(AP photo of Iranian protesters)
I hope I don't come across as an ignorant tool, but I don't really know much about Iran, but I would like to.
It makes you pause when hundreds of thousands of people turn out to protest an election of a hard-line holocaust denier like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and then people start getting shot and suddenly Western news reporters are banned from reporting on the unrest.
Something, indeed, is going on here. That link is all in Arabic, but I think HuffPo has it translated. From what they say though, it's mostly pictures and not any new news.
Fivethirtyeight breaks down the numbers, here.
As I stated above I am not nearly informed enough on gender and Iran, Iranian/Persian culture, politics, and Middle Eastern culture in general, etc. I have decided to take on a mini project of learning more about Iran, specifically. I have a few links about some books that I've read, and some that I would like to read. If you can recommend any reading, videos, blogs, etc., by all means do:
Persepolis, first a book, now a movie, by Marjane Satrapi- a graphic novel memoir of her childhood before and after the 1979 revolution. It's brilliant! There is a part 2 which I haven't read yet, but the first book was engaging written and illustrated.
According to Wikipedia the real Persopolis was the ceremonial city of the Persian Empire during
the Achaemenid dynasty.
Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi. I know this book has been taught in a lot of classes and read in a lot of book clubs, but it's really fantastic, if you haven't read it, go out and get it soon. It's worth a re-read too!
An interesting article on distinguishing Islam from Muslims from Middle East Online.
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