Women in Iran Are Rebelling Against the Compulsory Hijab Law

VICE – July 11th 2022

By : Mohammed Rasool

Women across Iran are defying the rule that says they must cover their hair in public, posting videos of themselves removing their hijabs in protest against the country’s hardline president.

President Ebrahim Raisi, a cleric supported by the country’s very conservative religious elite, described the recent backlash of mostly young people to the hijab law as “an organised promotion of moral corruption in Islamic society.”

The authorities are cracking down on the rebellion and plan to celebrate “Hijab and Chastity” day on Tuesday. The events will include a rally in Azadi Stadium, a large football stadium in Tehran, to encourage women to follow the hijab rule.

The Iranian security forces have stepped up their moral policing patrols across Iran to reinforce the strict dress code in recent months, and many women are rebelling against the stricter rules.

The law in Iran requires women to wear a head covering, but the restrictions vary from one administration to the next, depending on the political background of the incumbent president.

Some regions are more liberal than others, with women in the religious Mashhad and Qom provinces tightly monitored while those in Tehran or Shiraz can often get away without wearing a full head covering.

Since Raisi’s victory last year, more restrictive guidance has been introduced, and officials have given directives to refuse “badly veiled” women into government offices, banks, and public transport.

Iranian women have followed the Islamic hijab rule for the past four decades, since it was mandated after the Islamic Revolution in 1979. People have found ways around the limitation of the laws to wear colourful fabric and show some of their hair. Religious scholars have long been concerned about this, saying they are breaching the Islamic republic’s principles of “chastity and hijab” guidance.

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