. We are really grateful to have one of the best educations we could get, and also Oklahoma seems to be a great place to raise a family. We both had expanding families at the time. We both got married, and Mohammad had a son, and we were going to raise families. So Oklahoma is a great place to live, and work, and raise family.

JOSHUA LANDIS: Now you've gone on to create this big, successful American company, from being just two little students looking for a cheap and good education.

JALAL FARZANEH: (Laughs) The truth of the matter is, as you know, when we came here it was immediately before the Iranian Revolution, and then after the Iranian Revolution we had the hostage crisis. When we graduated, it was barely after the hostage crisis was over. And together with the oil bust, we could not find a job as an architect anywhere in the state, so we decided to go out and create our own jobs. Mohammad and I decided to buy a piece of land, and build a house, and sell [it], and that way we'd create our own job. We kept on doing the same thing, and 7,000 homes later, we are still here.

LANDIS: So nobody wanted to hire an Iranian in 1979?

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Well, 1981. That was during the hostage crisis. It was not accidental for us to be in the housing industry. My father was doing that for years, and we both worked for my father back in Iran. So we had the background of construction, even though our education formally was architecture...

LANDIS: His company was nationalized, wasn't it?

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Yes, he has a factory which got nationalized after the revolution, and a new government took over, and he lost all of the business, including the housing industry. His housing business was not as big as his manufacturing, but his manufacturing was one of the first that got nationalized, yes.

GRILLOT: Well, you mentioned the Iranian Revolution and the hostage crisis. I mean, you were here for that. You were young students. What was that like? You mentioned not being able to get a job. Joshua mentioned nobody wanted to hire an Iranian at the time. But really, what was it like to live here in the state of Oklahoma at that particular moment?

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Well, there were many times we had to introduce ourselves as not Iranian. When people ask "Where are you from?" you sometimes hesitate to say where you are from, who you are and everything. So being 22-24 years old, and hiding your identity is just not comfortable. You feel ashamed doing that, but at the same time for safety reasons sometimes you didn't mention it, because there was hostility against Iranians or people the Middle East. [People] still confuse Iranians with Arabs, or Arabs with Iranians. Nowadays they do the same thing. It doesn't matter. But when you're from that part of the world you have to always be careful. When things like publicity against Muslims these days, and publicity against Iranians back then, it was very negative.

GRILLOT: Coming forward a couple of decades, what about after 9/11? Things changed in this country once again, in terms of the attitudes towards Muslims in this country. What was your experience then? The two of you became U.S. Citizens since coming here.

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: It was pretty much the same, it was just like...

JALAL FARZANEH: Deja vu.

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: ...deja vu, remembering everything all over again. It just happened exactly the same way.

JALAL FARZANEH: Unfortunately, the reality of life Suzette is that people have a fear of the unknown. When people do not know enough Muslims, do not know enough Iranians, then they start panicking about "Oh my God, what are they going to do to us?" About 30 days after 9/11, one of my managers, in front of one of my staff, was asking if I had any problem since 9/11. And my staff just asked my manager, "Why should he have a problem?" And he said, "Oh, well because he's Iranian." And all of a sudden she said, "Oh my God, I didn't realize that." See, people do not realize what kind of religion you have, or what kind of national origin you have if they know you in person. They don't see you as a package deal. They just see you for who you are. We have been really, really blessed to be living in a society, and in a community in a place like Norman, which is very tolerant of everybody. This society has really given us so much. But when we started going back and forth outside of the United States, at every airport we saw how we had been treated at the airports, and how "randomly" we have been checked, so we decided, both Mohammad and I.

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: It was randomly every time, right? (Laughs)

GRILLOT: (Laughs) Randomly every time.

JALAL FARZANEH: So we decided to educate the students that go through school about the great heritage and culture that we have from Iran. Iran has 7,000 years of history, and there is a great culture. People are unbelievably great people. We just wanted to get that message across so the students would not just see what's on TV, or what they read in the paper, or hear on the radio as who these people are, or what this culture is.

