From Mahsa Amini to Azerbaijan’s Schoolgirls: Western Media’s Double Standards on the Hijab

Women’s freedom is tested not only when they reject the hijab, but also when they choose it; a consistent rights standard rejects state coercion in both directions and applies equally

The hijab protests in Azerbaijan have brought women’s freedom back into the spotlight from the opposite direction to the events witnessed in Iran in 2022. In Iran, women took to the streets to protest compulsory hijab, while in Azerbaijan, schoolgirls and teachers demonstrated in defence of their right to wear it in schools. In both cases, the central issue was the same: state interference in women’s choices concerning their religious and personal appearance.

Yet the similarity in the fundamental right at stake has not been matched by a comparable level of attention in Western media. In the Iranian case, Mahsa Amini’s death and the issue of compulsory hijab quickly became global news, dominating international news bulletins and platforms for weeks and months before evolving into an international political and human rights issue. In Azerbaijan, by contrast, despite hijab-wearing schoolgirls being barred from attending classes, teachers being asked to remove their hijabs, protests taking place and dozens of people being arrested, the issue received considerably less attention from several major Western media organisations.

This comparison reveals clear double standards in the treatment of women’s freedom. When Iranian women demanded the right to remove the hijab, they were presented as symbols of liberation and resistance to state interference in their personal lives. When Azerbaijani women demanded the right to wear it, however, their choice did not receive the same level of media attention, even though the human rights principle was identical in both cases: women should be able to choose what they wear without political or administrative coercion.

There is no need to assume that centralised instructions or a coordinated editorial conspiracy exist among Western media organisations to explain this disparity. The practical outcome is enough to warrant scrutiny: one right, two women demanding freedom of choice, and two authorities intervening in women’s clothing, yet markedly different levels of media attention and different approaches to framing the issue.

Iran in 2022: When the Hijab Became a Global Issue

In September 2022, the young Iranian woman Mahsa Amini died after being detained over an alleged violation of compulsory hijab rules. Her death sparked widespread protests that spread to dozens of Iranian cities. Initially, the demonstrations focused on women’s freedom and opposition to coercion in the wearing of the hijab, before expanding to encompass broader political and social demands.

From the earliest days, the issue made its way to the forefront of Western media coverage. It was not presented merely as a dispute over dress codes or an administrative matter concerning public order. Instead, it was framed explicitly in terms of women’s rights, fundamental freedoms and resistance to state interference in individual choices.

Major Western media organisations devoted extensive, successive coverage to the issue. Axios, for example, published a series of reports on the protests, internet restrictions, efforts by the US administration to help Iranians circumvent censorship, American sanctions against Iranian officials, and the positions taken by US politicians on the demonstrations. Mahsa Amini was not simply a passing news story in this coverage; she became a recurring symbol of a broader struggle over women’s rights and political freedoms.

The coverage continued weeks after the events began. In late October 2022, Axios was still publishing reports on the protests, the activities of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the crackdown and the victims. This indicates that the attention was not confined to the immediate aftermath of Mahsa Amini’s death, but had developed into an ongoing media and political focus.

Reuters, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian and other outlets also covered developments in the protests, international reactions, killings and arrests, internet restrictions, and the voices of demonstrators. The slogan of women’s freedom became a central element in the narrative surrounding the events.

The Iranian protests spread geographically, continued for an extended period and resulted in hundreds of deaths, according to human rights organisations. They also evolved from an issue associated with the hijab into a protest movement with broader political dimensions, contributing to the intensity and persistence of media coverage. Nevertheless, comparison with the Azerbaijani case reveals disparities in the application of the human rights principle concerning freedom of dress: state interference in Iranian women’s clothing occupied a central place in the coverage, while state interference in Azerbaijani women’s clothing received less prominence and attention from the same media organisations.

Azerbaijan in 2026: Women Demand the Right to Wear the Hijab

Four years later, the Azerbaijani case presented the human rights discourse with the reverse test.

The controversy began after school dress-code rules were amended in September 2026. Although the rules did not explicitly mention the hijab, they prohibited certain items of clothing deemed incompatible with the “principle of secularism” in education. As the rules were implemented, hijab-wearing schoolgirls began to be barred from attending classes, while female teachers were asked to remove their hijabs while at work.

The issue did not remain confined to school procedures. Students and parents took to the streets in protest, male students expressed solidarity with their hijab-wearing classmates, some refused to attend classes, and footage emerged of schoolgirls being denied entry to schools because of their hijabs.

