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Subscribe to RSSViolence often eclipses Afghanistan's fledgling movie and television business, but one boy's story shows that dreams may just come true for that country's actors and actresses. NBC News' Thanh Truong reports.
KABUL, Afghanistan – When she returned to the country of her birth last year, 33-year-old Fereshta Kazemi was shocked to discover that fellow actresses in Afghanistan are often considered prostitutes.
“It’s true that that’s what many think, but are the actresses prostitutes? Absolutely not,” the Afghan-American said. “They’re taking a risk for art to represent our culture."
In a country where many see stepping onto a stage or in front of a camera as "un-Islamic," being an actor in the slowly evolving television and movie industry is less about fame and more about trailblazing.
And being a trailblazer comes with risks.
In August, an Afghan television actress was stabbed to death in the capital Kabul. Two surviving fellow actresses were also stabbed but then subjected to the ultimate indignity -- virginity tests at a local police station and prostitution charges.
Soon after, the country's most famous actress, Sahar Parniyan, went into hiding following a slew of death threats.
It isn't just women in the performing arts who have a difficult time. Twelve years after U.S.-backed forces toppled the Taliban, Afghanistan remains one of the most difficult countries in the world to be a woman or a girl.
There have been improvements. In 2004, the government signed into law a new constitution granting equality for all its citizens and ensuring women’s rights. And in 2009, the country passed the Elimination of Violence Against Women law, intended to protect women from abuse, rape, and forced marriages.
'Failure of imagination'
Despite the pledges to help improve women's lives, the country has one of the highest levels of maternal mortality and, according to U.N. estimates, around 90 percent of women suffer from some sort of domestic abuse.
Lawlessness is central to the problems facing Afghanistan's women, according to John Sifton, Asia advocacy director for the international organization Human Rights Watch.
"In the grand scheme of things, sure it has been a huge improvement (for women in Afghanistan) since the late 1990s, but it remains very, very difficult for women to go about activities that they are able to in neighboring Pakistan and even neighboring Iran … including acting," he said.
He called it an "enormous failure of imagination" to have laws that enshrine women's rights but largely exclude women from being involved in the legal and law enforcement system.
It is within these constraints that a tiny group of brave women decided to become actresses.
The profession has thus taken on an altruistic quality in Afghanistan, where the entertainment scene is reemerging in fits and starts after decades of violence and suppression by the Taliban.
“Most of the time (actors) haven’t had the opportunity to express this love for the arts," said Mina Sharif, an Afghan-Canadian TV and film producer in Kabul. "As soon as things were different here in the last 10 years or so, the boom in the art industry shows you that this was here all along, there just wasn’t the opportunity to express it.”
Sharif is currently producing a new series of Sesame Street for Tolo TV, the self-proclaimed most popular channel in Afghanistan.
The word “tolo” itself means sunrise or dawn in the native Pashto and Dari languages. It’s a fitting name, since producing shows and movies is new in the country. Resources are limited, as are the talent and money pools.
But perhaps the more significant hurdle is the attitude toward acting, and especially toward actresses.
Related:
Senior female Afghan official shot dead
EXCLUSIVE: US, NATO behind 'insecurity' in Afghanistan, Karzai says
Leave a Comment:
And we're fighting and dying in this country why? We ought to go to every house and tell everyone who wants to we will help them leave Afghanistan. Those that stay can choose to live in the fifth century with the Taliban. Let's get out now.
Oh, brilliant. Yes, go door to door and "set them free" to go where? Many Americans hate them ferners, and would probably march in protest over a sudden influx of Afghanis (or, more likely, write a misspelled letter to Rush or Bill or Sean from their comfortable home). And there are massive numbers of people in Afghanistan who hate the Taliban and are actually trying to help our soldiers succeed, believe it or not.
I sincerely admire the dignity and defense of education, culture, and civlization that many women who live in patriarchal, autocratic, and hyper-religious countries possess.
I try to inspire upon my American students, for example, that female adolescents in Afghanistan risk having acid thrown on them on their way to summer school...which they pay for...
Can you imagine if this country valued education to that degree?
We have one "Party" that openly denigrates knowledge, education, and Modernity. They are represented by intellectual behemoths such as Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann.
