Penurious Country, Culture of Subjugation
In a poverty-stricken country constantly wracked by wars, historically beset by the armies of imperialist-minded raiders with little in the way of natural resources everyone suffers. Poverty, ill-health, low infant mortality, little-to-no educational and job opportunities are all endemic ills. Men suffer, women suffer, children suffer - if they survive childhood - and then go on to struggle as long-suffering adults with foreshortened lives. Misery, and the universally human determination to forge on prevails.In countries where the standard of living is so perilously low, where hope is short, where help is nowhere to be found, where religion imposes its own brand of suppression and judgement, women are always to be found at the bottom echelon of survival. Men, as miserable as their condition can be, are still viewed as the family breadwinners, and without men, women left to their own earning devices are in dire straits.
They're viewed either as commodities, potential objects of use if they're young enough, or societal nuisances once they're no longer useful. One of the reasons Canada ostensibly is in Afghanistan is in response to the plight of Afghan women, particularly under the fanatical Taliban rule which imposed their dreadful burden of Sharia law as they interpreted it. Canada wants to believe its presence in that war-torn country has helped and is continuing to help its population.
Particularly the lives of women and children. If there are good news stories, examples of progress to be found they will always be in the cities where transformation, though slow, does occur and where the attention of government and foreign investors and assistance is first directed. So medical clinics have been opened, schools re-built, public civil infrastructure improved, and the formerly Taliban-imposed strictures upon women lifted.
Now we learn that these are mere superficial changes. All the good will in the world won't alter societal practise and cultural tradition in the space of a few short years. Forced marriages, honour killings, extreme poverty linked to slavery, the presence of drug lords and the ills they bring, are among the travails visited upon Afghan women living in the vast countryside of this country.
For girls and women living outside Kabul life remains desperate. Hundreds of thousands of households headed by widows are unable to muster sufficient necessities of life for their children. Girls are considered assets to be bartered to pay off family debts, or offered for marriage at truly young ages; 60% of girls are married before the age of 16.
Yet the first order of business is security. As long as the country remains segmented, one part ruled by a legitimate (albeit corrupt) parliament, the other by war lords and resurgent Taliban, there can be no peace, and no security. "You cannot improve the situation of women without improving the security situation as a whole" cautioned Adeena Niazi of the Afghan Women's Organization.
How to successful infiltrate a vast sometimes geographically-inhospitable country's hinterland to search out militantly theistic aspirants to the governance of the country when its own elected representatives in parliament contain former war lords with bloodied hands, and where governmental corruption is known to be firmly in place?
Does Afghanistan really want to help itself?
Labels: Realities
posted by Pieface @ Wednesday, January 31, 2007
<< Home