I spent almost 2 years (ok one and a half) in that same country trying to stop this from the other side of things.
I can tell you this. There are schools for girls in some places in many there aren't. There are a great many places SHE wouldn't have been able to go without an armed escort, especially if she were showing her eyes or more. We had a civilian female embedded reporter with us when we first arrived. She made it two of her planned six weeks. I'd like to hear your friends stories, and their locations cause I know for a fact that women are beaten and abused for the slightest infraction, and that can happen even in the most "modern" of Afghani villages. All that said the plight of their women isn't our concern unless we're going Conan style :) What is our concern is establishing some form of national government that will eventually be able to handle it's own internal security. BTW they don't have town halls, they don't even really have towns. They have collections of mud compounds. Also I've never heard Michael be anything but respectful of the people on the ground, he's talking about policies formed at levels much higher than some OGA or military employee. This is a major shift in US policy is the sort of thing that can only come from people in DC, not near the ground in question. -----Original Message----- From: Judah McAuley [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, March 09, 2009 12:51 AM To: cf-community Subject: Re: is this true - Obama hinting at negotiating with the Taliban? This is why I don't take you seriously in the slightest. Everything is black and white to you and there is no potential room for moderates. Fine, you've got your cut and dried world view, please take it somewhere where you don't run up against the very complicated and greyscale actual world. One of my best friends in the world spent 2 years wandering from local town hall to local town hall in Afghanistan trying to help convince people that they ought to grow something other than opium poppies. And they did a surprisingly good job. And she, yes "she", was dealt with by the men with big beards and a sometimes hostile attitude. It is not a situation where everything is going to be sweetness and light right away. But yes, there are moderate elements and yes they balance religion with the needs of their people and even with political reality. And you don't know shit for shit Michael. She showed her eyes in public, she raised money for schools for girls in Afghanistan. Is it a perfect system? Hell no. Far far from it. But you? You know fuck all about the situation and are spouting intolerant crap with no basis in reality. Give it a rest and have a little respect for the people on the ground that are trying to make a better future. Yes, with the moderates. Judah On Sun, Mar 8, 2009 at 2:57 PM, Michael Dinowitz <[email protected]> wrote: > > And next is moderate elements of Hamas, then moderate elements of Hizballah, > then, then, then. I'm sorry to say this in a totally sweeping way but these > organizations have no moderate elements. Those that are moderate either > leave or are killed. > > Pakastan has dealt with the 'moderate' elements of the Taliban and you can > just do a google search on "swat valley". As you can see, these groups have > one goal and that is Islamic dominance over all. The only middle ground > between then and us is that we both breath air and they hate us for that. > Moderate to them is letting women show their eyes in public (and no, I'm not > really joking here). ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:291048 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
