“My Stealthy Freedom” is getting lots of media attention. But the idea of “uncovering-as-freedom” is fraught with historical baggage.
And some women are doing the opposite of these Iranian women. Syahirah describes how “they are not media darlings for pushing the boundaries of personal freedom. Instead, they are terrorists, bad citizens and ungrateful immigrants.
I respect the ‘stealth freedom’ that these Iranian women are searching for. But I fear that the mainstream media, taught to see covering as oppression and uncovering as freedom, is framing this movement as proof that Iranian women will soon need ‘saving’ by Western imperial powers. These powers have already used the veil/hijab/niqab/burqa as a symbol of women’s oppression that justified the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq …
I don’t deny that there are Muslim women or women in Muslim countries who are oppressed. But it is the state, and not a headscarf, that is oppressing them. Freedom is not just being able to feel the wind in your hair, it’s being able to make the choice between covering your hair or letting it free.
Most importantly, I think these Iranian women want to bring to light that freedom is the ability to have a free conscience: free to (not) believe in God, free to speak without fear, free to make choices about their bodies, free to have ambitions for their lives.