Why don't we focus on what Afghan women can do? They can cook, bear children and pray. As I recall, that was fine for our grandmothers.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I mean, honestly, we have to be clear that the life for many Afghan women is not that much different than it was a hundred years ago, 200 years ago. The country has lived with so much violence and conflict that many people, men and women, just want it to be over.
I feel Afghanistan has a very strong social fabric and sense of family... what I would like to do is encourage everybody in the country to appreciate more the role of women at home and outside.
In Afghanistan, we have had a history of very strong women, and we need to reclaim that history and talk about it.
The draconian prohibitions of the Taliban years and the gains Afghan women have achieved since the Taliban government was overthrown in 2001 are now well known and often cited: Today, Afghans lucky enough to live in secure regions can go to school, women may work in offices, and the burqa is no longer mandatory.
In all the debate about Afghanistan, we don't hear much about our obligation to the wretched lives of Afghan women. They are being treated as collateral damage as the big boys discuss geopolitical goals.
Afghan women, as a group, I think their suffering has been equaled by very few other groups in recent world history.
I think the emancipation of women in Afghanistan has to come from inside, through Afghans themselves, gradually, over time.
The women of Afghanistan have a voice, and it needs to be heard and not forgotten.
No woman in Afghanistan is in business without support from either her husband or her father or her uncle, someone.
We were spending American blood and treasure to liberate the people of Afghanistan from one of the most brutal regimes on the face of the earth. That we would not use that moment to press for women's rights seems to me unthinkable.
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