The day life changed in Kabul
August 16, 2021 3:29 PM Subscribe
The streets of Kabul were emptied of women on Monday, the first full day of Taliban rule across Afghanistan, as Taliban gunmen patrolled in cars seized by police, confiscated guns from security guards and urged shopkeepers and government employees back to work.
An Afghan woman in Kabul: ‘Now I have to burn everything I achieved’
A university student tells of seeing all around her the ‘fearful faces of women and ugly faces of men who hate women’
An Afghan woman in Kabul: ‘Now I have to burn everything I achieved’
A university student tells of seeing all around her the ‘fearful faces of women and ugly faces of men who hate women’
This is so heartbreaking. There was an Afghan reporter at a Pentagon briefing today that brought me to tears. sltwitter
posted by bluesky43 at 4:03 PM on August 16, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by bluesky43 at 4:03 PM on August 16, 2021 [2 favorites]
An amazing interview with Elay Ershad who used to be an MP in Kabul, she is staying put with her two daughters: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p09sbxxk
(BBC Sounds. You need a login I think, but should be multi regional)
posted by Kiwi at 5:05 PM on August 16, 2021
(BBC Sounds. You need a login I think, but should be multi regional)
posted by Kiwi at 5:05 PM on August 16, 2021
I will not defend the US war in Afghanistan, either its conception or its execution. But if nothing else, the women of Kabul had a 20 year respite of relative liberty. It is only up to them to say if it was worth it, but sadly it is going to be very hard for us to hear their voices now.
Fuck the Taliban, and their theocratic, misogynistic ilk everywhere. This is a dark day for the whole world.
posted by biogeo at 5:17 PM on August 16, 2021 [36 favorites]
Fuck the Taliban, and their theocratic, misogynistic ilk everywhere. This is a dark day for the whole world.
posted by biogeo at 5:17 PM on August 16, 2021 [36 favorites]
What Women's Advocacy Groups Worldwide Are Doing For Women In Afghanistan
August 16, 20218:28 AM ET (npr)
Women for Afghan Women
It's not clear from their website what they can do but I just donated.
posted by bluesky43 at 5:50 PM on August 16, 2021 [7 favorites]
August 16, 20218:28 AM ET (npr)
Women for Afghan Women
It's not clear from their website what they can do but I just donated.
posted by bluesky43 at 5:50 PM on August 16, 2021 [7 favorites]
Reach 871: “The crew made the decision to go”.
With approximately 640 passengers aboard, some who had "pulled themselves onto the C-17’s half-open ramp" as it was departing Kabul airport, Reach 871 refueled in flight from a KC-135RT, and landed at an unspecified location generally assumed to be Qatar.
Maximum troop capacity of the C-17 is typically 134.
posted by Kadin2048 at 6:08 PM on August 16, 2021 [8 favorites]
With approximately 640 passengers aboard, some who had "pulled themselves onto the C-17’s half-open ramp" as it was departing Kabul airport, Reach 871 refueled in flight from a KC-135RT, and landed at an unspecified location generally assumed to be Qatar.
Maximum troop capacity of the C-17 is typically 134.
posted by Kadin2048 at 6:08 PM on August 16, 2021 [8 favorites]
I think there’s a middle ground between complete opposition of the war in Afghanistan (which I did/do oppose) and throwing up our hands and saying this is just the way it has to be for Afghan women. At the very least, our withdrawal strategy should have precluded a full withdrawal until the safety and evacuation of Afghan allies , journalists, activists, etc had been completed. Our country’s decades long insistence on uselessly interfering in the Middle East was a huge contributor to this situation, it’s unfathomable to me that it ends with “yeah sorry nothing more we can do here good luck bye.”
posted by nancynickerson at 7:31 PM on August 16, 2021 [17 favorites]
posted by nancynickerson at 7:31 PM on August 16, 2021 [17 favorites]
Two threads:
Pashtana Zalmai Khan Durrani, women's education advocate, founder LEARN:
posted by Pallas Athena at 7:35 PM on August 16, 2021 [31 favorites]
Pashtana Zalmai Khan Durrani, women's education advocate, founder LEARN:
When I started @LEARNAfg it was because my cousin couldnt access school. No foreigner came n gave me ideas. I looked for ways to teach her. And after a year search we got an app that was offline. I made the a library for her. And she started learningSamira Shackle:
This helped me understand I couldn't fight the whole world and I didnt need to. Because learning should be easy, safe and interesting. We formed a group and made courses in local languages because schools didnt have a lot Sciences teachers, no labs and few resources in Kandahar.
