Note: Why the 'Girls of Revolution Street' Movement Cannot Be Defeated

The movement that Vida Mohammadi started in the first week of December 2017 on Revolution Street has been followed by brave women like Narges Hosseini in the next wave and is gradually spreading across the country. The Tehran police announced on February 1 that they had arrested 29 people, which indicates that hundreds have participated in this movement throughout the city. Photos and videos from Shiraz, Isfahan, and other cities also show the spread of this spark in the provinces. Besides women and girls who stand with their headscarves on a stick in the square and streets, dozens of women have been reported moving without hijab in the streets, alleys, and shopping centers in Tehran after the snow in February 2018. Will this movement stop with the arrests that have been made, or will it continue and expand? All existing realities indicate that the internal and international conditions are suitable for the expansion of this movement: 1. Public Acceptance. People passing by girls without hijab standing at electricity stations or high platforms or curbs in Iranian cities view this act not as something against the norm or ethics (contrary to the officials' claims that they are promoting sin) but as a courageous act. In none of the dozens of cases reported so far has there been a negative reaction to these girls in various cities across the country; 2. Diversity of Participants. The diversity of women participating in this movement ranges from a mother with a child in her arms to an elderly woman over eighty, from teenage girls to older women, all with dignity and grace, making it very difficult for the security and police forces to treat them violently. Clerics who usually engage in promoting virtue and preventing vice are very likely to avoid this issue because they know the possibility of a severe backlash from the public exists. While it may have been easy for officials to label the killing of Syrian children as a 'Daesh' act, they cannot so easily destroy an Iranian woman with a child in her arms with barrel bombs. Hiring forces from Afghan, Pakistani, and Lebanese Shiites to suppress this movement is also very difficult. 3. Suitable International Context. We no longer live in the 1980s where Basij forces could carry out their ugly acts without global scrutiny. The Islamic Republic is still paying the price for the global consensus against it following the publication of Neda Agha Soltan's footage a few years after the Green Movement. They know that any small action they take is recorded by people's mobile phones and exposed to billions. The government understands that in this issue—unlike its anti-American and anti-Israeli policies—European and American leftists cannot align themselves with them under the banner of anti-imperialism and identity politics. In February 2018, photos of these brave women and girls appeared in various newspapers, magazines, and news websites. A brave Iranian woman driving without hijab responded to Ali Motahari's claim that there were only four protesters against compulsory hijab, and a few hours later, hundreds of thousands saw her on social media; 4. Normalization of Not Wearing Hijab. In 2016, over nine million Iranians traveled abroad. Even if we assume that one million of them were women who went abroad and appeared in the streets without hijab (a minimal and acceptable estimate), this indicates a very high capacity of young women for whom being in the streets and alleys without hijab is an experienced matter, and they only need to overcome the element of fear. Iranian women over 50 have practically seen or experienced not wearing hijab in their country until 1979. The rulers of the Islamic Republic have belatedly realized the need to increase exit fees to reduce these travels. Tying women's foreign travel to the permission of male family members has also had little impact on preventing women's foreign travel. In addition to traveling abroad, Iranian women see women from all over the world (except Saudi Arabia and Iran) without compulsory hijab in the streets, workplaces, and daily life on their cell phones from morning till night, allowing them to feel the abnormality of their situation. The government and Shiite clerics, in their insistence on compulsory hijab, are like Don Quixote, fighting windmills with their wooden sword, lame horse, and rusty armor. 5. No Cost. The participants in this movement have a clear and specific demand that does not conflict with the election of any individual in Iran and does not impose a cost on citizens or the government: the abolition of compulsory hijab. This action, of course, must start from the streets in a country where the rulers want to impose their desires on everyone by force, and reformist groups consider this demand secondary and unimportant (they oppose overthrow and do not accept reform). 