Many of us have been following the situation for women in Afghanistan where a new law passed by Parliament and signed by President Karzai would forbid women from leaving the house without their husbands’ permission and legalizing marital rape. Brave women in Afghanistan took to the streets last week to march in protest.
Yesterday, I received a bright bit of news courtesy of a new group called NoLimits.org. The letter was from Ann Lewis and here’s what she had to say (emphasis added):
Women Senators have spoken up: a bipartisan group, led by U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and including Olympia Snowe (R-ME), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Claire McCaskill (D-MO), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) sent a letter to President Karzai.
“This law should be reversed immediately,” Boxer said. “Not only is this law an attack on individual freedom, but it condones despicable acts against women in their homes. By approving this law, Afghan leaders are holding back the entire country’s progress and turning the nation back toward some of the most oppressive practices of the Taliban.”
This is yet another of the numerous examples of the women in the Senate working together to help women in this country and abroad. We saw this recently when all four Republican women in the Senate broke party ranks to vote in favor of The Fair Pay Act.
For women to have power, we must unite and work together on the issues that impact all women. Focus on what unites us, not divides us — starting now!
Let’s learn from the successes of our female Senators (again per Ann Lewis’ letter):
Responding to the public outcry, President Karzai has now promised to review the law. According to his aide, the legislation is not yet law, and will be reviewed so that it will be “consistent with the rights provided in the Constitution — equality and the protection of women”
Pressure from any and all places is certainly needed but NATO is the one that should be leading the proverbial charge on this matter. Without NATO forces on the ground, princiapally US combat forces, the reality is the Taliban would take control again in a matter of months, then said domestic oppression law would look lenient and mild compared to what they would do again to women. I recall seeing a video taken in secret in Afghanistan prior to the invasion and smuggled out- it showed women being savagely beaten for not having their veils high enough and it showed executions of women in a soccer stadium filled with men watching.
What goes on overseas is clearly important but why no blog posts about how Jamie Foxx treated Miley Cyrus or Perez Hilton and Miss California- both to me was domestic sexism at its worst
If the United States cuts a deal with Afghanistan and Pakistan that “accepts” these oppressive and oftentimes brutal policies and practices regarding women in exchange for assurances that “terrorism” will not be tolerated, that bit of hypocrisy will come back to bite. If women, who by an accident of birth, are Afghan or Pakistani are denied human rights, all women are denied human rights.
I sometimes stop by a professional military blog and just recently read where the Taliban is making some serious expansion moves and gaining more control in Pakistan and sadly, Pakistan seems to be in position to give no assurances to anyone. This does not bode well for women in these two nations. Coming from a number of people who have been on the ground in Afghanistan, NATO and US are making very little progress.