We reached first year 900 this year with 7000 students by teaching them through this offline app. We got courses in local languages. Girls used those learning resources to overcome their fear of math and other complicated subjects.
And now all I see how girls learning is politicized called western concept.I see men having opinions about it. Stop it nobody needs your opinion they loved learning. And you dnt have a right to dictate. Also what is up with ppl not understanding concept accessing education
We saw a problem and tried finding solution for it. This wasnt a project.I find it funny when trolls and taliban apologists keep mentioning how its a foreign project. Sure no school and a girls wanting to become a midwife who has never seen school is a foreign project.
To give a small sense of the nightmare unfolding for Afghans: weeks ago, my friend in Kabul, a female TV journalist and single mother of two, asked me to help her find info about legal routes out of the country.Nasrin Nawa, WaPo: My Taliban nightmare came true. I left, but my sister couldn’t.
She's been threatened by the Taliban for several years, as a woman in the public eye, and these threats were intensifying. I tried to find info; there were very few options for visas or resettlement, despite western govs grandstanding about vulnerable women.
[...]
Through a small charity, earlier today I got my friend and her kids booked onto a flight out of Kabul in a few days, to a third country, where they'd be safe and could continue to seek resettlement. Relief! Then by this afternoon all commercial flights had been cancelled.
This was today, as Kabul fell. Soon after the flight was cancelled, my friend called sobbing to say that armed men had come to her door. She managed to get away and she and her children are currently in hiding with friends and relatives.
My sister and I used to go cycling around the city. (We were members of the female national cycling federation.) She even used her bike to go to the bank the day the Taliban arrived in Kabul. Now I can’t imagine girls biking freely like that ever again.I've been tangentially involved today with trying to help a friend-of-a-friend's sister, a restaurant owner, get out of Kabul. She's had threats from the Taliban and says "my life is in danger". Just being a woman trying to do something as mundane as run a restaurant makes them angry, it seems.
With reports circulating about Taliban militants raiding the houses of activists, journalists and others, I called my sister and told her to go home and hide all of our identity cards. Then I told her that she needed to destroy her guitar. She said her hands were unable to do that, but I pleaded with her. I told her the Taliban’s hands are capable of killing you for your art. But I can’t imagine literally shattering such an important part of who you are.
This is how the hopes, passions, careers and plans of many young Afghans are crumbling.
posted by Pallas Athena at 7:35 PM on August 16, 2021 [31 favorites]
Looking around for coordinated online resources, I see an international #stopkillingafghans protest announced for 28th August gaining traction, as per The Afghan and the United Afghan Association (IG, FB); they have a backgrounder minisite here.
Women for Afghan Women
It's not clear from their website what they can do but I just donated.
Would be great to hear of any other frontline organisations whom it's critical to support right now.
posted by progosk at 5:22 AM on August 17, 2021 [2 favorites]
Women for Afghan Women
It's not clear from their website what they can do but I just donated.
Would be great to hear of any other frontline organisations whom it's critical to support right now.
posted by progosk at 5:22 AM on August 17, 2021 [2 favorites]
The US should never have invaded Afghanistan. There is likely going to be suffering and death at the hands of the Taliban soon, for innocents in Kabul and elsewhere. This after tens of thousands of civilian deaths thanks to the US and the war. Some stats:
- As of April 2021, more than 71,000 Afghan and Pakistani civilians are estimated to have died as a direct result of the war.
- The United States military in 2017 relaxed its rules of engagement for airstrikes in Afghanistan, which resulted in a massive increase in civilian casualties.
- The CIA has armed and funded Afghan militia groups who have been implicated in grave human rights abuses and killings of civilians.
- Afghan land is contaminated with unexploded ordnance, which kills and injures tens of thousands of Afghans, especially children, as they travel and go about their daily chores.
- The war has exacerbated the effects of poverty, malnutrition, poor sanitation, lack of access to health care, and environmental degradation on Afghans’ health.
