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Global Issues through a Female Eye

The burning issues of the day
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isha
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Global Issues through a Female Eye

#1

Post by isha »

There are often stories in the media from around the world that seem to hit me differently as a woman.

I first thought about a thread on Afghanistan but then I realised there are always stories here and there that have a particular effect on me as a woman, and I thought to keep them in one place. I know 100% these stories affect men greatly too, because we have brothers, friends, fathers, partners, but I do not know if they have quite the same fear kick in the belly. And of course men are suffering terribly in the situations also. It is just this world remains quite difficult for women in different places, and I feel that connection to the female of the species.

Might as well get it out of the way - I do not vibe with all that pay gap, rape culture, toxic masculinity stuff that is rammed down our collective throats at the moment. I have adult sons who are brilliant, as are their friends, their peers, etc. I am not a feminist as the concept exists as a modern political entity, though I am big time on the side of girls and women. People can talk about that stuff if it is their bag somewhere else - I understand people can be upset about those things and are completely entitled to their opinion.

Anyway I will start with Afghanistan because that bothers me recently.
Many years ago in the 1990s when the Taliban first started up I heard stories that horrified me of women being forced to leave their jobs, not allowed education or medical attention, even in childbirth, and having to wear slippers so that they could be more silent as they moved about. Now the US have left Afghanistan, and one can argue about the geopolitics of that. In that wake of that the Taliban are moving across the country like a wild fire, well -equipped, taking cities, driving refugees before them, and kidnapping girls from 12 years old to be their wives or sex slaves. It must be unimaginably terrifying to be living in that place right now. The thoughts of trying to protect your daughter or sister or wife from being captured and kept to be continuously abused by marauding groups of mobile well-armed fanatics is just terrible.

It is terrible for men also, there are decapitations. The men are being killed, the women raped. Rape is a tactic of war.
A million refugees have been displaced, they are living in tents in large cities like Kabul, 70% are women and children fleeing. Those cities look like they might fall to the Taliban. A medieval social structure will be reimposed.
However, 38-year-old Ziagul from Bamiyan does not need a government agency to tell her that the Taliban are using women as “weapons of war”. She is old enough to remember what happened when they attacked her province in the 1990s.

“Even then when they attacked Bamiyan, they had raped women. This fear has always been in our minds. That’s why we ran away, to prevent this from happening again,” she says.

Ziagul and six other women from Bamiyan escaped to the capital in the middle of the night. Many families in their villages are sending just the women and girls away to safer areas, they say.

Many believe that the Taliban have become more violent and brutal than in the 1990s. “Much of the recent wave of displacement across Afghanistan has been caused by the fear the Taliban have created about how they will treat the survivors,” says Ali Amiri, an Afghan sociologist and university professor.
https://www.theguardian.com/global-deve ... fghanistan
A generation of Afghan women who have taken their place in society are now watching that space shrink before their eyes. They entered public life as lawmakers, local governors, doctors, lawyer, teachers and public administrators, working for two decades to help create a civil society and generate opportunities for those who come after them.

Now the Taliban are going door-to-door in some areas, compiling lists of women and girls aged between 12 and 45 years for their fighters to forcibly marry. Women are again being told they cannot leave the house without a male escort, they cannot work, study or dress as they please. Schools and colleges are being shut and businesses destroyed. The exodus of those who can afford to flee the country is growing by the day.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/artic ... fghanistan
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#2

Post by 316670 »

Typical woman, me, me, me, what about the other 186 genders opinion on this subject?
Think of the other genders before you post something like this again
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#3

Post by isha »

NotThatDevnull wrote: Thu Aug 12, 2021 1:08 pm Typical woman, me, me, me, what about the other 186 genders opinion on this subject?
Think of the other genders before you post something like this again
Dear NTD, I confess - you made me laugh a little snort laugh :)
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#4

Post by Edz87 »

The thing about Afghanistan and other places where women are treated as 2nd class is that change has to come from the inside. They have to wake up to the madness of treating half the population like shit. Until then there's not much you can do other than propaganda and international pressure but that only goes so far, especially when you are dealing with 6th century mindsets.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#5

Post by isha »

Edz87 wrote: Thu Aug 12, 2021 8:04 pm The thing about Afghanistan and other places where women are treated as 2nd class is that change has to come from the inside. They have to wake up to the madness of treating half the population like shit. Until then there's not much you can do other than propaganda and international pressure but that only goes so far, especially when you are dealing with 6th century mindsets.
Thanks for replying.
I do agree an imposed change will not sustain itself. I think that the women in at least the urban areas are motivated and aware of their human rights. There are quite a lot of women in public life, as far as I can make out. And obviously they are supported as women making independent choices by THEIR menfolk.

