My Stealthy Freedom

My Stealthy Freedom is an online movement that was commenced by a London-based journalist Masih Alinejad.[1] This movement started from a Facebook page My Stealthy Freedom where women from Iran post their photos without scarfs,[2] as Iranian women have to cover their hair in public according to local Islamic dress code.[3] This rule was forced after the Iranian revolution in 1979.[4]

The campaign's Facebook page has received 500,000 likes in less than one month.[5]

Alinejad's view

Alinejad said she is not leading a battle against the headscarf. She affirmed that she wants to support the right for individual women to be able to choose whether they want Hijab.[6]

"It's a place where male and female Iranians with different opinions can meet and talk about how they feel, think and what they do in private. They don't have to be afraid of censorship, like in the Iranian public sphere. It makes them brave to see that they are not alone with their thoughts and actions", she described her page.[7]

Conservatives' reaction

State TV

Iranian state broadcaster (IRIB) reported[8][9] that Alinejad, who left Iran after the 2009 Presidential election, was assaulted, stripped naked, and gang-raped[10] in London in the presence of her son. The claim was denied by Alinejad.[11]

Clerics

Kazem Sedighi, a prominent cleric who delivers Friday prayer in Tehran, criticized “corrupt messages circulating on the internet and getting through to Iranian families” and “instances in which headscarves had been taken off”.[12]

Websites

Vahid Yaminpour, an Iranian commentator and TV personality, shared a critical message in his Google Plus. “Masih Alinejad is a whore, and not a heretic as some people claim her to be,” Yaminpour wrote also on his Facebook page. “We shouldn’t elevate her to the level of a heretic. She’s just trying to compensate her psychological (and probably financial) needs by recruiting young women and sharing her notoriety with younger women who are still not prostitutes.” [13] A conservative website Raja news called the movement as an obvious insulation against Islam and Marja'. The author concluded that because of these kinds of contents, Facebook must remain banned.[14] Another website, Nedaye Enghelab (Call of the Revolution), published a cartoon which depicted two pigs wearing flags of United States and Great Britain. The cartoon was titled "Members of Stealthy Freedom Campaign".[15]

Women's rights award

In 2015 the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy gave Alinejad its women's rights award for "giving a voice to the voiceless and stirring the conscience of humanity to support the struggle of Iranian women for basic human rights, freedom and equality."[16]

Many Iranian men have also supported My Stealthy Freedom, appearing in photos with women who are not wearing a hijab.[16]

References

  1. ↑ Iranian Women Discard Their Hijabs On Masih Alinejad's 'My Stealthy Freedom' Facebook Page Huffington Post
  2. ↑ Iran Facebook Page Wants Women Lashed for Unveiled Photographs Bloomberg
  3. ↑ Iranian women post pictures of themselves without hijabs on Facebook The Guardian
  4. ↑ Women shed hijabs for 'Stealthy Freedoms' Facebook page Washington Post
  5. ↑ Get it off, put it on: A culture war over the wearing of the veil may be hotting up, Economist
  6. ↑ ‘Stealthy Freedoms of Iranian Women’ Campaign Gains Steam Interview with ABC News
  7. ↑ No hijab: an Iranian journalist offers women a stealthy freedom on Facebook Deutsche Welle
  8. ↑ Iranian State TV: Alinejad gang-raped Aparat (in Persian)
  9. ↑ Iranian State TV: Alinejad gang-raped Youtube (in Persian)
  10. ↑ Iranian journalist faces threats, false report of rape after viral Facebook success Washington Post
  11. ↑ Iranian State Television Faked My Rape Time
  12. ↑ Iran Conservatives Hit Back at Facebook Campaign on Headscarves Bloomberg
  13. ↑ Iranian Journalist Denounced as ‘Whore’ Amid Women’s Rights Campaign ABC News
  14. ↑ Stealthy freedom and insulation against Islam Raja News (in Persian)
  15. ↑ Members of Stealthy Freedom Campaign Nedaye Enghelab (in Persian)
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 Dehghan, Saeed Kamali (24 February 2015). "Iranian woman wins rights award for hijab campaign". The Guardian. Retrieved 27 February 2015.