I agree, we should have never went in there in the first place, but now we are commited for years and years, there will never be peace over in those countries and they will win in the long run, just like the Vietnamese did. Obama, Wash DC and the politicians just can not get through their heads the US and UN can not run the world.
Blackbelt Marine...don't recon any terrorist would appreciate the free trip...state side do you...kind like cutting your head off to save money on a haircut...
Berecca: That's right. Focus on the issue. Hate Americans while ignoring the MAIN facts of this article: that Islam and Muslim countries treat women like @!$%#.
You're such a fool. We should give you a mandatory, permanent trip there!
Rachel, I don't hate Americans, I hate stupid people who make uninformed comments suggesting that huge populations of people "move out" without knowing the complexity of the issues that these Afghanis face. And if you think the oppression of women is only something that happens "over there," visit your local women's shelter or if you're lazy, you could just google statistics for sexual and physical assault against women. Or check out your local sex offender list and find that the vast majority are male. *Gasp* American males, and they're probably good old Christians, too.
You miss the point, you stupid so-and-so. There are criminals, rapists, pedophiles everywhere. Always have been. But here, unlike in the EVIL Muslim countries, the law is against them and prosecutes them, sometimes incarcerating them for life. And gangs of victims aren't taken from shelters to jails--or soccer fields to be executed--for "fornication" as in Muslim countries. And honor killers aren't celebrated here--in fact, they flee back to the Muslim hellholes from which they came.
Really, your level of ignorance is simply astounding. We're talking the government and the law vs individual acts. And ONCE AGAIN, I say you hate Americans. You'll excuse any act by Islam by obfuscating with irrelevancies about individual criminals here.
Think there's such a thing as "marital rape" in Muslim countries? BWAHAHAHAHAHA!
Case 1: A man is Islamically and lawfully allowed to seek sexual satisfaction and pleasure from his wife and to derive all sorts of enjoyment from this relationship. His wife is lawfully duty-bound to yield to her husband's sexual desires. If a woman refuses to satisfy her husband, the husband should initially persuade her in an orderly manner. However, if a man feels that his wife is trying to be malicious to him, and if he cannot tolerate the situation, then by observing the prescribed stages can punish her.
Allah states in the Holy Qur'an: "...And (as to} those on whose part you fear desertion admonish them. and leave them alone in the sleeping places and beat them; then if they obey you do not seek a way against them; surely Allah is High Great (4:34)."
Therefore, the Quran allows beating one's wife as the final stage of punishment, in the event of unreasonable behaviour of a woman with regard to the sexual desires of her husband.
Isn't religion great?? Almost same thing was done here in the past by religious fanatics...and lets not forget Jim Jones, Jimmy Baker, Al Sharpton, Jimmy Swaggert and all the 'men of God' who, like every other religious nutcase believes THEY are the TRUE ones and all of us are going to Hell....
Send all Democrats and Republicans to a work camp. They and their supporters are responsible.
2Little(is right): Jim Jones is dead. Jimmy Swaggert didn't rape or have sex with children but with willing women who, we will note, were not executed by the state for fornication. No, it's not almost the same.
But perhaps you are just obfuscating to make excuses for the abuse done to women in Muslim lands. (Shrug) There are such secret propagandizing posters here.
Sharia Law works for me. Being a male nowadays in the US is liken to what is going on with women in Afghanistan, courtesy of the American "judicial system". We need to have a law similar to Sharia to put the puppet back in the box. America had laws on the book, and the customs dictated what a womans role was in society. Somehow, due in part to feminism, we lost our way. We need to bring those traditions and laws back.
Rachel, nobody is saying that women have it great in Muslim countries. Most people agree that there should be serious change and liberation in those places. But what are you doing about it? Have you donated any money to the cause? Have you sat with a crying Muslim woman who just got raped? Do you even know any actual Muslim people?
You seem to be just another person who sits around listening to pundits and talk radio hosts who give you their OPINION while you sit there nodding and feeling all indignant. Then you repost some sentences from the Koran that you googled in an attempt to assert that you've actually read the book. If you had, and if you've ever fully read any religious books, you'd realize that it's no different than the other ridiculous, self-protecting memes that weak-minded people follow. If you're going to be anti-Islam, you better be anti-religion across the board, you hypocrite.
