Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Burqas and Porn

There is a gender issues time bomb awaiting this country. Young men live in a society where contact with women and recognition of their equality is limited but they also have access to and a fondness for hardcore porn. If the history folders of web browsers at internet cafes are anything to go by many have progressed from bollywood fantasies to explicit and graphic depictions of highly sexed women. Indian porn (no I will not give you the link) is as popular as seeing white westerners making the beast with two backs. "Western women like it in the…", Abdullah (not his real name) says pointing at his rear. Once he realised I wasn't a Taliban spy, he showed me a clip on his phone of a horse mounting a rotund blond woman.

The system of restricted interaction between the sexes may have worked functionally to maintain a society (ignoring the analysis that our westen liberal eyes would put on the situation and leaving for another day the surprising prevalance of bachabas, or young boy buggery), but the combination of the idea of pure and distant women and the images of silicone porn stars is going to cause problems. How can the burqa'd madonna and the w.w.whore co-exist?

Men are building up unrealistic images of women which are not tempered by dialogue or interaction. Tradition and the sense that foreigners live by a different set of rules will do a bit to reduce the impact of porn on the young Afghan mind but as we know exposure breeds familiarity to the point where the ideals presented by the media are subconsciously accepted, slick editing or not. Coke anyone? Brown water and sugar.

This is particularly true of an illiterate population which stabs memorised patterns into internet keyboards. The ease with which beliefs can be transmitted when unchallenged by personal discovery and learning facilitates the extremist terrorist's indoctrination of young men. They have no other way of forming ideas about the west, westerners or even their own government. Those porn fans have no conversations with women that could present alternate models to their hardcore indulgences.

One theory about crime is that lifestyles depicted by the media are unachievable by the masses and out of frustration at the dissonance between expectation and reality people are driven to illicit measures to try to secure for themselves what they see on TV.

What happens when there is a discrepancy between the assimilated ideal of female behaviour and the reality? If in economy the gap gives rise to crime and illegality, the same could happen in the sphere of male female relationships. There could be an increase in the use of, and associated abuse and trafficking of, prostitutes; domestic violence already endemic according to the UN could rise further.


(this is a little taste of an article I'm working on.) The internet cafe I am posting this from has extendible privacy dividers.

Monday, October 02, 2006

Commander Re-education

A group of Afghan wartime commanders graduated today(a month ago) from a rehabilitation course having overcome old attitudes to women and foes, as well as developing useful peacetime skills.
To qualify for training, the commanders, some of whom had led thousands of men, had to surrender their weapons. In return, the month long course funded by the Afghanistan New Beginnings Program taught them business management, English and computers.
But perhaps the biggest transition they made was in their attitudes towards women and enemies from the past.
Abdul Khalid was a jihadi general in Balkh province. He joined the holy war leading 8 men as they hid in caves from the Soviet bombardment, but he attracted 1200 men to his side.
"At first I thought it would be impossible for women to teach us, but now I have respect for them," he said, "We didn’t know what gender was, we fought with our sisters, our women but when we go home we will behave in a good way."
Shoughla Aqdas, who taught the 20 commanders English and computer skills said, "At first we were very worried, and excited. People said they still had private weapons so at first we were very scared that they were dark minded.
"But after we taught them in class we felt comfortable. They told us that they were proud of us. We are women but they agree and respect us."
While there is a misperception that Islam encourages the denial of female equality, Abida Lewal, their human rights and gender issues teacher said she used the Koran to instil the old warriors with a sense of women's rights.
"In the first lesson I asked them if they were good Muslims, they all replied that they were," she said. Throughout the month-long course she then showed them passages from the Koran that support gender equality.
Their attitudes towards old enemies have also softened. Haji Fazel Hadi said, "We were fighting each other before. Now we are friends and we will miss each other. "
Supporters of the communist regime, and the mujahideen who fought them shared sleeping quarters and ate at the same table for a month. After the graduation ceremony they exchange laughs, bear hugs, and phone numbers. "I feel I have friends in all 34 provinces." Says Haji Fazel.
In his home province of Laghman, Haji Fazel now plans to set up a business importing cheap Chinese plastic goods. He wants Afghanistan to progress, but is realistic about his priorities. "I want to set up the business for myself, to feed my family, and hopefully help my country."
After more than two decades of war, Afghanistan needs to rebuild, and measures such as these seem like positive steps.
The head teacher hopes the country will allow these men to stay peaceful. "They were driven to fighting by the circumstances. There will be a problem again if the government and economy is not strong enough to provide jobs."