Source, Watson Institute, Brown University (CW: photo of dead children at the top)
I don't know what the answer is to protect the people of Afghanistan (especially the women and children) from the Taliban, and I wish I did. My heart hurts for them. Sometimes I really hate the dark sides of human nature more than usual, and shit like this just....my god. A deep, dark sadness.
posted by lazaruslong at 5:48 AM on August 17, 2021 [6 favorites]
- As of April 2021, more than 71,000 Afghan and Pakistani civilians are estimated to have died as a direct result of the war.
- The United States military in 2017 relaxed its rules of engagement for airstrikes in Afghanistan, which resulted in a massive increase in civilian casualties.
- The CIA has armed and funded Afghan militia groups who have been implicated in grave human rights abuses and killings of civilians.
- Afghan land is contaminated with unexploded ordnance, which kills and injures tens of thousands of Afghans, especially children, as they travel and go about their daily chores.
- The war has exacerbated the effects of poverty, malnutrition, poor sanitation, lack of access to health care, and environmental degradation on Afghans’ health.
Source, Watson Institute, Brown University (CW: photo of dead children at the top)
I don't know what the answer is to protect the people of Afghanistan (especially the women and children) from the Taliban, and I wish I did. My heart hurts for them. Sometimes I really hate the dark sides of human nature more than usual, and shit like this just....my god. A deep, dark sadness.
posted by lazaruslong at 5:48 AM on August 17, 2021 [6 favorites]
No offense lazaruslong, but this post is specifically about how women are being affected by the current events in Afghanistan. Your comment about the general effects of the US's war on Afghanistan as a whole seems like it would be more appropriate for this general Afghanistan thread.
posted by LizBoBiz at 6:17 AM on August 17, 2021 [17 favorites]
posted by LizBoBiz at 6:17 AM on August 17, 2021 [17 favorites]
This thread by Bushra Ebadi seems full of sound advice: Looking for ways to support Afghanistan and Afghan people? Here's a list of actions that you can take and avoid.
There are various lists of causes making the rounds; to add to the ones mentioned upthread, these three seem solid/relevant:
- Emergency Relief Afghanistan (by Khyber Khan, since April 2020): "Relief for Internally Displaced Afghans" GoFundMe
- Children Without Borders (by Nooria Kamran, since 2016) & Watan Project (by Sulaiman/Yasamine/Ali, since 2019): "Urgent Crisis Relief for Afghanistan 2021" GoFundMe
- "Emergency Help for LGBTQ Afghans in Afghanistan" GoFundMe by Qais Munhazim et. al.
posted by progosk at 6:31 AM on August 17, 2021 [8 favorites]
There are various lists of causes making the rounds; to add to the ones mentioned upthread, these three seem solid/relevant:
- Emergency Relief Afghanistan (by Khyber Khan, since April 2020): "Relief for Internally Displaced Afghans" GoFundMe
- Children Without Borders (by Nooria Kamran, since 2016) & Watan Project (by Sulaiman/Yasamine/Ali, since 2019): "Urgent Crisis Relief for Afghanistan 2021" GoFundMe
- "Emergency Help for LGBTQ Afghans in Afghanistan" GoFundMe by Qais Munhazim et. al.
posted by progosk at 6:31 AM on August 17, 2021 [8 favorites]
this post is specifically about how women are being affected by the current events in Afghanistan.
And the destructive, murderous actions of occupying forces over the last twenty (plus) years very much determine the "current events" of today.
It's galling and indeed patronizing how many Americans suddenly care about Afghan women and children (how many Afghan women and children were killed by American bombs?)
Many here should consider reading Lila Abu-Lughod's book Do Muslim Women Need Saving? (Harvard UP, 2013)
posted by Ahmad Khani at 7:58 AM on August 17, 2021 [10 favorites]
And the destructive, murderous actions of occupying forces over the last twenty (plus) years very much determine the "current events" of today.
It's galling and indeed patronizing how many Americans suddenly care about Afghan women and children (how many Afghan women and children were killed by American bombs?)
Many here should consider reading Lila Abu-Lughod's book Do Muslim Women Need Saving? (Harvard UP, 2013)
posted by Ahmad Khani at 7:58 AM on August 17, 2021 [10 favorites]
Am I wrong to boil this down to a complete failure by men? To enter a war, to sustain an occupation, to be religious extremists, to seek patriarchal power.
posted by zerobyproxy at 8:08 AM on August 17, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by zerobyproxy at 8:08 AM on August 17, 2021 [2 favorites]
It's galling and indeed patronizing how many Americans suddenly care about Afghan women and children (how many Afghan women and children were killed by American bombs?)
