By Elise Solé
Hundreds of Iranian women are ripping off their hijabs and posting selfies online to the Facebook page "Stealthy Freedoms of Iranian Women,” a photo project that's reaped more than 130,000 likes and sparked conversation about how safe it is for women to forgo their headscarfs.
London-based Iranian journalist Masih Alinejad told the U.K.’s he Guardian that since she created the page on May 3, she’s been inundated by submissions. "I've hardly slept in the past three days because of the number of pictures and messages I've received,” she said.
The hijab is a veil that covers the head and chest and is worn by many Muslim women. Alinejad says she is not anti-hijab (her mother wears one and Alinejad did for 30 years until she left her Iranian village in 2009) but it took time to summon the courage to tell people that she prefers to go without it. Now, she wants other women to feel comfortable making their own decisions about the religious headpiece.
The photos reveal women in various locales. “My stealthy freedom at Kish Island waterfront,” wrote one who posted a photo of herself throwing her head back at the resort island in the Persian Gulf. Another posted a photo of herself and her husband on the beach, writing, “My husband and I enjoying our stealthy freedom by the Caspian sea.” And one woman posted her image, taken in an unknown field, with her scarf blowing in the wind behind her. “No words to say. Just that freedom is wonderfully enjoyable; even a brief moment of it,” she wrote. One even boldly posed standing near two parked police cars. The caption: “She is standing bareheaded only meters away from the police cars. It takes guts to do so.”
There's been an outpouring of support on Twitter:
But as empowering as the project is, is it dangerous? It’s a question posed by journalist Brian Pellot for the blog Religion News. He points out that Iranian women are required by law to wear the hijab in public, a mandate since the country’s Islamic Revolution in 1979. Pellot also notes that while women sometimes remove their scarves in trusted company, to do so in a public setting is risky, citing recent attempts to punish women caught without their hijabs by charging them larger fines, and giving them prison time and lashes.
Iranian president Hassan Rouhani has shared his progressive stance on issues such as gender segregation, Facebook, the Internet, and Iran's dress code, telling the Iranian media in July, "If a women or a man does not comply with our rules for clothing, his or her virtue should not come under question … In my view, many women in our society who do not respect our hijab laws are virtuous. Our emphasis should be on the virtue." However, last week, conservative men and women in Tehran staged a protest demanding arrest for women who break the country's dress code. Only time will tell whether women like those in the Stealthy Freedom project can finally bring forth change.
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