But all that modernising over the past couple of decades is being swallowed up by a force with great fire power and great ideological convictions.

The modernised men of course will suffer if..when..all the cities fall, they may have to dress a certain way or make religious observances, but women I think will be especially curtailed. Maybe deprived of all engagement in society. A total regression from what a society willingly chose and moved towards under other conditions.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#6

Post by isha »

Same can be said for Iran and I will have things to say about there too. It regressed from a chosen state of modernity. So many young women in prison now for simply not wearing a scarf.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#7

Post by Guburnor »

NotThatDevnull wrote: Thu Aug 12, 2021 1:08 pm Typical woman, me, me, me, what about the other 186 genders opinion on this subject?
Think of the other genders before you post something like this again
MOD NOTE: Deleted
Last edited by Guburnor on Thu Aug 12, 2021 8:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Wrong end of the stick
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#8

Post by Guburnor »

Guburnor wrote: Thu Aug 12, 2021 8:36 pm MOD NOTE: Please think about the forum rules, specifically "Attack the post, not the poster" and "Don't be a dick", before you post something like this again.
MOD NOTE: My own mod note post was reported by another user with "Whoosh". Fair point. I get the joke now. @Notthatdevnull You can disregard the previous mod note.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#9

Post by isha »

mailman wrote: Thu Aug 12, 2021 8:36 pm If you are a Father wishing the best for your Children irrespective of their gender why would you stay in a country like Afghanistan? Is it a case of not knowing better.
It would be a case of I cede these 10 square metres of dust and rubble to you Fanatics, good luck and goodbye.

I do feel that there is a patriarchal element to it in that boys are told you will grow up and become master of your house and your children and wife/wives will obey you without question.
How would you get out? Most people in the world live hand to mouth and if they make a choice to leave they effectively instantly become homeless. They go into certain danger that way too. Indeed if I, a very lucky person living in the affluent modern West, had to flee for some reason I would pretty quickly also be homeless having not that much longer term resources in the bank. Imagine how it is for subsistence farmers.

Usually the wealthy can get out, the rest are carrying their belongings on their back and camping in cheap tents in the city parks. They are trying to get away, but it is a sticky web.

As for people for whom the ideology appeals in that they can become masters of chattels I think it might have to do with an intellectual deficit. This is just an idea, so I don't know. (I would have to say there is a similar imprint if a person buys sex from a trafficked person - just not caring about the other as a human being.) These Taliban are not bright people in the rank and file, who can succeed in business or education or etc. So put a powerful gun in their hands and tell them they are lord of all they wish to take, it must be appealing to people who would otherwise be nothing.

We should not be leaving things to unfold as they are. This is why we are supposed to have supra national organisations like peacekeeping forces.

Could not believe Psaki, Bidens press secretary, saying yesterday that the Taliban "has to make an assessment of what they want their role to be in the international community". Really?! Wtf. These are marauding murdering rapists on a national scale.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#10

Post by isha »



This lady tells how the charade of negotiations allows the wealthy time to leave.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#11

Post by Cyclepath »

We in the 'liberal west' have some difficult decisions ahead of us. And at every step we'll stand accused of islamophobia, cultural imperialism, and so on. None of the superpowers are covered in glory here because none of them intervened in these medieval hellholes out of concern for the plight of women.

It's become problematic to call these cultures what they are, backward and regressive. If we really cared we'd go in and forcefully liberate the victims of these cultures. In many cases however the victims don't even understand that they're victims. We are also engaged in a slow process of cultural dilution in the west where cultural relativism is the order of the day.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#12

Post by isha »

Cyclepath,I am not sure how far your views go re these issues (takes time to 'know' people) - some people go right off the deep end and I cannot vibe with a lot of unpleasant hardline ideas.

But personally I have no problem calling any type of backward and regressive ideology what it is - backward and regressive.

Afghanistan as it was once upon a time, before fundamentalism, was not so backward and regressive. It was a place many western backpackers visited in the 60s, 70s and 80s (I know, I know the ganja was good). It was like any of the more traditional and religious societies eg Morocco, Egypt, which have their own cohesive beauty and grace, just like India etc, which may seem now somewhat backwards to us who are used to very liberal cultures.

