The 1975's Matty Healy speaks out in support of the empowerment of women.

The 1975 frontman Matty Healy has taken to his Instagram today to ask fans to "pay attention to the momentum that protest has at the moment and how the mobilisation of so many young people has had such a profound effect on the world already," and that "we need to stand up against ideas that oppress people and ideas that try and separate people, and we need to unify globally as people."

Specifically, Healy has spoken out in support of Yasaman Aryani:

 

 

 

 

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It was International Women’s Day 2019 when Yasaman and her mother took off their headscarves and walked through a women-only train carriage in Tehran, handing out flowers. Yasaman spoke of her hopes for a future when all women would have the freedom to choose what to wear, “me without the hijab and you with the hijab”. After a video of this went viral, Yasaman was arrested and charged with “inciting and facilitating corruption and prostitution" through promoting “unveiling”. After the authorities held Yasaman in solitary confinement and threatened to arrest her family if she didn’t “repent”, they sentenced her to 16 years in prison. She is required to serve 10 years of this sentence. Yasaman’s cruel punishment is part of a wider crackdown on women campaigning against discriminatory forced veiling laws in Iran. The Iranian authorities must not be allowed to rob Yasaman of the best years of her life – simply because she believes women should have the right to choose what they wear. @amnesty

A post shared by matty (@trumanblack) on Nov 10, 2019 at 9:11am PST

Healy has also said via Instagram today that: "Any society that does not put the empowerment of women at the forefront of their agenda is not only shameful it is also ignorant to the fact that a functioning society and economy is dependant on women being empowered. All ideas, nations and institutions that are not empowering women and guaranteeing them an equal role in society must be challenged actively."