DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — On the streets of Iranian cities, it’s becoming more common to see a woman passing by without a mandatory headscarf, or hijab, as the second anniversary of the death of Mahsa Amini and the mass protests it sparked approaches.

There’s no government official or study acknowledging the phenomenon, which began as Iran entered its hot summer months and power cuts in its overburdened electrical system became common. But across social media, videos of people filming neighborhood streets or just talking about a normal day in their life, women and girls can be seen walking past with their long hair out over their shoulders, particularly after sunset.

This defiance comes despite what United Nations investigators describe as “expanded repressive measures and policies” by Iran’s theocracy to punish them — though there’s been no recent catalyzing event like Amini’s death to galvanize demonstrators.

The country’s new reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian campaigned on a promise to halt the harassment of women by morality police. But the country’s ultimate authority remains the 85-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who in the past said “unveiling is both religiously forbidden and politically forbidden.”

For some observant Muslim women, the head covering is a sign of piety before God and modesty in front of men outside their families. In Iran, the hijab — and the all-encompassing black chador worn by some — has long been a political symbol as well.

“Meaningful institutional changes and accountability for gross human rights violations and crimes under international law, and crimes against humanity, remains elusive for victims and survivors, especially for women and children,” warned a U.N. fact-finding mission on Iran on Friday.

Amini, 22, died on Sept. 16, 2022, in a hospital after her arrest by the country’s morality police over allegedly not wearing her hijab to the liking of the authorities. The protests that followed Amini’s death started first with the chant “Women, Life, Freedom.” However, the protesters’ cries soon grew into open calls of revolt against Khamenei.

A monthslong security crackdown that followed killed more than 500 people and saw over 22,000 detained.

Today, passersby on the streets of Tehran, whether its tony northern suburbs for the wealthy or the working-class neighborhoods of the capital’s southern reaches, now routinely see women without the hijab. It particularly starts at dusk, though even during the daylight on weekends women can be seen with their hair uncovered at major parks.

Online videos — specifically a sub-genre showing walking tours of city streets for those in rural areas or abroad who want to see life in the bustling neighborhoods of Tehran — include women without the hijab.

Something that would have stopped a person in their tracks in the decades follwing the 1979 Islamic Revolution now goes unacknowledged.

“My quasi-courage for not wearing scarves is a legacy of Mahsa Amini and we have to protect this as an achievement,” said a 25-year-old student at Tehran Sharif University, who gave only her first name Azadeh out of fear of reprisal. “She could be at my current age if she did not pass away.”

The disobedience still comes with risk. Months after the protests halted, Iranian morality police returned to the streets.

There have been scattered videos of women and young girls being roughed up by officers in the time since. In 2023, a teenage Iranian girl was injured in a mysterious incident on Tehran’s Metro while not wearing a headscarf and later died in hospital. In July, activists say police opened fire on a woman fleeing a checkpoint in an attempt to avoid her car being impounded for her not wearing the hijab.

Meanwhile, the government has targeted private businesses where women are seen without their headscarves. Surveillance cameras search for women uncovered in vehicles to fine and impound their cars. The government has gone as far as use aerial drones to monitor the 2024 Tehran International Book Fair and Kish Island for uncovered women, the U.N. said.

Yet some feel the election of Pezeshkian in July, after a helicopter crash killed Iranian hard-line President Ebrahim Raisi in May, is helping ease tensions over the hijab.

“I think the current peaceful environment is part of the status after Pezeshkian took office,” said Hamid Zarrinjouei, a 38-year-old bookseller. “In some way, Pezeshkian could convince powerful people that more restrictions do not necessarily make women more faithful to the hijab.”

On Wednesday, Iran’s Prosecutor General Mohammad Movahedi Azad warned security forces about starting physical altercations over the hijab.

“We prosecuted violators, and we will,” Movahedi Azad said, according to Iranian media. “Nobody has right to have improper attitude even though an individual commits an offense.”

