Afghan women's voices

[ArabellaScott]

Given the latest attempt by the Taliban to further silence the women of Afghanistan, seek out the writing and words and music of Afghan women.

Here's a long and very well written article on landays - a form of Afghan poetry.

https://static.poetryfoundation.org/o/media/landays.html

'When sisters sit together, they always praise their brothers.
When brothers sit together, they sell their sisters to others.'

'In Afghan culture, poetry is revered, particularly the high literary forms that derive from Persian or Arabic. But the poem above is a folk couplet — a landay — an oral and often anonymous scrap of song created by and for mostly illiterate people: the more than twenty million Pashtun women who span the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan'

I remember the days when we had a sporting boycott against South Africa.

Ive no idea how to go about organising protests but we need to start

Yes, this. They should be sanctioned against in all possible ways until the law is repealed

I am so frustrated by this. Normally there would be a boycott, protests, letters from charities....yet silence. Its like the world has collectively shrugged.

Fuck them.
Fuck the Afghan men too, who conspire with this, too - who collude in the imprisonment of their mothers, daughters, wives and sisters.

I want to do something more than wring my hands and donate money, especially when most of it ends up back with those fundamentalist bustards.

Thanks arabella.

where are the protests. Where are the marches.

it’s just women so they don’t matter

Just seen this in the Guardian.
www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/sep/01/heres-how-we-can-help-oppressed-women-and-girls-in-afghanistan

Thanks. Interesting about Pakistan's aid - I don't know much about that aspect.

Yes to the World Service, although there is already a radio station broadcasting similar in Afghanistan, I posted it upthread or on another thread.

As for penpals - great, but how?

Powerful speech from Nahid Fattahi
https://x.com/NahidFattahi/status/1829581460044681300?t=s36ocVnuVaMMKJdUS278oA&s=19

Islamic countries, Muslim men, Muslim women, people of Afghanistan and specially Afghan men: Your silence is a betrayal. By allowing the Taliban’s gender apartheid and brutality to go unchallenged, you let them hijack Islam. This is not our faith. Stand up now—reclaim Islam’s true essence of peace and justice. The world is watching. Silence is no longer an option.

#EndGenderApartheid #Afghanistan #StandwithWomenOfAfghanistan

I'm still waiting for the outrage from politicians and religious leaders. I'm so sick of the accusations of apartheid levelled at Israel when this actual real gender apartheid passes unnoticed.

Janice Turner's comment in the Times today:
https://www.thetimes.com/article/5b3d4ab0-7333-4c5b-a253-efd19cb8e577?shareToken=185f8398bf9b219ccaa7831a7dfb9656

Yes, ban the fucking cricket.

From Janice's article.

Campaigners are enraged to hear that female advances in every sphere of life, from law to sport, were a mere blip. They say the Taliban’s edicts are neither social “norms” nor Islamic law but mechanisms of social control (and of men, too, who are brutally punished for not keeping “wayward” womenfolk in check). What they endure needs a name and in October the UN legal committee will debate codifying a new crime against humanity into international law: gender apartheid. Existing laws address abuse of women but campaigners, from Nobel laureates to Amnesty, believe none fully capture the codified, systemic abuse of Afghan women.

Who do we lobby.

https://endgenderapartheid.today/

This is a magazine featuring work from women from Afghanistan.

https://www.instagram.com/underthestarryafghansky

There's a fair few accounts on Insta that are schools or groups supporting women-.Online Herat School is one. Most are in Arabic script (I don't know enough to discern what languages) but there is auto translate.

Give them a follow and let them know.we've not forgotten them.

Yes, although they fuck it all up at the end:

'Does this apply to people who don’t identify as women but are also discriminated against for their actual or perceived gender or sex?

Targeting based on gender is not limited to women and can include victims who identify as women, girls, men, boys, nonbinary, and LGBTQI+ persons. Gender crimes target persons based on their sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression (e.g. woman/girl, man/boy, or nonbinary), or based on their sex. The Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court’s guidance on gender crimes defines gender as “sex characteristics and social constructs and criteria used to define maleness and femaleness, including roles, behaviours, activities and attributes.” These social constructs can vary between societies and can change over time. '

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/sep/08/the-observer-view-on-afghanistan-britain-and-the-us-are-complicit-in-the-talibans-oppression-of-women

'they have been let down again by the failure of liberal democracies to take action against the Taliban. In June, the UN held a conference on Afghanistan and acceded to the Taliban’s demands that Afghan women be excluded. Afghanistan under the Taliban is not being treated as the international pariah that it should be; the country continues to be a full member of the International Cricket Council, for example, despite not having a national women’s team that is a requirement of membership. After withdrawing from Afghanistan in 2021, the previous Conservative government relocated just 2,000 Afghans through its resettlement schemes, despite pledging to bring 20,000 – including female human rights activists. Afghan women are right to feel as if the west has abandoned them, and is effectively ignoring their brutal oppression.'

[email protected]

This is the email for the ICC .

I encourage women to write to tell them to remove Afghanistan as a member.

'The Anti-Discrimination Policy ... one of the toughest in world sport - confirms a level of commitment from the ICC and its Members to promote and encourage participation at all levels regardless of race, colour, religion, descent, culture, ethnic origin, nationality, sex, gender, sexual orientation, disability, marital status and/or maternity status and to ensure that there is no discrimination in the sport.'

https://www.icc-cricket.com/about/integrity/anti-discrimination/about-us

Shame on New Zealand for playing Afghanistan. I can't actually believe all these men are smiling away, playing fucking cricket with each other, while women are imprisoned and silenced in Afghanistan.

https://x.com/ACBofficials

I agree @ArabellaScott

It's unbelievable.

The social media is all merrily supporting both teams. Not a fucking word about the women of Afghanistan. They really don't fucking care, do they?

No, they don't.

Sorry to add to this thread.

Unfolding disaster of starving children in Afghanistan:

'Up until August 2021, international funds given directly to the previous government funded nearly all public healthcare in Afghanistan.

When the Taliban took over, the money was stopped because of international sanctions against them. This triggered a healthcare collapse. Aid agencies stepped in to provide what was meant to be a temporary emergency response.

It was always an unsustainable solution, and now, in a world distracted by so much else, funding for Afghanistan has shrunk. Equally, the Taliban government’s policies, specifically its restrictions on women, have meant that donors are hesitant to give funds.'

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cj35611ngyro

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cgedlz5wx88o

'“When I learnt about the new law, I decided not to attend the course any more. Because if I go out, I’ll end up speaking and then something bad might happen. Maybe I won’t return home safely. But then my mother encouraged me to continue.”
In the three years since the Taliban takeover, it's become clear that even if edicts aren’t strictly imposed, people start self-regulating out of fear. Women continue to be visible in small numbers on the streets of cities like Kabul, but nearly all of them now are covered from head to toe in loose black clothes or dark blue burqas, and most of them cover their faces with only their eyes visible, the impact of a decree announced last year.
“Every moment you feel like you’re in a prison. Even breathing has become difficult here," said Nausheen, an activist.'

'“I believe that when it comes to aid, the world should continue helping Afghanistan. But when it comes to talking to the Taliban, there should be a rule that in each discussion women must be present. And if that can’t happen, they [the international community] should stop talking to them,” psychologist Karina said.
“The world must care about what’s happening with Afghan women, because if it doesn’t this mentality could easily spread to them, to their homes.”'

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c70jp1yy7wjo.amp

Embassy closing. Further isolating Afghanistan internationally.