Until you roll up your sleeves and become active in the process of liberating those women, you should just stick a sock in it.
Forget "un-Islamic". What does it finally take to see how "un-holy" this whole Islamic religion is?
People are people before putting a label like muslim, christian etc. God made women and they are to be treated as equal to man not less, we as woman no matter what race was created with gifts and talents, not just to be treated as doormats or man's sex relievers. Some where in all the teachings of the Bible and even in the Quaron, teaching is being taught by personal opinion, because I am reminded of the women in the Bible that was to be stoned, Jesus said "he who is without sin cast the first stone" I feel that at that moment the women was set free and the men had to look at themselves because they were not without sin and probably had also laid with this women, Just saying! As a people we tend to go with what has been taught without really searching for ourselves and call it the truth. It was never intended for women in any country to be treated badly, it is just pure evil!! if you believe there is a God (whatever you may call Him) then you have to believe there is a devil and that's the spirit that people open the door to and cause hatred and violence towards each other. Ask God for wisdom and guidance so you will know the real truth, you ask He will give. Don't be mislead! Have a Blessed one!!
Never Stop Asking Questions---The only party that denigrates it's people is the one that thinks they are right and everyone else is wrong, your party. You say you educate but I bet you place limits on that education which would mean you indoctrinate and not educate.
What a load of crap. We kicked the Taliban out ten years ago, and the Afghans welcomed them right back in with open arms. The Taliban ARE the government Afghanistan wants! Let them have what they want.
"And we're fighting and dying in this country why?
Because we invited the Russians to kill them in a proxy war and where that wasn't enough we kicked in the door ourselves Mr. Backbelt.
Now, write 'em a check and smile.
Equality doesn't seem possible. There, they oppress women. Here, in the US, a man can do no right and is always suspect.
I have never disrespected a woman, but in this culture I have received a lot of disrespect from women. They are entitled to everything, yet responsible for nothing. This country (the US) is so anti-male, I think it should just go ahead and outlaw male births. Since most people here are too poor to afford any medical care, much less artificial fertilization, this will fix America's problem. Within 100 years after the new policy is enacted, the problem will pretty much be solved.
Why don't we send all the US males who dislike the way things are here to Afghanistan where men rule, and in turn bring all Afghani women and girls to US where they'll be more respected, and can go to school without threat of rape (well perhaps), acid burns, and whatever the Afghanist men do to them. I, myself, would prefer to stay here and treat the Afghani women/girls with more respect.
I like it. American men who cannot deal with independent partners as wives are ordering mail order brides from 3rd world countries. Men who cannot establish a relationship with a thinking , working woman will have the devoted Muslim woman and the Muslim woman will be an American woman. Keep the 76 virgins and give him one woman who knows what she is doing.
Not surprisingly, as most Americans are functionally illiterate, Ed and Mah did not read my post yet made smart arsed, negative remarks.
Ed...I believe in equal respect for men and women, as I clearly stated in my post. However, I do not believe in women not being held accountable for anything in this culture....heck, they can go raping little kids and society does nothing to them here!
Mah..."independent partners," "working," "thinking" woman....lol. Here, the women mostly lay on their arse or work easy jobs and demand things from everyone else. Heck, here they don't have to work at all...they can just divorce and take all his money for any reason...and get alimony while they use other men.
"3rd world countries"....sounds like America these days. I go overseas routinely and the only places I know of that qualify as 3rd world countries are mainly in Africa and the Americas....mostly because of US involvement. The rest of the world is outpacing this country...I don't think you could even say America is anywhere equal to those of Western Europe or some of East Asia.
Since everyone wants to be gay in the US anyway...why not just eliminate male births so all Americans can enjoy wonderful same-sex love! The remaining effeminate American males can share their love together...until they eventually pass on. The eventual result: a wonderful, perfect, all female heaven where there is no violence, no ugly people, no criminals, and no sexual harassment/abuse.
"“It’s true that that’s what many think, but are the actresses prostitutes? Absolutely not,” the Afghan-American said. “They’re taking a risk for art to represent our culture.""