While the government isn’t directly addressing the increase in women not wearing hijabs, there are other signs of a recognition the political landscape has shifted. In August, authorities dismissed a university teacher a day after he appeared on state television and dismissively referred to Amini as having “croaked.”

Meanwhile, the pre-reform newspaper Ham Mihan reported in August on an unpublished survey conducted under the supervision of Iran’s Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance that found the hijab had become one of the most important issues in the country — something it hadn’t seen previously.

“This issue has been on people’s minds more than ever before,” sociologist Simin Kazemi told the newspaper.

___

Associated Press writers Nasser Karimi and Amir Vahdat in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report.

If you’re looking for the Wordle answer for September 14, 2024 read on. We’ll share some clues, tips, and strategies, and finally the solution. Today’s puzzle is easier; I got it in four. Beware, there are spoilers below for September 14, Wordle #1,183! Keep scrolling if you want some hints (and then the answer) to today’s Wordle game.

How to play Wordle

Wordle lives here on the New York Times website. A new puzzle goes live every day at midnight, your local time.

Start by guessing a five-letter word. The letters of the word will turn green if they’re correct, yellow if you have the right letter in the wrong place, or gray if the letter isn’t in the day’s secret word at all. For more, check out our guide to playing Wordle here, and my strategy guide here for more advanced tips. (We also have more information at the bottom of this post, after the hints and answers.)

Ready for the hints? Let’s go!

Does today’s Wordle have any unusual letters?

We’ll define common letters as those that appear in the old typesetters’ phrase ETAOIN SHRDLU. (Memorize this! Pronounce it “Edwin Shirdloo,” like a name, and pretend he’s a friend of yours.)

They’re almost all common letters from our mnemonic today! Only one isn’t, and it’s fairly common.

Can you give me a hint for today’s Wordle?

Not narrow.

Does today’s Wordle have any double or repeated letters?

There are no repeated letters today. 

How many vowels are in today’s Wordle?

There are two vowels.

What letter does today’s Wordle start with?

Today’s word starts with B. 

What letter does today’s Wordle end with?

Today’s word ends with D. 

What is the solution to today’s Wordle?

Ready? Today’s word is BROAD.

How I solved today’s Wordle

I started with RAISE and TOUCH followed by BLOND, which made it clear that BROAD was the solution.

Wordle 1,183 4/6

🟨🟨⬛⬛⬛
⬛🟨⬛⬛⬛
🟩⬛🟩⬛🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Yesterday’s Wordle answer

Yesterday’s Wordle was easier. The hint was “jarring to the senses” and the answer contained all common letters.

The answer to yesterday’s Wordle was HARSH.

A primer on Wordle basics

The idea of Wordle is to guess the day’s secret word. When you first open the Wordle game, you’ll see an empty grid of letters. It’s up to you to make the first move: type in any five-letter word. 

Now, you can use the colors that are revealed to get clues about the word: Green means you correctly guessed a letter, and it’s in the correct position. (For example, if you guess PARTY, and the word is actually PURSE, the P and R will be green.)

• Yellow means the letter is somewhere in the word, but not in the position you guessed it. (For example, if you guessed PARTY, but the word is actually ROAST, the R, A and T will all be yellow.)

• Gray means the letter is not in the solution word at all. (If you guessed PARTY and everything is gray, then the solution cannot be PURSE or ROAST.)

With all that in mind, guess another word, and then another, trying to land on the correct word before you run out of chances. You get six guesses, and then it’s game over.

The best starter words for Wordle

What should you play for that first guess? The best starters tend to contain common letters, to increase the chances of getting yellow and green squares to guide your guessing. (And if you get all grays when guessing common letters, that’s still excellent information to help you rule out possibilities.) There isn’t a single “best” starting word, but the New York Times’s Wordle analysis bot has suggested starting with one of these:

• CRANE

• TRACE

• SLANT

• CRATE

• CARTE

Meanwhile, an MIT analysis found that you’ll eliminate the most possibilities in the first round by starting with one of these:

• SALET

• REAST

• TRACE

• CRATE

• SLATE

Other good picks might be ARISE or ROUND. Words like ADIEU and AUDIO get more vowels in play, but you could argue that it’s better to start with an emphasis on consonants, using a starter like RENTS or CLAMP. Choose your strategy, and see how it plays out.

