STORM2K

That is HORRIBLE! That country is crazy!

"Homosexuality is illegal, those charged with love-making Irangay_teens_2 are given a choice of four deathstyles: being hanged, stoned, halved by a sword, or dropped from the highest perch.

And Outrage, in its release about the gay teens' execution, noted that, "according to Iranian human rights campaigners, over 4000 lesbians and gay men have been executed since the Ayatollahs seized power in 1979. Last August, a 16-year-old girl , [Atefeh Rajabi] was hanged [in the Caspian port of Neka] for 'acts incompatible with chastity,' [i.e., sex before marriage]."

I remember hearing about the girl last year. As warped and disgusting as their laws are, you'd think people would refrain from doing it since it means DEATH. That's just so sad.

What a terrible, terrible thing.... And I doubt things there are going to get any better any time soon. Their new president is very much a conservative - he will eliminate whatever small challenge the theocratic courts and religious leaders have faced with "reformists" in elected positions. The only upside to any of this, that I can see, is that if the social freedoms that have been largely permitted (not legally, but by the government turning a blind eye) are rolled back, the young people (who make up most of Iran's population) might be angry enough to fight...

As warped and disgusting as their laws are, you'd think people would refrain from doing it since it means DEATH. That's just so sad.

I think the situation in Iran is very, very confusing when it comes to what crime leads to what punishment.... legally, sharia is in place almost to a tee, and a ridiculous number of things can lead to imprisonment or execution (a woman talking to a man with whom she is not related, for example .... or letting your hijab slip back in public....). But the authorities have chosen not to enforce many of these laws strictly. Occasionally, though, they will choose to make an example of someone, and they seem to choose these "examples" almost at random. I guess young people there just accept these kinds of risks as part of what they have to deal with in life....