Article by Rebel* from Afghanistan and Maricla Pannocchia
Rebel and I connected over an Instagram post. When she wrote me about the situation of women in Afghanistan, asking me to amplify her voice, it felt like the most natural thing to do. We all have heard the recent, horrendous news of the Taliban banning women from university. We all know how this follows their decision of banning girls from high school. As Rebel writes, these are just 2 of the many things Afghan women and girls are not allowed to do anymore.
I don’t know why I have always felt a connection to this country. I have never been there but I long for the day in which it will be free and safe for everyone to go and visit. I am sure it is beautiful. I’ve asked Rebel to write a joint article, since she used to be a journalist and I am a professional writer, to send a clear message: we must join hands and work together. I realize many people have their own issues, they are busy and focus on their day to day life, but I think that, now more than ever, we must stand with our Afghan sisters.
It’s past the time in which we can wait for others to do something but we must take matters in our own hands. I think we must push politicians and governments to make the changes we need to see for situations like this to end, and for them to do so with the culprits brought to justice. That would send an important message to the world and to all others who are doing evil: we can not tolerate this anymore. We are not scared. We know we are equal and we all should have access to our human rights at birth. None should be allowed to trump on them and walk away with it. We have declarations and other official documents to declare that each human being, regardless of the color of their skin, their nationality, religion, sexuality etc., has the right to be protected, fed, educated and to live a dignified life.
We all share this world. Even if at times it doesn’t seem or feel like it, we all are in this together. Let’s all join hands with our Afghan sisters – and with all the other people suffering around the world – so to make our voices stronger, an unique, impossible not to hear cry demanding justice, peace, security and freedom for everyone.
I think it’s our duty.
Rebel’s voice:
Here’s the article. I am sorry I couldn’t write it in a proper document but we only have 1 or 2 hours of elecricity per day in our province and using Internet is very hard. I can not use my laptop so I have to write from my phone. The Taliban know that the majority of educated people live in Kabul and that is why they cut electricity so often.
August 5th 2021. The day in which the Taliban took over was also the day in which our lives – the lives of Afghan girls and women – went black. That was also the first time in which I saw the Taliban in person, while we were going to Kabul airport that no one let us leave.
The beginning of their government was the start of depression and anxiety for me. That caused me panic attacks and sleep disorders.
I can’t even describe what is going on inside my mind, how deep my depression is!
Thinking that it’s not the end for us but they’ll distroy our young years of development!
The funny thing for me was that I felt like somehow the rest of the world left us alone with these monsters. They were just watching us being forced to bow down at the feet of the Taliban. There have been many Western people who made fun of us or who bullied those of us who managed to go and live in their countries (I know an Afghan lady living in the United States, she doesn’t want to say she is from Afghanistan because she has already been bullied for that).
They didn’t do a single thing to actually stop the Taliban.
As the Taliban were getting closer, I tried to get a visa and move to Turkey but they made a rule that women could not leave the country without a mahram (husband/brother/father).
And I got stuck here.
They gave us a warning that we can’t work anymore without a mahram. Before the Taliban took control of my country once again, I worked for an International aid relief organization on FSL (food security and livehood projects). The rest of the team and I received a blackmail email from the Taliban saying, “When your work here will be done, we will give you a lesson”. That happened despite the fact that we were wearing burqas, covering ourselves from head to toe. We assisted more than 500 hundred pregnant and vulnerable women and their children, saving them from hunger and improving their hygienic conditions.
There is no investing in women’s education or development.
What we actually need, though, it is not funds. It’s freedom!
We desperately want to study and have the careers we choose. On top of that, the funds that are sent rarely arrive in the hands of the people in need. Those are senty directly to the Taliban.
I clearly remember someone said that “we have equal job opportunities for men and women, 30% of the employees are women”! Those women are not in important positions – they are not managers etc.
The highest position that a woman holds these days is just an officer.
When I was working in the field, all of us women were assistants!
I have started to get used to the fact that there are no equal rights, I should know how to live in a cage and continue my activities in limited areas of work in order to survive but I am here writing this because I want everyone out there to know that we Afghan women are not what they have labeled us. We are not unwise, uninformed slaves. We are human beings.
Over the past 20 years women have fought for rights that they have never achieved before.
While fighting for these rights, and to defend them, women have had to endure bullying, and physical/sexual/psychological violence. I remember they have burned a woman alive in public. Her name was Farkhunda. I myself have experienced violence from the Taliban. They hit me with a durah (whip) for not covering my face.
They do not simply kill us, they want to make us suffer until we die!
The world looks at us and can see we are the strongest women on Earth.
We are used as slaves in households to do all the chores. They have thrown acid on so many women’s faces. We have been victims of bomb blasts. We have a lack of career opportunities and our right to an higher education is constantly trampled on. We have experienced all types of violence yet, despite all of this, we will never give up.
The world knows the Taliban have banned girls and women from higher education and our country is the only one in which the female population is legally forbidden to attend high school or university.
Many of us are educated women. We are writers, politicians, artists, business women, activits and so on. All I am saying is that we Afghan women are not what you think we are.
We are more than that.
If we only had the freedom to be our true selves and live meaningful lives.
Note: *Rebel is the nickname the woman has chosen for herself in order to hide her real identity.