The rest is politics - “The Taliban took over the country and it's much safer”

[HiggledyPiggledy33]

Just outraged at what I’ve just heard in the rest is politics.

They are discussing why aren’t we boycotting Afghanistan, and I can’t believe what Rory is saying.

“For the first time in over 20 years, you can travel safely through the country.”

Well maybe you can Rory, but I don’t think women can - is that fine? Throw half the population under the bus, as long as you’re OK.

“The Taliban have very repressive views on women, but they've also in other ways changed”
oh well that’s ok then.

“We're in a culture now where it really suits a lot of people, particularly on the far right, to emphasise Muslim countries where women are not treated correctly”
Women not being treated correctly is the problem. Once that’s sorted, let’s look at any sensitivity about muslims.

From The Rest Is Politics: Question Time: Assad’s People - Syria, Torture, and Justice, 9 Jan 2025

I remember reading about the Drow societies in Forgotten Realms fantasy books. It's supposed to be dark fantasy/horror, but all the writers did was invert the sex roles standard of a society and added human sacrifice with a touch of BDSM. Right down to getting rid of a third son as boys were valued less than girls.

It's really fucking depressing when you see it listed in black and white and realise how disposable most men consider women to be.

Cantbebotheredwithaname: Thank you for mentioning Mala - she really is someone to look up to. A schoolgirl shot in the head on her way to school. Says all we need to know.

By all accounts (I know someone who knows him) Rory is a decent and delightful chap. He's clearly not stupid. But he has a massive blind spot about women's rights. Baffles me completely.

You know what, I can absolutely believe that. I think it's why I'm exasperated with him rather than despising him as I do AC.

The really fucking maddening bit is this: he's been told often enough he has a blind spot, and he's made groping steps towards acknowledging it, but never seems to stop and think hey, should I factor in THE OTHER HALF OF THE POPULATION?

@kistanbul I’m confused by your post - are you suggesting you need to be Jewish to be outraged by Rory Stewart’s casual dismissal of the horrific abuse of women in Afghanistan?

I'm assuming that they posted in the wrong thread?

Posted on the wrong thread. Have reported myself and asked for it to be deleted.

I was horrified by this episode of TRIP too. Shocked at the blatant dismissal of women’s rights.

They are also cowardly about women’s rights as oppressed by trans activism. They don’t care.

Fuck me backwards, what a prick. How can he care so little for women who are suffering so much? Did he just not notice? Or do women really not matter to men like him?

(You’d not get this nonsense on The Rest Is History, listen to that instead!)

Maybe I should get the mutual friend to give him an earful. She is a force of nature who doesn't suffer fools...

Do it!!!

If nothing else, I’d be very interested in hearing his justification for his viewpoint.

Can confirm. I'm listening to the TRIH series on America in 1968 as I type, and Dominic Sandbrook is being very disapproving of the sexist attitudes of the right-on protesters around the Democratic Convention.

I adore them both.

I suspect it boils down to 'hasn't thought about it properly'.

Just like most people never think about accessibility until they know a wheelchair user... the difference being that there are very few wheelchair users compared to women, so you'd think...

And @Greyskybluesky I probably will. Don't see her very often though.

Perhaps he's just showing his true colours.

Or he needs bloody well educating.

I think he needs to open eyes. I doubt 'feminism' as a concept was ever introduced him until he was about 18, which is the age when you think you know it all anyway.

I’ve adored Dominic S since his series on post war British life when he went into such brilliant detail about the average day of a working class woman in a council flat.

I also think that the more you have a persona, the more your underlying values sometimes get away from that. DS masquerades as gruff middle England reactionary, but actually is disapproving of some of England’s heroes dastardly exploits, where as RS is so dedicated to being ‘right on’ that he has bought into his own self image and therefore has the face to be like ‘well, not so bad, is it? Don’t worry about the unseen, unheard, uneducated, unmedicated, unloved, UNFREE MAJORITY OF THE POPULATION’.

I think we are seen as collateral damage

I can believe that. I read his book and I know it's his version of events, but it sounded like he worked bloody hard and genuinely wanted to make a positive difference. Women are such a blind spot for him though, and that's just unforgivably arrogant

Your friend sounds fab, but Stewart has had so many female listeners try multiple times to get him and Campbell to open their minds, and they are just not having it. Maybe your friend has better things to do with her time than bollocking him for being such a plum

It can take a long long time and a lot lot lot of thought for some of women's oppression to be grasped even by women!

Let alone a man who hasn't really thought about it. I'm thinking of, say, Douglas Murray, who said 'genderism' finally revealed to him what feminists had been saying for years. And other men who had not seen it before.

Series sounds brilliant, do you mean TV or podcast?

And agree that he adopts the 'bluff John Bull' persona as a counterpoint to TH's 'weedy right on Guardianista'. They're both exaggerations and both fundamentally decent men.

I can just hear DS saying "what utter tosh"

(About RS that is!)

I like Dominic Sandbrook but haven't ever listened to TRIH, will do so.