Sepideh Rashno, Civil Activist Opposing Mandatory Hijab: Every Individual Must Stand for Their Identity and Personal Life

Sepideh Rashno, a civil activist sentenced to prison, criticized her punishment for opposing mandatory hijab and urged "every individual" to "stand for their identity and personal life." This deprived student emphasized on Friday, August 5, one day before the start of her three years and seven months imprisonment at Evin Prison, that she "did nothing to be considered a criminal, to be erased from the city and streets, to be deprived of education, and even to be imprisoned. However, the hands and feet of evil have penetrated our lives so deeply that our body, identity, and life are considered crimes." She called for an end to this "evil" as soon as possible and noted that "in this evil, we are all criminals and are only recognized as criminals in turn." This civil activist opposing mandatory hijab added: "Society needs every individual to stand for their identity and personal life." Sepideh Rashno, recalling the danger to the "lives and existence" of those sentenced to death, referred to the "No to Execution Tuesdays" campaign by some prisoners who strive to "bring their voice of protest against death sentences to society" through hunger strikes every Tuesday and to continue this campaign to "bring society along with themselves and humanity." This writer's message supporting optional hijab on Instagram received widespread attention, garnering over 33,000 approvals from followers within an hour of its publication. Meanwhile, the American PEN Association criticized the summons of Sepideh Rashno to prison and urged writers to condemn the "unjust imprisonment" of this dissident writer and dozens of imprisoned writers in the Iranian government's detention centers. Sepideh Rashno's sentence of three years and seven months relates to her case in 2022. In July 2022, she was arrested and sentenced to imprisonment after protesting against "mandatory hijab" and resisting the interventions of a "morality police" woman regarding her attire on a bus. Sepideh Rashno: The Islamic Republic, like any other totalitarian regime, is extremely afraid of narrators.