France: Oscar winners reduce off their hair for Iran protesters

Oscar-winning actors Marion Cotillard and Juliette Binoche, in addition to different French display and music stars, filmed themselves chopping off locks of their hair in a video posted Wednesday in help of protesters in Iran.

“For freedom,” Binoche stated as she hacked a big handful of hair off the highest of her head with a pair of scissors, earlier than brandishing it in entrance of the digicam.

The video, hashtagged HairForFreedom, comes with Iran engulfed by anti-government protests.

They have been sparked by the loss of life of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after her arrest for allegedly violating the Islamic Republic’s strict costume code.

Some of the Iranian demonstrators have publicly hacked off locks of hair on the protests, and the gesture has unfold.

Images of girls elsewhere reducing their hair to indicate solidarity with Iranian girls have gone viral — from Turkish singer Melek Mosso on stage final week, to girls in Lebanon and Syria, to Swedish lawmaker Abir Al-Sahlanion within the halls of the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Tuesday.

A museum in Rome is gathering locks of hair to current to the Iranian Embassy.

“For women to cut their hair in Iran is a form of protest … a symbol to stand against the mandatory hijab,” stated Dorna Javan, an Iranian political scientist primarily based in France and specialised in Iran.

Such a visible gesture is a means for ladies internationally to rally across the Iranian girls’s plight, she added.

The video of Cotillard, Binoche and dozens of different girls reducing off locks of their hair was launched on an Instagram account, “soutienfemmesiran” — which interprets as “support women in Iran.”

“These women, these men are asking for our support. Their courage and their dignity obliges us,” stated a put up with the video.

“We have decided to respond to the appeal made to us by cutting — us too — some of these locks.” Some of the opposite girls who took half included actors Charlotte Rampling and Charlotte Gainsbourg, who was additionally filmed reducing off a lock of hair from the top of her mom, singer Jane Birkin.

This extremely symbolic gesture additionally echoes Iranian historical past and folklore through which for ladies to cut their hair is an indication of protest.

The Shahnameh (“The Book of Kings”), a nationwide epic of Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan written by the Persian poet Ferdowsi between 977 and 1010 A.D., refers to a princess chopping her hair to protest in opposition to the loss of life of her husband seen as unfair.

“Women cutting their hair is an ancient Persian tradition also found in the Shahnameh, when the fury is stronger than the power of the oppressor,” tweeted Shara Atashi, an Iranian author primarily based in Wales.

Researcher Javan described it as a “benevolent gesture,” and referred to as for extra sturdy political motion from the worldwide group to help Iranian protesters.

“We can’t reduce the fight of Iranian women for their rights — which dates back to the second half of the 19th century — to the gesture of cutting their hair,” she stated.

“But these viral videos are a way to give an international impact to their fight.”