GRILLOT: So your experiences then, have really motivated you to make sure people understand Iranian culture. Iranian people. Iranian societies. Not so much Iranian government, but Iranian way of life.

LANDIS: So what are some of the things you've done? What are the steps you decided to take after 9/11 to try to help Oklahomans understand who you are, who Iran is, and what things did you think were the best ways to help change your community?

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Well, we started with...we thought the solution is talking to politicians, and trying to get involved with politics, and elections, and encourage Iranian-Americans, and all kinds of Americans - Iranian-Americans, Muslim-Americans - to make sure they're going to vote. Because that's important, so they matter. But at the end of the day, I think we realized education is the solution. You can't necessarily influence a talk, or make sure one group of people understands. You need to educate the whole group of people. The best place is the university, because those are the young people that will eventually be influential in politics, or business, or whatever they do.

LANDIS: Now, you've given the Farzaneh Chair, and the Center for Iranian Studies, but what other things? You've done a bunch of things...

GRILLOT: I mean, for example, film series, music...

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Right.

GRILLOT: ...focusing on culture. Again, to help us understand the arts.

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: To understand the culture is not just you go through one class with Dr. Marashi and just learn about the history of Iran. As you said, it's music. It's art. It's architecture. I mean, all these things...

JALAL FARZANEH: Films.

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Films. They're all part of a culture. That's how you can see a group of people, if you understand their culture. For instance, every time there's a speaker in the architecture department, I make sure I attend. I enjoy that, I can relate because my degree is in architecture. So I really enjoy every time there's any type of architecture speaker, especially when he's from the Middle East or Iran. I enjoy that.

LANDIS: Let's bring it up to the modern day. I promised I wouldn't ask you...

FARZANEHS: (Laughs)

GRILLOT: Here we go.

LANDIS: ...what you think about all the discussion about whether the United States should be drawing red lines.

GRILLOT: Let's put it...

LANDIS: How do you think about...

GRILLOT: What are your hopes for Iranian-US relations? Let's put it that way. (Laughs) Let's maybe not think about what might happen (laughs). Let's think about what we'd like to see happen.

JALAL FARZANEH: I think that we both came at a time at the height of the best relationship the United States and Iran had. What we are hoping is for us to get back to that kind of time. As an American-Iranian, we see how great a people Americans are, and how great a people Iranians are. And I do not see any reason why we should not be able to put both countries back together. For so long, there has been so much mistrust built and so much bickering between the two countries, that we got to a point where no one can trust the other person. And we just need to bring both cultures and both people together. And that's the hope that we have. Both Mohammad and I are hoping that the first diplomats going from the United States to Iran, when we are normalizing the relationship, would be the graduates of the greatest school of international [studies] at the University of Oklahoma.

LANDIS: (Laughs) You must be a politician.

GRILLOT: We do too. (Laughs) We're fully expecting that.

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Well, I'd like to answer your question Joshua about what should be done. I think we have to realize we need to befriend the people of Iran. We should not punish them with sanctions, or war, or missiles. It's tough on people. The sanctions right now are really hurting the people of Iran. It's not changing any policy. I don't know if it does.

LANDIS: Americans are frightened. They're frightened of the program. They're frightened of the rhetoric coming out of Iran. How should they understand that? Should they not be frightened? Or is there a legitimate fear?

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Well, I don't think there is a legitimate fear out there, because according to intelligence reports and everything, Iran doesn't have any plan yet to make the bomb. So there's absolutely no reason for fear on that. Stop punishing people for that. The people of Iran are being punished for something we "think" they may do.

GRILLOT: Well Mohammad, Jalal Farzaneh, thank you so much for being here with us today on World Views.

JALAL FARZANEH: Thank you.

MOHAMMAD FARZANEH: Thank you, we appreciate it.

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