Virtue, Vice, & Valentines- A Round-Up

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pirasteh/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Last year, before the election and subsequent turmoil, Reza Sayah at CNN did a story about Valentine's Day in Iran.



In 2004, NPR interviewed Farnaz Fassihi in the following piece about red, heart-shaped boxes duking it out with the Office of Vice and Virtue in Tehran.



In 2006, filmmaker Shaghayegh Azimi interviewed people on the streets of Tehran about love, Valentine's Day, and the regime in this 3 minute film. Azimi's notes on the Frontline blog are worth reading.

Last year, history goddess and author of Sexual Politics in Modern Iran, Janet Afary, wrote about the sexual revolution taking place in gender roles in her article for the Guardian: Tehran, city of love.

This year, protesters in London sent a Green Valentine to protesters back in Iran.

And this article from the Ukraine reports on young Iranians celebrating the day in 2010, amidst ongoing escalations of political repression and violence.

Here are some Happy Valentine's Day tunes, themed for this crazy 31st anniversary of the Revolution week, to any of my readers still able to access Letters of the Living inside Iran...