She does not appear to know about her own religion Islam.
Islam is most unfair and sometimes deadly to females, minorities including minority sects/tribes and invented enemies.
These days oil rich Sunni rulers of House of Saud, Kuwait, UAE and other Sunni Arab League nations and Pakis have taken Islam to most dangerous and intolerant levels.
They are leaving only destruction, tears and dead bodies wherever they have set their feet.
Afghanistan is one of the many examples.
Not just Islam, most religions are male centric as well. However, this is what happen when you have religious based government.
Vatican is also can be most similar with male centric theme as well and refuse for woman to be anything more in their ranks.
She may not be a practicing Muslim.
She has the option to leave the horrid reigion of Islam...but that would put her at risk of execution by the more pious Muslims....she is in a lose-lose situation....Islam is rigidly strict on apostasy....
Why should she have to leave? Perhaps she wants to fight against the male status-quo and change something for other women and girls in her country. And CuongDNguyen is right, Islam isn't the only religion which gives men a free pass to do whatever they want to women. She is risking her LIFE for equality, and we should do everything we can to help her. If people are so appalled at what "those filthy Muslims" are doing to women, put your money where your mouth is and donate to any number of projects in Afghanistan. Go to Unicef's website or just do a simple google search to find one that suits you.
By remaining a Muslim she accepts whatever Islam dishes out...she will never change anything in Islam...One day you may read about her execution at the hands of a pious Muslim...Islam has no tolerance of anything non-Islamic...
The biggest problem with Islam (and many other religions) is that they've failed to adapt to the changing world. When it first started, Islam had better treatment of women than any of the others. However, as times changed, women gained more and more rights elsewhere while the Middle East didn't improve at all in this aspect. One of the fundamental reasons for this is that Islam was supposed to have been the "final revelation"--mostly to prevent a book 2 from being published.
Oh, and apostasy is treated differently in some parts of the world. You see, if some girl in America decides to stop being Muslim, she wouldn't have to face threats of bodily harm (and if she does she can simply go to the cops). If some girl in Afghanistan did the exact same thing, she'd be killed very quickly. For the record, the Quran allows Muslims to leave the religion as long as they don't start preaching against Islam.
Islam has no tolerance of anything non-Islamic" ~~~~~~~ Curiouser and curiouser! Mohammad favored education for women. Some of his wives were among the most highly education PEOPLE world wide at that time. Yet there are now a host of self-appointed little tin godlets who routinely ignore the Quran and even directly oppose it in the interests of promoting THIER own ideas about Islam. Example, The Quran imposes a virtually impossible standard to convict a man of fornication or adultery or rape, therefore the man usually goes free regardless of the evidence. AT THE SAME TIME, The Quran imposes THE SAME STANDARD of evidence to convict a woman, yet these little tin godlets usually ignore this word of their God and convict her on LITTLE, or NO evidence and even, sometimes knowing and admitting they know she is innocent, but convicting her anyway, just because of supossed appearances.
Islam is run by the zealots who have counterparts in all religions. The purpose is power and control. Voluntarily giving anyone that much power is repugnant. Islam is especially critical of art forms. It is something the leaders don't understand therefore can't control. Start with women because they cannot fight back. Horrible.
A shortage of Afghan actors and actresses? Try the CIA, they have plenty of them.
Do you think this is all about the stone age attitude of the religion they call peaceful there. It sounds like the many other countries with that same exact religion. It's not about who has rights at all and you must do what the Imam says or you die.....does this sound just a bit primitive to you too? It's like there are a bunch of little Kings all over the country to me. "I say, so there fore you do!!"
Just look at Morocco where a 15 year old was forced to marry her rapist last year in the name of honor. And to keep the rapist of of jail too. What was her choice? She decided it would be much better to be dead....so she eat rat poison to killer her self. And it worked too...Under Moroccan law, section 475, if the victims family agrees, a man can avoid being sentenced for the crime of raping a minor child under the age of 18, if he marries her. Once they are married, the rapist is pardoned for his crime and some believe that the girl, and more importantly, the family, can now restore their honor.
See just how primitive these people are! Just look under a rock and you'll find them.
