Mick Hartley

From the BBC:

The Iranian judiciary says a man has been stoned to death for adultery – the first time it has confirmed such an execution in five years.
Jafar Kiani was executed last week in a village in north-west Qazvin province.

Amnesty International said Mr Kiani and Mokarrameh Ebrahimi, 43, were convicted of adultery more than a decade ago.

The human rights group has appealed for Ms Ebrahimi to be spared. Adultery is a capital offence, punishable by stoning, under Iran’s Islamic law.

Should Mokarrameh Ebrahimi be similarly punished, her fate would be that bit worse:

Under the punishment of stoning, a male convict is buried up to his waist with his hands tied behind his back, while a female offender is buried up to her neck with her hands also buried.

Is that, I wonder, because women naturally have to be punished more severely, since they’re the ones doing the tempting, or is there a question of decorum here? Throwing stones at women’s breasts is a little, well….disturbing. The reminder of sexuality, and of mothering, might distract the stone-throwers from the important business of killing.