Original at: http://www.correntewire.com/war_women_peace
Lately, I've been hearing a lot of noise from lefty and women's rights organizations about the next Big Thing: The rights of Afghan women and girls. Eleanor Smeal's group, Feminist.org (yes, she's one of the ones who helped with the infamous Obama Ms. Magazine cover), has a campaign for them. NOW and The Nation have also jumped on the bandwagon. We are supposed to elevate the cause of the liberation of Afghan women and girls from the oppression of the Taliban, above the liberation of all other women from the oppression of the patriarchy.
I confess that my jaundiced eye looked rather askance at all of this concern for one oppressed portion of the generally oppressed female population. What about Saudi Arabian women? What about African women? What about Chinese women? Come to think of it, what about American women? Much to our discredit as human beings, there's never a shortage of sexism, repression and violence to go around.
Alas, it is now apparent why the choirs were all singing in unison.
WASHINGTON — Women's rights activists on Tuesday backed a US troop surge in Afghanistan but warned that hard-fought gains in women's rights will vanish without a long-term commitment to develop the country.(emphasis mine)
"If the US left, women would be back in their burkas," said Esther Hyneman, a member of Women for Afghan Women (WAW), a rights group advocating for Afghan women in the United States and Afghanistan.
Her comments came just hours before President Barack Obama's long-awaited speech on Afghanistan, during which he was set to announce an accelerated deployment of 30,000 troops within six months to the war-torn country and a US drawdown to begin by July 2011.
While a troop surge would help to bring much-needed security to Afghanistan, "the platform on which everything else can be built," the United States must meet its pledge to Afghan women, said Afghan-American Masuda Sultan, who serves on WAW's board.
"When the fall of the Taliban happened, we said, 'Go to school, take jobs.' Afghan women risked their lives, they did it," said Sultan, who has moved back to Afghanistan and works as an adviser to the Finance Ministry in addition to her WAW advocacy work.
"We have a moral obligation to continue to follow through for Afghan women who have put themselves at risk over the last eight years," she told reporters.
A moral obligation to continue to follow through? Did she really just say that?
Follow through with what? We have lost Afghanistan. The Taliban have taken over almost the entire country. There is no functioning government. No one thinks we can "win" there except (presumably) the President, some of his team, and the delusional Obama worshipers who believe that everything that comes out of His mouth is Holy Writ. This "surge" will do nothing at all to help anyone, least of all the women of Afghanistan. (Well, I suppose if you consider Unocal a person, then you might disagree with that statement.)
I wonder if Ms. Sultan heard what Vice President Biden said on teevee the other day about how the Taliban, to "President" Karzai, was not really an enemy group. I donkey poop you not.
Vice Pres. BIDEN: Well, no, because these are going to be--the troops being put in now into Afghanistan are to break the momentum of the Taliban, giving the Afghan government opportunity to train up through our help and the international help the forces it needs to maintain its own security, and at the same time going into the Taliban and reintegrating and reinvolving elements of the Taliban who are not in incorrigible, who want to be part of the process. If you notice in Mr. Karzai's inauguration speech, he never mentioned the Taliban as an enemy. He views the Taliban as sort of disgruntled brethren that have to be accommodated in a way that is political. (emphasis mine)
Guess what? When we "follow through" as Ms. Sultan suggests, the so-called "moderate Taliban" will be PART OF THE FUCKING GOVERNMENT. That is what "accommodated in a way that is political" means. Does she honestly, truly believe that this will be GOOD FOR WOMEN?! News flash, "sweetie," there is no such thing as the moderate Taliban. If they were moderate, they would not be the fucking Taliban!
Has it truly come to this, where the laudable goal of achieving equal rights and freedom for all women around the world is being cynically manipulated in order to perpetuate...the oppression of women?
Congratulations, Obama and Co. You have passed Orwell, and gone straight to Vonnegut. You may now collect $22 trillion, and as the cherry on top, a whole lot of natural gas and oil!
Too bad for the women and girls of Afghanistan...and for that matter, too bad for the women and girls of America, who have to lose their spouses, families, friends, and sometimes even their lives, in an never-ending war on feelings, er, terror.
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