Keep in mind not all of us are Americans here, and even among the Americans here I’m pretty sure a good contingent if not the majority were against the US military intervention in Afghanistan.
Also, most people are reacting to these reports in the news about how the current situation seems especially precarious for women. It’s not necessarily a sudden interest, but it is a heightened interest now because of what’s happening and it’s based on reports from within Afghanistan. I don’t think it’s fair to characterize it all as patronizing or based on some idea that "Muslim women" in general "need saving".
posted by bitteschoen at 9:07 AM on August 17, 2021 [19 favorites]
Keep in mind not all of us are Americans here, and even among the Americans here I’m pretty sure a good contingent if not the majority were against the US military intervention in Afghanistan.
Also, most people are reacting to these reports in the news about how the current situation seems especially precarious for women. It’s not necessarily a sudden interest, but it is a heightened interest now because of what’s happening and it’s based on reports from within Afghanistan. I don’t think it’s fair to characterize it all as patronizing or based on some idea that "Muslim women" in general "need saving".
posted by bitteschoen at 9:07 AM on August 17, 2021 [19 favorites]
I sure hope that is the case.
Nonetheless her work is germane as it discusses these very conditions and attitudes. Anyways here's a recent essay by Marya Hannun that considers Abu-Lughod rather seminal text: ‘Saving’ Afghan Women, Now: The status of Afghanistan’s women is a separate question from the presence of American troops.
posted by Ahmad Khani at 9:44 AM on August 17, 2021 [23 favorites]
Nonetheless her work is germane as it discusses these very conditions and attitudes. Anyways here's a recent essay by Marya Hannun that considers Abu-Lughod rather seminal text: ‘Saving’ Afghan Women, Now: The status of Afghanistan’s women is a separate question from the presence of American troops.
Abu-Lughod didn’t deny the oppression faced by women at the hands of the Taliban. But, she argued, the way Afghan women were depicted in Western media was removed from the complex realities on the ground. Such representations reduced these women to a series of contextless images. They sought to blame culture or Islam, while ignoring the long history of foreign involvement in Afghanistan that contributes to the current situation—from the social disintegration during the Soviet occupation to the sexual violence during the subsequent civil war and mujahideen rule. They collapsed Afghan women—who encompass a complex mosaic of identities, ages, ethnicities, classes, and religious backgrounds—into a single voiceless image with a single set of desires, which in turn made it seem like the only solution for them was to be saved from their own society by Western forces.If you can, is worth one's time.
Twenty years later, as the precipitous U.S. withdrawal unfolds and the Taliban seize power, women are again at the center of the story. We are hearing fear that the gains in women’s rights of the last two decades will be lost under a new Taliban rule, hope that they will not, and a great deal of cynicism about saving women as a pretext for war to begin with.
As we struggle to make sense of current events and what they mean for women, it is helpful to revisit the critique of “saving women,” which offered a way to think critically about how women’s rights have been deployed in justifying intervention for two decades. What does it have to teach us now? I think it can offer three correctives that are relevant to this moment.
posted by Ahmad Khani at 9:44 AM on August 17, 2021 [23 favorites]
Thank you, Ahmad Khani.
posted by nakedmolerats at 9:56 AM on August 17, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by nakedmolerats at 9:56 AM on August 17, 2021 [1 favorite]
Thanks Ahmad, that is indeed worth a read.
posted by bitteschoen at 10:15 AM on August 17, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by bitteschoen at 10:15 AM on August 17, 2021 [1 favorite]
The USA has a moral obligation to give every single Afghan who wants it US citizenship, or at least permanent resident status, a free ride to the US city of their choice, and help getting in their feet.
It won't happen. But it should.
I fear the US invasion has set women's rights in Afghanistan back by 40 years. I really hate it, I wish there was something the US could do that actually is productive and helps shorten the way, but it seems the only truly effective course of action is to not invade.
Look at Iran. It's not good there, but Iranian women have more freedom today than they did 20 years ago. Baby steps over 20 years suck. I'm not saying that it's good or optimal. But baby steps over 20 years beat the US throwing a temper tantrum that murders 80,000 or more Afghans and fuels fanaticism in the Taliban.