We used to call them "shot-gun weddings" here. It was not unheard of, in the last century, for girls who were impregnated from date rape to have to marry their rapists, so that the baby would have its father and be born in wedlock. Too bad if the man was already married; my aunt's husband divorced her so he could marry the teen-age girl he impregnated.
I heard one woman's story, whose family had her do it, back in the 1930's, "and there was another boy at school that I really liked instead, but...." and she ended up married to the father of her children for decades, even though she didn't love him, but that was expected of her, in her Protestant household.
ElkMeadow: Good try but not even close. They didn't make raped girls marry their rapists if they didn't want to. The "shot-gun" was to make the MAN marry. And they didn't kill girls who refused to marry their rapists. The idea here was to get the baby a father and spare the girl a difficult life raising a child on their own. Date rape implies DATES were a possibilty--not like in Islamic countries, where the penalty for a girl "dating" is death. Stranger rapes in this country were prosecuted.
Okay, rachel, I guess someone's personal story isn't valid for you. It couldn't have happened if YOU weren't there, right?
Because, you ignoramus, we're talking about the women of a country and culture. Personal stories are NOT valid here, not without qualifiers.
KEEP MAKING EXCUSES AND OBFUSCATING!
What does "obfuscating" mean? Berecca asks.
It means concern trolling--pretending to care about the issue while sewing the seeds of disagreement, here making fallacious moral equivalents to personal stories when that is not the issue.
Knowing the family, I'm sure that her dad would have killed her (and her unborn baby) if she didn't marry the thug. She sure didn't dare to divorce him, either.
Examples of one mean nothing. If the father had killed her, he'd have gone to jail. In a Muslim country he would be feted as a hero who saved his family honor. BIG difference.
Afghan woman forced to choose between marrying her rapist, or 12 years in jail for adultery
The plight of the woman in this report, Gulnaz, first came up in this story, in connection with an EU documentary that was at the time deemed too dangerous to the women featured in it (or perhaps too politically damaging) to be shown. That story also revealed the fact that half of the women in Afghan jails are there for "moral crimes."
Gulnaz herself is a victim of Sharia, and particularly of the demand for four witnesses to support the allegation of a sexual crime, as stipulated in Qur'an 24:13. A woman alleging rape must produce four witnesses, or invite charges of adultery.
Sharia is enshrined in the Afghan constitution as the highest law of the land, thereby hard-wiring the entire society against reform: any proposed legal reforms will go against Sharia as it has been practiced for centuries. And so, here we are. And there is Gulnaz.
"Afghan woman's choice: 12 years in jail or marry her rapist and risk death," by Nick Paton Walsh and Masoud Popalza for CNN, November 22:
These people have lived like this for 1000's of years....We need to just mind our own d@mn business and let the savages live like savages.....Afghanistan and Iraq were stupid wars....it should have been Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Syria if a real difference was to be made.....
Islam is a cult for child molesting morons like Muhammed. Send all muslims to Yemen or some other Muslim s*** hole.
But what about the likes of Naser Abdo, the would-be second Fort Hood jihad mass murderer; and Khalid Aldawsari, the would-be jihad mass murderer in Lubbock, Texas; and Muhammad Hussain, the would-be jihad bomber in Baltimore; and Mohamed Mohamud, the would-be jihad bomber in Portland; and Faisal Shahzad, the would-be Times Square jihad mass-murderer; and Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, the Arkansas military recruiting station jihad murderer; and Naveed Haq, the jihad mass murderer at the Jewish Community Center in Seattle; and Mohammed Reza Taheri-Azar, the would-be jihad mass murderer in Chapel Hill, North Carolina; Ahmed Ferhani and Mohamed Mamdouh, who hatched a jihad plot to blow up a Manhattan synagogue; and Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the would-be Christmas airplane jihad bomber; and many others like them who have plotted and/or committed mass murder in the name of Islam and are motivated by its texts and teachings — all in the U.S. in the last couple of years.
Are you sure that we are in the 21st century? It certainly doesn't sound like we are. More like the 5th to me.
This story has political agenda written all over it to me. I was almost sucked in by the wording, until upon closer inspection I discovered the discrepancy between the title and the article.