6. Easy Interpretation of Religion Without Compulsory Hijab. In Islamic law, there is no compulsory hijab. This is a construct of 'totalitarian Islamism.' The Sharia addresses the believing Muslim woman, not the entire society or country. On the other hand, Iranian women know that when clerics cannot impose an issue by force, they will find new verses and hadiths for the new situation (like 'there is no compulsion in religion'). Unlike other demands, the members of the religious and military bureaucracy and their propaganda horns cannot fabricate strange consequences like the disintegration of the country or civil war for this movement. 7. Changes in Neighboring Countries. Developments in Saudi Arabia have shown Iranian women, who were ahead in gaining their rights until 1979, that the global and regional conditions are suitable for their movement. When a few Saudi women challenged the baseless driving restrictions for women and a few months later the crown prince officially lifted it, Iranian women, who do not see themselves as lesser, are encouraged to take to the streets. Photos of Saudi women in stadiums must also have been envied by Iranian women. 8. The Possibility of Joining All Social Classes. The uprising of December 2017 primarily belonged to small towns and the low-income class, while the urban middle class was hesitant to join. However, the denial of compulsory hijab is a concern for both low-income classes and a demand of middle and upper classes. Even some daughters of military, security, and political officials have intellectual sympathy for this movement, and if their fear is alleviated, they will join. 9. The Extent of the Oppressed. The scale of women and girls who have been suppressed for enforcing compulsory hijab over the past four decades is in the tens of millions. According to the statistics of the social deputy of the police force, in 2013, this force issued warnings to two million and 917 women for bad hijab, referred 18 thousand and 81 to judicial authorities, and as a result, obtained written commitments from 207 thousand and 53 women with bad hijab. The statistics for individual cities in this regard are not available, but in Qom, as the most important base of Shiite clerics, in 2010, 62 thousand women were warned to observe hijab (without a clear timeframe). As a result of an anti-bad hijab campaign in one month, tens of thousands of women were arrested in 10 provinces, and tens of thousands more received warnings. The Islamic Republic has been creating a massive potential for protesting against compulsory hijab for forty years, and one day it will have to witness the activation of this capacity. Humiliation is not something that people forget. 10. Fragmentation Among Government Supporters. Religious reformists were almost unanimously opposed to the December 2017 uprising (some, like Abbas Abdi and the Combatant Clergy Association, opposed it like the police of dictatorial regimes, while others took a calmer tone), but they are divided on this movement: some have supported it (like Tajzadeh), some have remained silent, and others have explicitly opposed it (like Fatemeh Rakeei). However, none of them have called for the severe suppression of this movement. The Attorney General and police officials have few allies for severe repression in this case. Describing the movement as 'childish' and 'emotional' and labeling the brave Iranian women as 'ignorant' and 'deceived' and deeming their movement insignificant (Attorney General), calling them 'deceived' (Tehran police), and claiming their numbers are few (Ali Motahari) indicates that the authorities' hands are tied in repression and they are only forced to humiliate. A full-fledged social movement against compulsory hijab or unveiling is not a blind rebellion or a temporary movement but a full-fledged social movement for four reasons: 1) Historical Precedent. Just weeks after the fall of the Pahlavi regime in 1979, hundreds of thousands of women protested against compulsory hijab and other restrictions that clerics and Islamists wanted to impose on them; the government imposed hijab on them only through naked force and legalized it after five years of repression; 2) Theoretical Backing. For four decades, dozens of books, thousands of articles, and tens of thousands of notes, along with thousands of letters and verbal and behavioral expressions have been presented in denial of compulsory hijab by Iranian men and women. This movement is not a spontaneous uprising without theoretical and behavioral backing; 3) Core Demand. This movement has a clear demand. Women want to decide about their own clothing; and 4) Campaigns and Practical Expressions of Opposition. Before appearing without hijab in the streets, Iranian women expressed their opposition to compulsory hijab in campaigns like 'Secret Freedoms' or 'White Wednesdays,' and Iranian men opposed it with a campaign for hijab after the arrest of Majid Tavakoli in 2009. Millions of Iranian women have also published their photos without hijab on internet sites and social media. The younger generation of Iranian women, who mostly believe in personal choice (and this includes some women who believe in hijab), will continue their struggle until they have the right to choose their attire, and no bayonet, club, insult, humiliation, or acts of terror can deter them from this movement.