It'll be worse after we leave than it was when we invaded, and it was horrible when we invaded. It'll take decades for women in Afghanistan to claw their way back up to the horrible lack of rights and respect they had before 2001.
We owe the people of Afghanistan, and especially the women of Aghanistan, a debt that America will never pay.
posted by sotonohito at 11:02 AM on August 17, 2021 [4 favorites]
It won't happen. But it should.
I fear the US invasion has set women's rights in Afghanistan back by 40 years. I really hate it, I wish there was something the US could do that actually is productive and helps shorten the way, but it seems the only truly effective course of action is to not invade.
Look at Iran. It's not good there, but Iranian women have more freedom today than they did 20 years ago. Baby steps over 20 years suck. I'm not saying that it's good or optimal. But baby steps over 20 years beat the US throwing a temper tantrum that murders 80,000 or more Afghans and fuels fanaticism in the Taliban.
It'll be worse after we leave than it was when we invaded, and it was horrible when we invaded. It'll take decades for women in Afghanistan to claw their way back up to the horrible lack of rights and respect they had before 2001.
We owe the people of Afghanistan, and especially the women of Aghanistan, a debt that America will never pay.
posted by sotonohito at 11:02 AM on August 17, 2021 [4 favorites]
On Tuesday an unprecedented discussion took place on an Afghanistan television channel: a female presenter interviewed a Taliban spokesperson about the group’s plans for the country.
Beheshta Arghand’s discussion with the spokesperson Mawlawi Abdulhaq Hemad is being claimed by the rolling news channel TOLO News as the first time an Afghan woman has conducted an interview with a senior Taliban official inside the country’s borders.posted by roolya_boolya at 11:42 AM on August 17, 2021 [2 favorites]
“We said to them, look, a female is going to interview you,” said Saad Mohseni, the founder of TOLO News. “And they said fine. They could have easily have said screw you – they run the country, they can do whatever they want.”
...
Mohseni suggested the Taliban were going out of their way to placate watching western governments and media outlets. “It’s important for them to win hearts and minds, and show the internationals that they’re legitimate and that they’re folks you can work with. In this phase the media will have a great deal more freedom than in the latter phases.”
Malala Yousafzai (@malala) has a guest essay in today's New York Times. It is short and worth reading.
I have also been following Aisha Gulalai Wazir (@wazir_gulalai, Wikipedia bio), an ethnic-minority (Pashto) Pakistani politician from Peshawar (about 100 mi from Kabul), in an effort to understand the situation better.
For obvious reasons, many high-profile Afghan women have been deleting their online presence.
posted by Kadin2048 at 5:05 PM on August 17, 2021 [5 favorites]
I have also been following Aisha Gulalai Wazir (@wazir_gulalai, Wikipedia bio), an ethnic-minority (Pashto) Pakistani politician from Peshawar (about 100 mi from Kabul), in an effort to understand the situation better.
For obvious reasons, many high-profile Afghan women have been deleting their online presence.
posted by Kadin2048 at 5:05 PM on August 17, 2021 [5 favorites]
Keep in mind not all of us are Americans here, and even among the Americans here I’m pretty sure a good contingent if not the majority were against the US military intervention in Afghanistan.
And some of us who were for the war in Afghanistan were for it because the Taliban are gynocidal monsters.
posted by mr_roboto at 10:34 PM on August 17, 2021 [2 favorites]
And some of us who were for the war in Afghanistan were for it because the Taliban are gynocidal monsters.
posted by mr_roboto at 10:34 PM on August 17, 2021 [2 favorites]
Women protesting against the Taliban in Kabul, asking for political and social rights.
posted by kliuless at 11:56 PM on August 17, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by kliuless at 11:56 PM on August 17, 2021 [3 favorites]
Women protesting against the Taliban in Kabul, asking for political and social rights.
This video was posted by Masih Alinejad, the Iranian journalist with quite a story of her own (previously); she also recently interviewed the young woman whose tearful video made major media rounds the other day - turns out she's Iranian too, not Afghan, as was previously reported. As often, details being lost in the fast media landscape we find ourselves in, and the interwoven issues will make this a typically difficult issue to keep a clear framing on. Ahmad Khani's links above are helpful in this respect, I find.
posted by progosk at 2:40 AM on August 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
This video was posted by Masih Alinejad, the Iranian journalist with quite a story of her own (previously); she also recently interviewed the young woman whose tearful video made major media rounds the other day - turns out she's Iranian too, not Afghan, as was previously reported. As often, details being lost in the fast media landscape we find ourselves in, and the interwoven issues will make this a typically difficult issue to keep a clear framing on. Ahmad Khani's links above are helpful in this respect, I find.
posted by progosk at 2:40 AM on August 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
Shabnam Khan Dawran, news anchor at state-owned RTA Pashto, says she was denied entry to her office today. She turned up wearing a hijab and carrying her entry card, and was told "The regime has changed. Go home."