Granted, even with an unbiased interpretation, the Islamic virginity test are most likely degrading, out of the three females only one woman was stabbed. While it's not the best reputation to have, or even the safest climate, It's dishonest to argue that being an actress is inherently a death sentence. This sounds like more of a political issue to me. Newsflash: A majority of American female celebrities are of dubious sexual morals anyway. It sounds like she's intentionally victimizing afghan women. I would say that perception is also dependent on the role.
what a creep you are! had they failed the virginity tests, which shouldn't have been done as a woman's private life should be her private life, they might have been imprisoned or executed1
how is it that you don't bother discussing the majority of American MALE celebrities?
next you'll come out against gays.
I think the problem is with you. Are you Muslim by chance?
"A majority of American female celebrities are of dubious sexual morals anyway." So, you don't like that they have sex, and they therefore deserve death? And the males? All virgins until their wedding night, are they? Do THEY deserve to be stabbed?
SHE isn't victimizing Afghan women. The men who stab them are.
@Racheal
Judging by your statement, you're exactly the kind of person this story was designed to take advantage of -- another quasi feminist reading into instead of what's written determined to deify females.
First, the issue of the validity of Afghanistan virginity test, or their error ratio, isn't on trial here, nor is the sex lives of the actresses being considered. What is problematic is whether or not it's intellectually honest to place them in the same sentence with a women who has died, solely because they're actresses. If Kazemi has no other factors, that's mainly correlation in my opinion, especially since not much is specifically stated regarding the circumstances surrounding the actress death.
Had male celebrates been brought up, there would be a comparison. Addressed is the unstated notion that only afghan actresses are of low repute because of their profession.
I have several issues with the homosexual cause, but that's off topic.
No. But that is also off the issue.
@Sandy
If I read the story correctly, it is believed that the women who were stabbed were stabbed mainly because of their profession, not necessarily because of her gender or virginity, to say nothing of their thespian skills, so from what, other than your own bias, in the original statement or the article lead you to draw that conclusion? Granted, the test, in addition to the stabbings, of the survivors were adding injury to insult, not to mention degrading and wrong, it's just as wrong to cloud the issues.
You're correct. Violence, by either gender, is a considerable problem that should be addressed.
The many opportunities denied women under Islamic law, from
giving equal testimony in court to having the right to exclude other wives from
their marital bed, is very clear proof that women are of lesser value then men
in Islam. Muslim women are not even free to marry outside the faith without
being killed by their own families.
Islamic law also specifies that when a woman is murdered by a
man, her family is owed only half as much "blood money" (diya) as they would be
if she had been a man. (The life of a non-Muslim is generally assessed at
one-third).
Although a man retains custody of his children in the event
of his wife's death, a non-Muslim woman will automatically lose custody of her
children in the event of her husband's death unless she converts to Islam or
marries a male relative of within his family. Even the rights of Muslim mothers
are subordinate to her husband's family.
Contemporary Muslims like to counter that Arabs treated women
as camels prior to Muhammad. This is somewhat questionable, given that
Muhammad's first wife was a wealthy woman who owned property and ran a
successful business prior to ever meeting him. She was even his boss...
(although we're sure that changed after the marriage). Still, it is somewhat
telling that Islam's treatment of women can only be defended by contrasting it
to an extremely primitive environment in which women were supposedly
non-entities.
Homa Darabi was a talented physician who took her own life by
setting herself on fire in public protest of the oppression of women in Islamic
Iran. She did this after a 16-year-old girl was shot to death for wearing
lipstick. In the book, Why We Left Islam, her sister includes a direct quote
from one of the country's leading clerics:
"The specific task of women in this society is to marry
and bear children. They will be discouraged from entering legislative,
judicial, or whatever careers which may require decision-making, as women lack
the intellectual ability and discerning judgment required for these
careers."
Modern day cleric Abu Ishaq al-Huwaini has called
for a return of the slave markets, where Muslim men can go to order concubines.
In this man of God's ideal world, "when I want a sex-slave, I got to the
market and pick whichever female I desire and buy her."
At best, Islam elevates the status of a woman to somewhere
between that of a camel and a man.
