The streets of Iran look much different than they did a year ago, when news of Jîna Mahsa Amini’s death sparked women-led protests throughout the country. In defiance of the Islamic Republic, women now walk around with headscarves, unmarried couples hold hands, and men wear make-up, according to a new report from the BBC. After morality police demanded one woman veil herself, she told them, “Screw you!”

One diplomat in Tehron told the BBC that an estimated 20% of Iranian women are currently defying the mandatory hijab law. In the wealthier northern Tehran, they said, the numbers are even higher.

But the diplomat cautions that the movement is not just confined to affluent enclaves. He told the BBC, "It's a generational thing much more than a geographical thing… it's not just your bright educated people, it's basically any young person with a smartphone… so that's what takes you right out into the villages, and all over."

The “Women, Life, Freedom” protests, as they’ve come to be known, have given Iranian women the chance to live life on their own terms, despite the risks.

“Things have changed so much since last year,” a music student in Tehran told the BBC. “I still can't believe the things I now have the courage to do. We've become so much bolder and braver.”

Iranian authorities are attempting to crack down on this behavior by installing surveillance cameras to identify women who break the headscarf law. Offenders can be fined, imprisoned, or stopped from entering public places, and their cars can be impounded. As of May, over 2,000 businesses have been shut down for serving women without hijabs.

But even in the face of serious punishment, the women of Iran are hopeful that their resistance will create a better world.

“I don’t want my daughter to be under the same ideologic pressures that I and my generation lived through,” said Sorayya, an Iranian woman who doesn’t wear a hijab, to PBS NewsHour. “This is for a better future for my daughter.”

Amini’s father was allegedly detained Saturday, exactly 1 year after his daughter died in the custody of Iran’s morality police. After a few hours, he was released, though his son was warned against encouraging people to gather in Amini’s memory. Iranian authorities have denied detaining him.

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By KENADEE MANGUS