Even such traditional societies enabled women to express ambitions - they have been female teachers, doctors, scientists, Prime Ministers, leaders etc in such societies.
These traditional societies can be very protective of women, keeping them cloistered to a certain extent, which can depend on family opinions. Some of this is grounded in a genuine desire to protect their girls from attack and abuse - throughout human history women and girls have not generally been able to walk freely through the world, due to strong possibility of sexual attack. The fact that girls and women can in the west, generally speaking, is a huge advance in human civilisation.

There is a long arc of nuance between a society (like ours) where girls are sexualised from childhood with a pop culture that promotes their sexual body as their main tool of expression and a society where girls are kidnapped at 12 as sex slaves, or gang raped as in India. These are two extremes, one more dangerous obviously than the other, but both trading on a base line of human desire. Or debased maybe is the word.

Somewhere in the average and middle portion of that broad arc people can argue about back and forth about what is ''good'' and what is ''bad'' .
But at the end of that arc where women are kept indoors, refused education, genitally mutilated, married young, and at the extremes treated as pieces of meat to be kidnapped or gang raped, I think we can all easily say backward and regressive. I have no time for cultural relativism.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#13

Post by Waning Gibbus »

I agree with Cyclepath wholeheartedly on this...

Let them have at it I says.. Just because they don't share our values, it doesn't mean that they're wrong.. For 1,000s of years humans have been living a tribal type existence... It's only relatively recently in the evolution of our species, that most have been living in what's considered somewhat 'civilised' (whatever that means) circumstances ie states, laws, infrastructure of roads/ sewerage /housing / indoor plumbing and education etc etc...

It seems that 'savagery' is part and parcel of 'Asian' ;) existence... Just cos they didn't drink the koolaid (or perhaps the fluoridated water :P ) it don't mean that I feel any obligation to feel sorry for them..

Same with Pakistan and India with their messed up (by our standards) cultures; with the 'Caste Systems' , 'Honour Killings' and stoning of homosexuals and adulterers...

As long as they stay where they are, it's fine with me.. We've only got to look at Rotherham, Luton , Blackburn, and many other large towns and cities in England to see what happens when folk with their mindset comes over... All these sob stories, and "please help" ads from UNICEF are only designed to accustom us to feel shame or some sort of obligation to affect their unfortunate circumstances; as well as making it okay and normal for them to 'escape' the oppression by coming over to European Countries.. There are plenty of nearby ones they could go to, but for some reason it's Europe (with it's liberal values that they apparently hate :roll: ) Then comes the rage against the very people that take them in, because they consider us infidels :evil: Import the Third World etc etc etc... I doubt Neeson or Olivia Colman live in 'Multicultural Areas' , or the rest of the luvvies like Cunningham and Imelda May....
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#14

Post by isha »

WG, you don't agree with Cyclepath as you have expressed a culturally relativistic view, which in his last sentence he says is not useful.

You have done it for a different reason though than a so-called liberal would, as they would perhaps genuinely claim to believe that we cannot ''judge'' or appropriate other cultures through our lens. You have instead expressed cultural relativism as a kind of spite.
It is the two extremities of the same arc of cultural relativism, the ''Awww, how sweet those cultures are, who am I to say tis bad'' versus the ''Fcuk yiz, stew in it'' extreme. In my opinion, they are the same thing from different emotional places and neither are useful.

There has to be sanity somewhere else away from these extremes.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#15

Post by Waning Gibbus »

I didn't read anything into his post regarding whether he considers it 'useful' , or indeed the opposite. If anything, I feel he doesn't believe in cultural dilution , and that Cultural Relativism is at fault (that we're not allowed to complain, because others are entitled to behave according to their cultural norms, at our expense) for it.. That was my take on it...

I think I'm entitled to my Culturally Relative view, insofar as I don't want medieval customs being tolerated in any way, shape, or form..

You're very articulate isha, and you can make your point/s well, but I don't get the "Fcuk yiz, stew in it" point of view.. If it's part of their way of life, then they accept it, and as far as they're concerned, they have nothing to "stew" in, or about... The only reason European/Western people have those two 'extreme' mindsets to begin with is because those 'cultures' are coming over here..

