Opinion by Shabana Basij-Rasikh: Ignoring Afghan women and girls is to do the Taliban’s work for them
The men who rule my country wield their control with a casual cruelty that can be breathtaking. Just this month, the Taliban told female employees of Afghanistan’s finance ministry — well-educated, well-qualified women barred from their workplace for these past 11 months —Vanished. Just like the freedom to work in your chosen profession. The freedom to travel without a chaperone. The freedom to decide what you will wear in public. The freedom to go to school beyond sixth grade.
None of that will be necessary, the Taliban says. Not for Afghan women. The blue burqa awaits you. At puberty, your education ends, your autonomy ends. Your future is a memory you never had a chance to make. Eleven months is all it took. The great vanishing of Afghan women is happening again before the eyes of the world, just the way it did in the 1990s when I was a child growing up under the Taliban’s first regime — a girl with no choice but to attend secret schools, walking frightened through Kabul’s streets among the blue shrouds of invisible women.
I am a woman now, in exile abroad, and I haven’t forgotten what those days felt like — just like I haven’t forgotten what I saw in the years after the Taliban’s retreat in 2001.I haven’t forgotten the Afghan women who returned home, those educated exiles who had studied overseas and came back to take jobs in our public and private sectors and showed all of us that our futures were exactly that — oIn August, you’ll be seeing Afghanistan in the headlines again.
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Amnesty: Taliban crackdown on rights is 'suffocating' womenThe lives of Afghan women and girls are being destroyed by a “suffocating” crackdown by the Taliban since they took power nearly a year ago, Amnesty International says.
Read more »
Taliban’s ‘suffocating crackdown’ destroying lives of women and girls in Afghanistan – new report“Less than one year after the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan, their draconian policies are depriving millions of women and girls of their right to lead safe, free and fulfilling lives.' MsReads via amnestyusa
Read more »
Paper Girls Review: Impressive, Compelling Female Led Sci-Fi JourneyICYMI: The first season of Amazon's PrimeVideo series PaperGirls offers an audience of millions of women & girls the sci-fi adventure they've long deserved: Review / PaperGirlsPV StephanyFolsom
Read more »
Man works to get family members to US nearly a year after Taliban takeover of AfghanistanThe Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan didn’t come as a surprise to Sayed Hashimi or his family. What Hashimi said IS surprising is that his loved ones are still there in hiding nearly a year later.
Read more »