At 1:33 PM -0700 22/2/09, Chris Gehlker wrote:
>On Feb 22, 2009, at 12:08 PM, Charles Bennett wrote:
>
>> I don't want to see the human rights abuses of the Taliban put back in
>> place under any circumstance.
>
>I agree with you but we have to recognize that in much of the third
>world, including Afghanistan, the children of the 'progressive'
>ruling elites were sent of to Cambridge, Oxford and the US ivy league
>schools to learn how to 'lead their countries forward'. There they
>were indoctrinated with Marxism. This lead to a situation in much of
>the developing world where two factions: a progressive faction
>favoring communism, women's rights and secular government and a
>traditional faction favoring theocracy and traditional roles for
>women. Then the US decided it would be a great idea to give stinger
>missiles to the traditionalists.
I think this is kind of an absurd oversimplification at best,
and propaganda at worst -- the idea that the Ivy League universities
are a global nexus of Marxism is a little ridiculous. That is why the
CIA likes to recruit from Ivy League universities, right? (the CIA is
particularly fond of Yale).
And it certainly glosses over the way the US didn't just give
the traditionalists guns and missiles-- it made a dedicated effort
(in cooperation with the Saudis) at making the traditionalists more
aligned to religious fanaticism, because it helped them recruit and
link up with covert backers in other countries, particularly the
Middle East.
>
>> The Afgan government has set a new standard for corruption and
>> incompetence so it won't surprise me
>> but it seems a damn shame to stand by and allow the women to be put
>> back under the yoke.
>
>The problem is that women indoctrinated from birth in these societies
>can't wait to get back under the yoke. You don't have to go to
>Afghanistan to see this.
Most of the women in Afghanistan haven't been 'indoctrinated
since birth' - the Taliban took power in 1996. The Taliban are far
more repressive to women than the native Afghani Islamic traditions
were, and considerably more so than other variants of Pushtuni tribal
Islam from which the Taliban sprung.
The differences might not seem huge to decadent Westerners
like most of us, but there is a BIG difference between women being
expected to wear hijab, and women being forced to wear burqa.
Prior to the Taliban, Afghani women were permitted to work in
mixed sex workplaces - under the Taliban, they became banned from all
employment.
Under the Taliban, male doctors were forbidden from seeing
female patients, and women were not allowed to work except in some
all female workplaces, which meant at least 75% of nurses were not
allowed to work - so many women (especially) simply didn't get
medical care they needed. Traditional Afghani of (segregated) public
baths were forbidden to women, causing significant hygiene problems
as well as social deprivation
Don't confuse the Taliban with traditional Islam, and
especially not traditional Afghani Islam (the native variant was
relatively relaxed).
Now, I'm not saying that women do not buy in to traditional
forms of oppression. Sure they do. But I think it would be a mistake
to think that most women under the Taliban are actively embracing its
values -- it is not the religion they were born into, not their
traditional way of life, and actively resisted.
>The women in the communities run by Warren
>Jeffs and his FLDS henchmen right here in the US were as downtrodden
>as those in Afghanistan.
While I wouldn't want to say even a slightly kind word about
the degenerate old creep Jeffs and his hideous coterie - they didn't
murder those who opposed them. They made the women under their
control dress in a conservative manner, yes, but in a manner
comparable to the hijab, not the burqa. They excommunicated those who
fled the faith, not jailed or killed them. The women of the FLDS had
enforced home schooling, but they were not forbidden to have any
education after the age of 8 like women under the Taliban.
The Taliban are worse. The Taliban are the most conservative
and repressive sect of Islam, certainly in respect to women, ever.
They are the worst people on earth.
> And yet very few have availed themselves of
>the opportunity to escape. It's not the kind of problem that can be
>solved purely with force, though force may be part of the solution.
The members of the FLDS have never known any other way of
life, have never seen other possibilities. The people of Afghanistan
remember the time before the Taliban, many of them even the time
before the Soviet invasion. I think few of them, especially the
women, will think of the Talibans rule as the Golden Age.
Cheers
Dave
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