I'll agree with you, when there's a reciprocity vis a vis "us" having to be "tolerant" of their culture/s 'because' they've come over here (for whatever reason/s) , and them (Asian Countries) if and when we go over to their Countries en masse, and expect to be likewise accommodated 'culturally speaking'
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#16

Post by isha »

Why Afghanistan? Why all the decades of occupation? Why are China now eager to step into the breach with recognition of the Taliban and investments? In spite of the medieval theocrats taking over..
Torn by four decades of war and desperate poverty, Afghanistan is believed to be sitting on one of the richest troves of minerals in the world. The value of these resources has been roughly estimated between $1-3 trillion.

Afghanistan has vast reserves of gold, platinum, silver, copper, iron, chromite, lithium, uranium, and aluminium. The country’s high-quality emeralds, rubies, sapphires, turquoise, and lapis lazuli have long charmed the gemstone market. The United States Geological Survey (USGS), through its extensive scientific research of minerals, concluded that Afghanistan may hold 60 million metric tons of copper, 2.2 billion tons of iron ore, 1.4 million tons of rare earth elements (REEs) such as lanthanum, cerium, neodymium, and veins of aluminium, gold, silver, zinc, mercury, and lithium. According to Pentagon officials, their initial analysis at one location in Ghazni province showed the potential for lithium deposits as large as those of Bolivia, which has the world’s largest known lithium reserves. The USGS estimates the Khanneshin deposits in Helmand province will yield 1.1.-1.4 million metric tons of REEs. Some reports estimate Afghanistan REE resources are among the largest on earth.
https://thediplomat.com/2020/02/afghani ... -a-threat/

Surprise, surprise, in spite of all the big talk in global organisations we are just a backward planet ruled by buccaneers.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#17

Post by CelticRambler »

isha wrote: Sun Aug 15, 2021 7:49 am Surprise, surprise, in spite of all the big talk in global organisations we are just a backward planet ruled by buccaneers.
You can also say that in spite of all the big talk by ordinary Westerners about wokeness and inclusivity and eco-responsibility, we're only delighted to throw our money at those same buccaneers for the baubles they dangle in front of us. A bit of rape and pillage and ethnic cleansing is a small price to pay for an extra half hour's battery life for a 12th generation smartphone. :roll:

To get back to your original point, though, not being of the female persuasion (well, not today at least ... :) ) I can only look at these issues through a male eye, and in that sense the one thing that stands out is not so much the barbarism (and criticism thereof) of Middle Eastern tribes doing what they do in Middle Eastern countries, but the deafening silence about an almost equal level of sexual barbarism by our peers on the other side of the Atlantic. 44 out of the 52 States in the US allow child marriages, and about 25000 older men take advantage of that every year to get themselves a compliant sex slave. When they get her pregnant, she stays pregnant, because the unborn life is sacred (and I'll kill you with my legally-held AK47 if you try to tell me otherwise). And when my daughter gets to puberty, I'll indoctrinate her into a virginity cult with a "purity" ceremony that binds her to me until I decide she can be free. Should I decide that one young bride isn't enough, well polygamy has recently been decriminalised in Utah. Let's not get started on the Amish, whose menfolk can probably compete with any Saudi on how much they control what their women can and cannot, must and must not do. :evil:

There is as much deviant, Old Testament-inspired barbarism exercised day after day in the USA as there is in the Middle East. It's hardly surprising that that bunch of mediaeval overlords have failed to bring peace and "civilisation" to the Middle East when their own union - another made up largely of territories with borders arbitrarily drawn by the British, and which share more differences than points in common - is more or less ungovernable today. Do we care? Nah. They speak English and gave us Facebook, Netflix and next-day delivery with Amazon, so it's all good.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#18

Post by isha »

I agree with a lot of what you say there, Celtic Rambler, though not on degree. A lot of our luxuries depend upon us being complicit in this pillage.

And there is incredible barbarism here - one does not have to be a Christian fundamentalist. A woman I follow on Twitter wrote last week about how she has just about recovered fully from awful damage to her body done while she was a prostitute - I will not describe it. It happened over long periods of time and due to extremely rough treatment by regular clients who would imagine themselves ordinary people. They are not fundies or inspired by the Old Testament.