Reports published by Deutsche Welle on 13, 14 and 16 October confirmed that the crisis involved hijab-wearing students and teachers being prevented from attending schools, as well as protests spreading across several areas and involving children and classmates of the affected students. Deutsche Welle described the demonstrations as unprecedented in Azerbaijan and directly linked them to religious freedom and the right to education.

Meduza reported that the new rules were followed by inspections in schools and that hijab-wearing schoolgirls were prevented from attending classes. Protests subsequently broke out in Baku and other cities, before the authorities arrested 37 people on 12 October. Its reports also referred to difficulties accessing social media platforms during the protests.

The issue, therefore, was not merely a theoretical debate over secularism. It became a practical matter concerning students’ right to enter school, teachers’ right to carry out their work, and women’s right to wear clothing they regard as part of their religious observance.

Nevertheless, Azerbaijani schoolgirls did not become global symbols of women’s freedom in the same way that Mahsa Amini and the Iranian protesters became international symbols.

This is where the double standard begins to emerge.

Freedom When the Hijab Is Removed—and Silence When Its Removal Is Imposed

The contradiction becomes clearer when examining how media narratives about the hijab are constructed. In the Iranian case, opposition to compulsory hijab was framed as an issue of freedom and individual rights, and this framing featured prominently in headlines, reports and analysis. In the Azerbaijani case, however, the prohibition of the hijab did not receive the same media prominence, nor was it presented with comparable intensity as state interference in religious practice and personal appearance.

This disparity shows that media coverage does not merely relay facts; it also determines the framework through which an issue is understood. When a state’s prohibition on women removing the hijab is highlighted as a violation of freedom, but that same framework recedes when another state prevents women from wearing it, the standards governing coverage become inconsistent.

In Iran, state intervention to impose the hijab was a central element of the media narrative. In Azerbaijan, state intervention to prohibit the hijab occupied a less prominent position in several reports. The contradiction, therefore, lies not in the nature of the hijab itself, but in the differing ways government intervention is presented according to the political context in which the issue arises.

The double standard in media discourse is evident in the unequal weight given to freedom when the direction of religious practice changes. In one case, it becomes a central and sustained headline; in the other, it recedes into a secondary element within broader political or educational contexts. This disparity in framing and editorial priority is what makes the comparison between Iran and Azerbaijan revealing of clear differences in media treatment.

Double Standards in Setting the News Agenda

Media organisations do not simply report events; they also help determine their international significance. The number of reports, the duration of follow-up coverage, the prominence given to a story, headline wording, the selection of interviewees and the emphasis placed on victims’ testimonies all help determine whether an issue becomes a global concern or remains a limited news story.

In Iran, the hijab was not merely a detail in the reporting. It became part of the central narrative: a woman punished because of her clothing, protests demanding freedom, and an authority using the instruments of the state to impose a particular standard on women.

In Azerbaijan, the reverse picture emerged: schoolgirls were being denied access to education because of their clothing, teachers faced restrictions on their ability to work, and protests called for freedom of belief. Nevertheless, the issue did not attract the same level of attention from several media organisations that had made women’s freedom of dress a central element of their coverage of Iran.

A review of the material examined for this report up to 17 October 2026 indicates that Reuters covered the Azerbaijani issue, while no comparable direct coverage appeared in Axios and The Wall Street Journal among the material reviewed. This contrasted with the extensive and repeated attention these two outlets gave to the Iranian protests, particularly Axios.

The existence of Western reporting on Azerbaijan, including coverage by Deutsche Welle, rules out the claim that the West imposed a complete media blackout. It does not, however, eliminate the double standard. Such a disparity does not mean that a story is entirely absent from the news; it means that the value assigned to the same right differs within the media hierarchy of priorities according to the country and its political context.

When Women’s Rights Become a Selective Concept

The two cases reveal a deeper problem in some patterns of Western media discourse concerning Muslim women.

The hijab is often addressed when it symbolises coercion or repression, while receiving less attention when it shifts from being something imposed on a woman to something she demands the right to practise.

This creates a limited image of Muslim women: their freedom becomes more worthy of media celebration when they abandon a religious practice, but less appealing when they embrace that same practice as a personal choice.

Freedom, however, cannot be defined in this way.

If freedom of belief is to mean anything, it must include the right to believe and not to believe, and to practise or not to practise a religion, within limits that protect the rights of others.

Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights establishes freedom of thought, conscience and religion, including the freedom to manifest and practise one’s religion or belief. Preventing a woman from wearing the hijab therefore requires legal justification and must meet the tests of necessity and proportionality, just as forcing a woman to wear it constitutes interference in her personal sphere. This is the point made in the original text when comparing the cases of Iran and Azerbaijan.

When media coverage treats one aspect of this freedom as a global issue but reduces attention to the other, it moves away from defending the principle of freedom and towards selecting the version of that principle that fits a particular conception of it.

Iran as an Adversary, Azerbaijan as a Partner

Differences in coverage cannot be separated from the international political environment in which media organisations operate.

Iran has been in open confrontation with the United States and Western countries for decades. Its image in Western media is associated with its nuclear programme, sanctions, regional conflict, relations with Israel and domestic policies. Consequently, any large-scale protest inside Iran quickly enters an existing field of political and media attention.

Azerbaijan occupies a different position. It is an important partner in the South Caucasus and maintains economic and security relations with Western countries. It is also significant for energy markets and transport routes, while maintaining close relations with Turkey and Israel. The original text points to these geopolitical differences and their potential impact on how media organisations establish their priorities.

This does not mean that journalists reporting on Azerbaijan receive political instructions to ignore the hijab issue. Media double standards do not necessarily require a direct order or government intervention. They can emerge through the ranking of priorities, the selection of stories, differences in the intensity of follow-up coverage, and decisions about which issues merit treatment as international human rights concerns and which remain local or regional news.

This is what makes the comparison important: it shifts the discussion away from journalists’ intentions and towards the outcomes of media practice itself.

If state interference in Iranian women’s clothing warrants sustained coverage under the banner of freedom, then state interference in Azerbaijani women’s clothing should be assessed by the same standard.

Does Secularism Abolish Religious Freedom?

The Azerbaijani authorities invoke secular education to justify the dress-code rules, but state secularism is one thing; forcing citizens to conceal their beliefs is another.

A secular state, understood in a way that protects pluralism, is expected to remain neutral among citizens rather than make the abandonment of religious appearance a condition for accessing education.

Western media, which have defended individuals’ right to resist state interference in many other cases, are expected to apply the same principle when the individual is a Muslim woman who wears the hijab.

The hijab cannot be treated as evidence of repression when it is imposed, then dismissed as an insignificant detail when it is prohibited. A consistent human rights standard rejects coercion in both directions.

Social Media Fills Part of the Gap

In the face of the limited visibility of the Azerbaijani issue in some major international media organisations, social media platforms became an important arena for circulating footage of students and teachers, sharing reports of the protests and calling for greater attention to the issue.

Discussions on Reddit and other platforms included criticism of what users regarded as insufficient international attention to the rights of hijab-wearing schoolgirls. Some users also challenged the association of the hijab with religious extremism and the distinction between women’s freedom to remove it and their right to retain it. At the same time, differing Azerbaijani views emerged, including criticism of the protests and arguments that the country faced more pressing political and economic problems.

These discussions do not constitute a measure of public opinion, but they show that the perceived disparity in media coverage was not merely a journalistic observation; it had also become part of the wider debate surrounding the events themselves.

From Mahsa Amini to a Hijab-Wearing Student in Baku

Iran in 2022 and Azerbaijan in 2026 are not identical cases. The Iranian protests were broader, longer and more deadly, and they evolved into a major political movement. By contrast, when this comparison was prepared, the Azerbaijani protests were more recent and narrower in scope.

But differences in scale do not invalidate the human rights comparison. The real test of consistency in media discourse is not whether the facts are identical, but whether the principle remains constant despite their differences.

The principle defended by Western coverage in Iran was clear: the state should not impose clothing on a woman against her will.

The same principle logically leads to a clear conclusion in Azerbaijan: the state should not prevent a woman from wearing clothing she chooses for religious reasons, nor should it make abandoning that choice a condition for attending school or carrying out her work.

Nevertheless, the comparison revealed a clear disparity in the level of attention and the extent to which the issue was elevated into an international headline about women’s rights. This is the essence of the double standard.

The issue is not that Western media reported on Iran while never reporting on Azerbaijan. Western outlets did cover events in Azerbaijan, most notably Deutsche Welle, which published several reports on the hijab restrictions and the protests.

The issue is that the freedom that became a global story and a political and human rights symbol in Iran did not receive the same prominence when women’s choices took the opposite direction.