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People sharing their photos from ten years ago and today under the hashtag #10yearchallenge put a spotlight on the struggle of women who abandon their headscarves.
One of them is Büşra Cebeci, a journalist and a former intern for bianet. She made a series of articles and interviews for bianet entitled “The Changing Journey of the Struggle for Headscarf”, reviewing struggles of women who cover their hair in the 1990s, the obstacles they face in education and working life and struggle of women who wanted to abandon their headscarves.
In the first article, which was published almost a year ago, she said,
“In this series of articles, we will read about the solidarity of women who cover their hair by their own will and women who abandon their headscarves, respect for different identities and equality.
“Is the headscarf, which has been debated for years, a “problem” of women or male politics?
“Now women have their say…”
It has been almost one year and the #10yearchallenge hashtag, under which people share their photos from 10 years ago and today has become a campaign for women who abandoned their headscarves.
Whereas the viral campaign was started by Hollywood celebrities for effect, it gained a political dimension in Turkey. In their tweets, people mentioned rising costs of living, destruction of the environment or politicians who say the exact opposite of what they said 10 years ago.
But the thing that got most attention was the tweets of women who abandoned their headscarves. These posts also draw criticism as much as support.
Journalist Büşra Cebeci supported the campaign with a tweet saying, “I couldn’t help myself, I am here too.
Another journalist, Mine G. Kırıkkanat, made a comment evocative of a conspiracy theory, which raised controversy. She said, “May I have my followers’ attention: The young ladies who pretend to give up on being covered for a while now, in my opinion, are a manipulation of Fetoists* or Adnanists**. Maybe I’m wrong, but I say, be sceptical.”
Büşra Cebeci replied Kırıkkanat, saying, “I am 25 years old and pulled out many stories from this topic, which draws my interest. I wish that you would also have followed the topic instead of targeting people as Fetoists or Adnanists from your armchair. Should we teach you about this profession?”
The You Will Not Walk Alone Platform
Some of the women also mentioned the @yalniz_yurume account and the yalnizyurume.com website in their tweets. The website, title of which means "you will not walk alone", publishes stories of women who removed their headscarves.
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What did women say?
Here are some tweets of the women who stated they abandoned their headscarves, sometimes using the hashtags #1yearchallenge and #10yearschallenge as well:
“Both covering and removing covers were my own decisions"
“Both covering and removing covers were my own decisions. Some women find themselves by covering, some by removing the covers. I was myself in both ways. Please let the women go! Not #10yearschallenge, but we can say 3 years.”
“We refuse to live by identities which we are belonged to”
“Nobody can live with two identities. Because of this, we don’t have to have the identities that our families and our society chose for us. We refuse to live by identities which we are not belonged to. Debating and questioning this situation is beyond the pale.”
“I am still in a struggle”
I always smile but life is not a bed of roses for me. Who struggled for the headscarf was me, then who struggled for eights years to remove my headscarf was me again.
“All my covered photos are passport photographs”
“I am 10 years old in this picture! At the elementary school age. All my covered photos are passport photographs because I believed having my photograph taken was haram.”
“You will understand what we succeeded”
“You shall understand what we have succeeded. You shall understand how the women fought the authority.”
“Have a blessed Friday”
"Have a blessed Friday."
“I can never fall behind”
"I can never fall behind."
*We got permission from the people who posted the tweets. (HK/VK)
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* Followers of Fethullah Gülen, who is allegedly behind the coup attempt on July 15, 2016.
** Followers of Adnan Oktar, a religious cult leader jailed for charges such as “forming an organization to commit an offence”, “sexual assault”, “military and political espionage”.
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