Muhammad captured women in war and treated them as a tradable
commodity. The immutable, ever-relevant Qur'an explicitly permits women to be
kept as sex slaves. These are hardly things in which Muslims can take pride.
ItIs:
That was in relation to American female celebrities, whom YOU introduced to the discussion. And because Afghan actresses are considered prostitutes by virtue of being actresses, they ARE being stabbed because of their perceived non-virginity, or, in the case of married women, infidelity.
There are those who make specious comparisons to the past in Western culture. In the past, actresses in Western Europe and America were viewed as prostitutes of a sort--in fact they were courtesans, taking important men as lovers and abandoning them when they'd gotten what they wanted. They lived full, independent lives. They weren't forced to marry and weren't killed.
In fact, the law didn't kill street prostitutes! In Islamic countries they kill innocent girls who...GASP...go to school.
They rape women who dare to join protests in EGYPT.
A couple big flashes of light and their misery will be over, their jihad will be over, they will be in heaven with their beloved Mohamed enjoying 40 virgins...yet we will continue to lose our innocents all in the name of jihad and mohamed for the next 100 years just like the last 500...
defeat your enemy while you can with no mercy...you never know when the tables will be turned and you will be defeated...
Mohammed's first act of mass murder was to attack a Jewish city, kill all the men and sexually enslave the women. I think we give payback now but instead set the women free. Some of them spend their whole lives in a 12x12 mud-walled hut with no books, no TV, no radio, no visitors, no right to go outside.
Afghanistan is going to be stuck in the third century whether the rest of the world likes it or not. As long as Russia, China, Iran and Pakistan continue to supply the terrorists, nothing will change. If the US wants to win the war, we need to declare war and begin carpet bombing the regions where the terrorists hide -- and that region extends to Tehran, as well as all the way to Islamabad. Nothing short of an all out war will be successful, but since we cannot seem to commit to that sort of thing, all is lost and we should just get out while we can. We should also stop interfering in Arab customs, trying to win hearts and minds and spread democracy. That doesn't work, either.
Bring our troops home...come what may...we cannot change the people in Muslim countries...they have to do it themselves...give them time...to catch up...I guess...the ones who want us there must be far and few...oh my words seem so harsh...I just don't know...simple to say...wave a magic wand to help the ones who want it...leave the rest behind...don't take them to America...wow...where would they go? so sad...
these women are like a man without a country...no where in this world for these women to go...they want to change their country...I can give them courage I would...
God Bless the poor women of Afganistain and America...we are all suffering one way or another...
they want their baby girls to live...and we are aborting babies...so sad...
Arab customs are not the problem...the problem is the Islamic religion and its draconian Shar'ia law....and the Muslim demands that everyone must be governed by Shar'ia law...
do your homework....read up on Islam and its Shar'ia law and discover what they say...
Still can't understand why liberals love islam again.
Because they both want to take away your freedoms...
most of us don't S(omething)Brain, it's just that we're smart enough to know you can't go globe trotting and forcing your will on others, nor can you change a culture and it's beliefs whenever they've practiced their way for centuries. "When in Rome...." may apply.
Liberals are deathly afraid of being perceived as racist or bigoted. They understand that being politically correct is an unassailably righteous position and they can't give that up. They've just overlooked the small fact that it's a self-righteous position. Islam is not a race. Muslims are not a race.
And, of course, liberals and Muslims are both knee-jerk professional victims.
Political correctness = sanctimony.
Islam is poison.
that may well be true Pray Hard, and inclusive be sure and add that most neo-cons, I like that better than "conservatives" because they never are conservative, ARE racists and bigoted. The difference really is, they lie and swear they're not. Oh, and the Christian Right is very often neither
"Fereshta Kazemi was shocked to discover that fellow actresses in Afghanistan are often considered prostitutes." She returns to Afghanistan to find ignorance and backward thinking. What on earth was she thinking or expecting? This is one of the most backward, out of touch places on the face of the earth. In fact if you look around the world it is a challenge to find a predominately Muslim country that is a leader in technology, education, human rights and other markers of a progressive societies.
thank you William...I have been trying to think of one...maybe England...they have a large population of Muslims...??? but they are not predominately muslim...I truly thing they are a sick society...but on the other hand...the gay thing here is not good either...gay marriage...not my idea of a good thing...laws for it are wrong...just as laws for marriage in general are wrong...but then you get into the quagmire of kids marrying...oh my...God help us...please...where does this end? sad for sure...