Things are not the same though for people in different places, it is again a question of nuance and a span of realities. At least in the West most people have the chance to walk away, whereas in other places a person rebelling or opting to change their circumstances may easily end up dead. Though in some places in the west we are not really ''in the west'' so to speak - See the case of Sarah Hussein, a 31 year old woman burned alive on the street in Bury, UK, two weeks ago. It is strange how little has been said about Sarah. I am almost positive it is an ''honour killing''.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#19

Post by CelticRambler »

isha wrote: Sun Aug 15, 2021 9:56 amThings are not the same though for people in different places, it is again a question of nuance and a span of realities. At least in the West most people have the chance to walk away, whereas in other places a person rebelling or opting to change their circumstances may easily end up dead. Though in some places in the west we are not really ''in the west'' so to speak ...
As you say, it's a span of realities. "The West" includes an awful lot of places where people don't have the chance to walk away, and - again, to cite an example from the epitome of "the West" - if you happen to be a pregnant woman in the southern states of the USA, your chances of ending up dead - either in childbirth, or at the wrong end of an aggrieved husband's rifle if you "walk away" - are the same as if you were in the back end of Somewhereistan.

All-in-all, we who live close to the Greenwich meridian have all kinds of notions about what life is like in the Middle East and the Middle West, most of which we'd find to be well off the mark if we made a bit of effort to scratch below the surface.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#20

Post by isha »

CelticRambler wrote: Sun Aug 15, 2021 10:16 am if you happen to be a pregnant woman in the southern states of the USA, your chances of ending up dead - either in childbirth, or at the wrong end of an aggrieved husband's rifle if you "walk away" - are the same as if you were in the back end of Somewhereistan.
That's not accurate.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#21

Post by Cyclepath »

CelticRambler wrote: Sun Aug 15, 2021 10:16 am As you say, it's a span of realities. "The West" includes an awful lot of places where people don't have the chance to walk away, and - again, to cite an example from the epitome of "the West" - if you happen to be a pregnant woman in the southern states of the USA, your chances of ending up dead - either in childbirth, or at the wrong end of an aggrieved husband's rifle if you "walk away" - are the same as if you were in the back end of Somewhereistan.

All-in-all, we who live close to the Greenwich meridian have all kinds of notions about what life is like in the Middle East and the Middle West, most of which we'd find to be well off the mark if we made a bit of effort to scratch below the surface.
When I think of 'The West' it's more of a conceptual notion of liberal democracy. I think that notion is probably more concentrated in Europe than America. America can't even take care of its sick or deprived citizens. It's a dog eat dog society that rewards greed and aggression.

I've travelled in the middle east and it's a place of amazing contradictions. But again it's the savage consequences of any misstep that have people live in fear. Ironically the much reviled Israel was the most tolerant place I found in the entire region, and the only place I felt relatively safe. I can tell you for sure the only place I saw, met, or interacted freely with women was in Israel.

Other locations were strange. The people were invariably very friendly, hospitable and pleasant but only so long as you conformed to a list of sometimes incomprehensible rules. For example, while in Doha I waited a few days for a sports massage at the hotel gym because the male therapist was on leave. Females cannot be alone with males unless married. Having waited several days, the male therapist at the end of the massage proceeded to offer me, ahem, favours! I barely dressed before running out of the room... not out of any homophobia but the sheer terror of imagined consequences. I can only imagine what it might be like to live in one of the stricter regimes.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#22

Post by isha »

This clip of a report by a CNN reporter out of Kabul is cultural relativism in a snap shot.
I saw some witty person saying elsewhere that the liberal US media are doing their best to fall in love with the Taliban now that their own government is on vacation.

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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#23

Post by Uncle Frank »

I've read the term 'cultural relativism' a lot lately but I haven't a clue what it means. Could someone explain it in simple terms for me please?
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#24

Post by isha »

Uncle Frank wrote: Mon Aug 16, 2021 8:33 pm I've read the term 'cultural relativism' a lot lately but I haven't a clue what it means. Could someone explain it in simple terms for me please?
Relativism itself means that there are no objective standards of right or wrong, truth or falseness. It can be applied to moral viewpoints, when it is called moral relativism.
When relativism is applied to cultures it is cultural relativism - who are we to judge the other culture, it is a product of its time, place and philosophies etc. No culture is inferior or superior and no cultural practise is "bad" because we cannot apply our own moral standards to frame it - note the moral relativism says there are no universal standards of good or bad.
This leads to also not acknowledging the advances or benefits of a different culture which has reformed archaic or superstitious practices and 'advanced'.

Relativism creates paralysis of judgement and in my opinion allows harmful practices to endure. It is a popular enough standpoint these days which ironically is more patronising than progressive.

This is a simple definition.
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Re: Global Issues through a Female Eye

#25

Post by Hodors Appletart »

If I'm understanding you correctly, you seem to be criticising those who look at the culture (as it is) of the Taliban and saying that the way they want to, say, treat women, is bad.

Am I reading that right?
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