How to win at Wordle

We have a few guides to Wordle strategy, which you might like to read over if you’re a serious student of the game. This one covers how to use consonants to your advantage, while this one focuses on a strategy that uses the most common letters. In this advanced guide, we detail a three-pronged approach for fishing for hints while maximizing your chances of winning quickly.

The biggest thing that separates Wordle winners from Wordle losers is that winners use their guesses to gather information about what letters are in the word. If you know that the word must end in -OUND, don’t waste four guesses on MOUND, ROUND, SOUND, and HOUND; combine those consonants and guess MARSH. If the H lights up in yellow, you know the solution.

One more note on strategy: the original Wordle used a list of about 2,300 solution words, but after the game was bought by the NYT, the game now has an editor who hand-picks the solutions. Sometimes they are slightly tricky words that wouldn’t have made the original list, and sometimes they are topical. For example, FEAST was the solution one Thanksgiving. So keep in mind that there may be a theme.

Wordle alternatives

If you can’t get enough of five-letter guessing games and their kin, the best Wordle alternatives, ranked by difficulty, include:

• Wheeldle, which lets you play one puzzle after another

• Dordle and Quordle, which ask you to play two (Dordle) or four (Quordle) puzzles at the same time, with the same guesses. There is also Octordle, with eight puzzles, and Sedecordle, with 16.

• Waffle, which shows you several five-letter words, scrambled in a grid; you play by swapping the letters around until you solve.

• Absurdle, which changes the solution after each guess, but needs to stay consistent with its previous feedback. You have to strategically back it into a corner until there is only one possible word left; then you guess it, and win.

• Squabble, in which you play Wordle against other people with a timer running. You take damage if you spend too much time between guesses; winner is the last one standing.

• Antiwordle, in which you are trying not to guess the day’s solution. You’re required to reuse any letters that you (oops) guessed correctly, so the longer it takes you, the better you are at the game.

Aaron Judge brought Yankee Stadium to its feet on Friday night with a single swing of the bat. 

The Yankee captain and former MVP came up with the bases loaded and no one in the bottom of the seventh inning. The Yankees trailed the Boston Red Sox 4-1. 

Then Judge crushed a 2-0 pitch to deep right field for the type of home run that the crowd knows is gone before it leaves the infield. It gave the Yankees a 5-4 lead. The Yankees held the lead to win, taking the first two games of the series against Boston and extending their lead in the AL East over the Baltimore Orioles by three games. 

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The Yankee Stadium crowd erupted to one of its loudest cheers of the year, as the fans celebrated their star player’s big moment over their hated rival. 

For Judge, the grand slam actually broke one of his rare home run droughts. Going into Friday night’s game Judge had not hit a home run in 16 straight games, which was the longest stretch of his career without one. It’s a stretch that came amid, arguably, Judge’s best hitting season yet. 

EX-YANKEES INFIELDER TYLER AUSTIN SUFFERS FREAK INJURY WITH JAPANESE CLUB

With the grand slam in hand, Judge collected the 52nd home run of the season, improving his average to .321 with a 1.143 OPS and 130 RBI. 

But before Friday, hfter he hit two home runs against the Colorado Rockies on Aug. 26, the six-time All-Star is hitting .204 (11 for 54) with 22 strikeouts in his net 15 games.

The prior longest homerless streak of Judge’s career came during his rookie season, when he did not leave the yard in 15 games from Aug. 17 through Sept. 2 in 2017. 

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Before his current drought, Judge was on a torrid pace, hitting nine home runs over 10 prior games, making people wonder if he had a chance to break his own American League record for most home runs in a season that he set in 2022 with 62 home runs. 

Still Judge is currently in the driver’s seat to win his second American League MVP award in three years. 

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