It's really pathetic that these women crave attention so badly that they'll risk their lives to get it.
That's just sad!
I think we should have made the Afghan army and police force all female and prohibited males. Establish the death penalty in Afghanistan for any male found carrying a weapon more dangerous than a potato peeler.
Almost all such males are already carrying a weapon far more dangerous than a potato peeler.
I am sorry for this in advance. So here goes. The Afghans are idiots. Just like the other societies that treat women this way. I don't know how anybody can treat another human being this way. It just confuses me to no end. And the thing is is that this has gone on since day one. Imagine all the suffering over the ages. Now on the dawn of our enlightenment their are people who still live the stone age and we are planning to put people on Mars. What a gap between cultures. These societies who oppress must make some kind of effort to change. But any kind of change is denied because they are so stubborn.
What I want to know is how can a father of a little girl grow up in a society like this? You see the difference between rednecks and Muslims is that rednecks stick with family right or wrong and the cowardly Muslims will throw rocks at their own daughters even if a stranger says they have sinned. So the next time anybody trashes America just remember that fact: That our lower and middle class in America have more integrity and family values than the highest level of society in those worlds. Except for the Ghetto dwellers in America of course, which is another story how they treat their women.
Why are you apologizing for stating the truth?
Scene: In Afghanistan
Man sees beautiful actress and becomes sexually aroused.
There is no word for leering in the language; in fact, it does not occur there.
So she must be a prostitute; and one day, he will ascend to paradise and be surrounded by actresses (?).
yeah...hurrah...72 of them...I just don't want to understand the side of the men in Afganistan...what is up with their pre-disposition...with women being virgins...and then they sell their daughters? They want them to be dumb...don't let them go to school...someone might be smarter than the men...
I just don't get it...we tried to help them...so much...but we have seemed to be a lossed cause...they kill their women...I know we have criminals here too...maybe they are muslim? did that ever occur...to anyone??? being jelous is bad...they have that on the brain...but then they kill the woman/women...I just don't understand...we have parts of the bible that are not to be taken literally...they were harsh examples to make us understand a point...we had bad leaders of our religions at times...but they were not the doctrine...just bad men...is this true of muslims...notas far as I know at this time...evil is always lurking in our lives...our Bible says be warry of false prophets...
just a lot of words on here...I do not know how to help these girls/women...so sad...praying for them and us...maybe someone smarter than I can help them...it makes me cry all the men/women died to help them...please don't give up...I know for now the only language they Musilm terrorists understand is force...sad...
Well into the Middle Ages Christianity considered acting by women unChristian and considered them Prostitutes!! So these Muslims have not yet left the 'Middle Ages'-------they are slow learners!!!
I am soo heartfelt and saddened by this story. I am going to start a non profit to fix this. I am accepting donations as of now. For every $100 I will send seven cents to the cause of this horrible situation (like CUNY). Then I will run around the block naked and freaking out.
I simply do not understand how anyone could practice or support any belief system this repressive.
Fear and willful ignorance.
Women in Muslim countries risk their lives simply because they're women.
who cares about actresses in afghanistan.....yawn
who cares about actresses in afghanistan.....yawn
When do this people is going to stop being so stupid
There has to be a reason this administration continues to send our young men and women over there to be killed. The entire nation of Afganistan isn't worth the life of one of America's worst citizens.
Freddy4Life, this administration didn't send the first troops to Afghanistan, or Iraq. In case you've forgotten 9/11/01 when we had airliners strike the Twin towers of the wtc in NYC, or Pentagon in Washington, DC, or crashed a plane in PA because the passengers attempted to overpower them these terrorists came from Afghanistan, and I strongly suspect Pakistan as well. As for the invasion of Iraq, Cheney and a few others lied about weapons of mass destruction to get Congress to go along with that. Obama is largely responsible for wrapping up occupation there.
Just being a woman in a muslim country is a risk to their lives.