The Moral Insanity of Siding with Iran
In this episode, hosts Chuck Warren, Sam Stone, and Shay Khatari are joined by former British soldier and Middle East strategist Andrew Fox, author of the article "The Moronic Obscenity of Siding with Iran." Together, they dissect the alarming rise of sympathy for the Iranian regime among some Western commentators and protestors.
Fox criticizes what he calls the "football game mentality" of modern political discourse—where people treat geopolitical conflicts like team sports, picking sides based on who they dislike more, rather than evaluating facts and values. While acknowledging that Israel has made mistakes, he emphasizes that Iran’s record on human rights, gender equality, and political repression should make it morally indefensible for anyone—especially progressives—to align with the regime.
They explore how complex foreign conflicts get flattened into simple, good-vs-evil narratives and how Iran’s long-standing anti-Western and anti-freedom policies are overlooked by those eager to oppose Israel. The conversation warns against the dangers of moral relativism, the viral spread of ignorance on social media, and the "Star Warsification" of global politics—where the "underdog" is automatically assumed to be the hero.
Transcript
Chuck Warren: So today's your birthday, and I immediately thought of a question I want to ask you. After three tours in Afghanistan, do birthdays take a little more significance to you now?
Andrew Fox: They do, especially as I now share my birthday with my son. So it's a very special day for both of us, which is rather lovely. But yeah, it's always a pleasure to have those extra trips around the sun.
Chuck Warren: Well, that's fantastic. So you wrote a great piece. It's why you're here. I found it and sent it to Kylie, and you were kind enough to come on. You wrote a piece called The Moronic Obscenity of Siding with Iran. You know, so we have social media, and we have a six-digit following.
And, you know, Kylie and I talk about this once a week, things we post sometimes. that people like and people that just sort of ignore it, right? So if I do anything with numbers, it just sort of makes their eyes roll, even long-form content or articles. But if I put something on Iran or China, they go off.
But I also understand our audience is right of center. So you always used to think there's one thing that Americans can agree on, and Iran always brings out their irritation on our following. You wouldn't think there's people supporting Iran on this. And it's weird. It's weird.
Andrew Fox: It's insane. Yeah, it's insane. And, you know, I think it shows a lack of understanding of what Iran actually is. I mean, you can you can criticize Israel, you know, all day long without having to decide that this is a football game. And if you don't support team A, you have to support team B. You know,
I think Israel have had a very challenging 20 months and they've done some things really, really well and some things that they've not got quite so right. But Iran have run a 46-year campaign against everything that people, particularly left of center, believe in. you know, freedom, equality, human rights, you name it, you know,
this is a country that stands against all these things and actually executes people and gouges out the eyes of people who stand up for these things in Iran itself. So to see people on the streets of London or New York or any big city in the West, you know,
supporting Iran and even holding up banners of the Ayatollah is just absolute insanity to me.
Chuck Warren: You know, I think also what frustrates me is you don't have to say I like what Israel is doing in Gaza, but therefore I have to like Iran. It's odd that they think they have to lump those in.
Andrew Fox: Yeah, it's the weird sort of looking at it like it's some kind of football game, some sort of college football game where, you know, if you hate, I don't know, if you hate the team that you support, the team that is your local rival, then you must support the other side.
I call it the Star Warsification of warfare as well. Where people kind of assume that the smaller guy like the rebel is always the good guy we've seen a lot of that over the last two years or so as well where people just assume that because somebody is is pushing against somebody bigger they must be the uh the good guy in the conflict.
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Read Andrew Fox’s article: The Moronic Obscenity of Siding with Iran
Follow Andrew Fox on X: @Mr_Andrew_Fox