The footage is brief but revealing. A player from Iran’s women’s national team is taken by the wrist and steered toward the team bus in Australia as the squad prepares to leave, days after several teammates slipped away to seek asylum. What looks like a simple travel scene is, in reality, a snapshot of life under a regime that treats female athletes less as representatives of their country and more as hostages of the state. 

The backstory matters. Iran’s women’s team, the Lionesses, had already defied expectations by remaining silent during the national anthem at the Asian Cup and skipping it entirely before their first match. In a free country, silent protest is routine. In the Islamic Republic, it is branded treason. State television figures went on air to label these women “traitors during wartime” and called for them to be dealt with “more strictly” when they return. That is not sports commentary. That is an open threat.

At least five players chose not to test Tehran’s idea of “stricter” justice. They slipped away from the team with the help of Australian authorities and have now been granted humanitarian visas and moved to a safe house. Others, apparently under pressure or fearful for family back home, reversed course after speaking with teammates and officials and boarded for the journey back toward the Islamic Republic. Outside, protesters in Australia surrounded buses and hotels, chanting “save our girls” while police held back the crowd and escorted the team under guard.

To understand what these women are fleeing, you have to understand how the regime treats them the moment they put on a uniform. Every appearance in public requires a compulsory hijab and strict adherence to state-approved “modesty” rules, enforced not only by coaches and federation officials but by morality-police patrols and other security authorities. Under Iranian law and practice, a player who appears unveiled or “improperly” dressed in public can face arrest, fines, or prison—and in some cases punishments that have included flogging. Those punishments are not theoretical. Iranians have watched women and girls beaten, detained, and in some cases die after encounters with authorities enforcing the same dress codes.

The current conflict and wartime rhetoric only make their position more dangerous. When state media calls them wartime traitors for refusing to sing an anthem, that language is designed to justify harsh national security charges if they step out of line again or are accused of dishonoring the Islamic Republic. 

In that context, being marched onto a bus is not a simple travel arrangement. It is the state reasserting ownership over the bodies and futures of its citizens. 

This is where Western policy and Western rhetoric often part ways. Politicians give speeches about “women, life, freedom” in Iran while continuing to treat the regime as just another difficult negotiating partner. The Lionesses are telling us something different. They are risking everything to say that the problem is not only a bad policy here or there, but a system that cannot tolerate women with independent agency, even on a soccer pitch.  

These women should receive asylum when they ask for it. Western governments should stop pretending that international sports federations can keep them safe once they are handed back to Iranian authorities. FIFA and the Asian Football Confederation talk about human rights, but activists and local communities were the ones literally throwing themselves in front of buses to slow the team’s departure. 

The lesson from Australia is simple: When Iranian women have even a small chance to step outside the control of the regime and its modesty enforcers, many take it. The response should not be to urge “dialogue” with the same authorities they are running from. It should be to stand clearly with the women who have already voted with their feet and to treat their courage as more than a news clip from a distant conflict.

(Editor’s Note: Brad Essex is a writer for RedState, an advocate for individuals with cerebral palsy, a devoted Kansas sports enthusiast and historian, and seeks to be a future advisor to President Trump.)