After a months-long pause, Iran’s dreaded modesty squads are back on the job of policing women’s dress. Many Iranian men are quietly asking themselves and one another a question that goes something like this: “Suppose you’re walking down the street with your hijab-less wife, girlfriend, friend, classmate, or sister. The morality police suddenly confront you, giving your companion a warning, or worse. What will you say or not say? Will you stand up for your partner?”

Distilled into one sentence, the oft-repeated question translates from Persian nearly word for word as follows: “When that time comes, Iranian man, will you be a hero, or will you be yellow?”

The death last September of a young woman named Mahsa Amini in the custody of Iran’s morality police sparked an inferno of rage over issues both related and seemingly distant: ethnic and sexual discrimination, corruption, economic and climate mismanagement—all avoidable indignities in a country with astounding reserves of natural resources and a highly educated population.

The regime met the public outpouring with violence, arrests, and executions throughout the fall of 2022. And yet, the confrontation changed the human face of cities across Iran. Walk today in comparatively well-to-do quarters of Tehran, the capital, such as Karim Khan, Valiasr Street, and Vanak Square; or peek inside the theaters, cafés, and malls of Iranian cities all across the country; and you’ll notice that more than the hijab has been discarded. The actual volume of cloth on women’s bodies appears to be diminishing. Skin is in.

A change as visible as this one is a first in the life of the Islamic Republic, and in a sense, the regime allowed it by choosing not to enact a ferocious end game to shut it down. The same regime, after all, cut off past periods of turmoil, such as those in the summer of 2009 and the fall of 2019, by thoroughly quashing dissent. By contrast, the rebellion of 2022 produced what Persian speakers like to call a khoruji, or “exit,” though what it really connotes is “results.”

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https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2023/08/morality-police-iran-women/674927/