Dawran's video (no subtitles, but RT'd in English by Miraqa Popal, head of news at TOLOnews)
Dawran's Twitter
Photos of male Taliban officials replacing anchors were circulated over the weekend, and anchor Khadija Amin told the New York Times that female staff at TOLO had been indefinitely suspended. NYT article, paywalled
The colleague who retweeted Dawran's video, Miraqa Popal, said yesterday that TOLOnews has resumed broadcasting with female anchors. No word on the status of other women employees.
(RTA is state-owned and does public broadcasting on TV and radio; TOLOnews is a spinoff of popular commercial channel TOLO.)
posted by Pallas Athena at 11:53 AM on August 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
Dawran's video (no subtitles, but RT'd in English by Miraqa Popal, head of news at TOLOnews)
Dawran's Twitter
Photos of male Taliban officials replacing anchors were circulated over the weekend, and anchor Khadija Amin told the New York Times that female staff at TOLO had been indefinitely suspended. NYT article, paywalled
The colleague who retweeted Dawran's video, Miraqa Popal, said yesterday that TOLOnews has resumed broadcasting with female anchors. No word on the status of other women employees.
(RTA is state-owned and does public broadcasting on TV and radio; TOLOnews is a spinoff of popular commercial channel TOLO.)
posted by Pallas Athena at 11:53 AM on August 18, 2021 [4 favorites]
Ah the Taliban, those good old country boys... they promised they'd respect women's rights and graciously allow them to work... Why shouldn't we believe them?!
Gen Sir Nick Carter, the head of the British armed forces, said on Wednesday he thought the Taliban wanted an “inclusive Afghanistan” and described them as “country boys” who had “honour at the heart of what they do”. Asked on Sky News about the Taliban’s repression of women, Carter said: “I do think they have changed and recognise Afghanistan has evolved and the fundamental role women have played in that evolution.”posted by bitteschoen at 12:18 PM on August 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
I could not stop my tears when I heard the stories of some families. One had lost their son in the war and didn’t have any money to pay the taxi fare to Kabul, so they gave their daughter-in-law away in exchange for transportation. How can the value of a woman be equal to the cost of a journey?
I think this here is a big reason the Afghan army collapsed so rapidly. With the Taliban advancing, a soldier had to consider what would happen to the women he was responsible for if he died fighting.
posted by riruro at 2:34 PM on August 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
I think this here is a big reason the Afghan army collapsed so rapidly. With the Taliban advancing, a soldier had to consider what would happen to the women he was responsible for if he died fighting.
posted by riruro at 2:34 PM on August 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
"I am an Afghan woman working for a Western NGO in Kabul. I feel forgotten." Opinion piece by an anonymous author, for the Guardian.
posted by biogeo at 4:45 PM on August 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by biogeo at 4:45 PM on August 18, 2021 [2 favorites]
(Footnote: the friend-of-a-friend's sister I mentioned earlier managed to get a flight out of Kabul to Italy, where her brother is. She's landed safely there and claimed asylum.)
posted by Pallas Athena at 1:28 PM on August 22, 2021 [9 favorites]
posted by Pallas Athena at 1:28 PM on August 22, 2021 [9 favorites]
Time for the [bicycle] industry to help rescue Afghan women cyclists, advocate says
posted by aniola at 9:02 AM on August 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by aniola at 9:02 AM on August 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
Women who found freedom riding bikes in Afghanistan are burning their cycling gear: Once a symbol of progress, association with the bicycle is now dangerous in Afghanistan.
posted by aniola at 9:04 AM on August 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by aniola at 9:04 AM on August 23, 2021 [1 favorite]
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In the midst of the political commentary from every side for me it is devastating, but crucially important, to remember how terribly daily life has changed for many people today.
posted by roolya_boolya at 3:34 PM on August 16, 2021 [53 favorites]