Rolling Afghanistan Thread

[luka]

im opposed to flogging women in the streets too.

 

[...]

Me too.

 

[Mr. Tea]

im opposed to flogging women in the streets too.

How very woke of you!

 

[shakahislop]

There seems to be a bit of a clear direction of travel for the taliban government now, and it looks like they're going to do exactly what they want regardless of what other afghans and other countries want. I had been a little more hopeful at first, but there's been very little compromise. It's bad news for lots of reasons, not least that it makes it less likely that the conflict will actually end (that is speculation obviously, based on me trying to predict something that's very unpredictable).

 

[HannahB]

There seems to be a bit of a clear direction of travel for the taliban government now, and it looks like they're going to do exactly what they want regardless of what other afghans and other countries want. I had been a little more hopeful at first, but there's been very little compromise. It's bad news for lots of reasons, not least that it makes it less likely that the conflict will actually end (that is speculation obviously, based on me trying to predict something that's very unpredictable).

The conflict between who? Because it seems like that’s all there ever is in most places. You could replace the word taliban for tory, starmer, small town estate agent, truck driver, OAP, libertarian non mask wearer, etc.

 

[shakahislop]

I am vehemently opposed to flogging women in the streets and changing the Women’s Ministry into one for Virtue. Patriarchy is abject lethal bullying and on every minute level. It happens in england every day and it happens lethally and terrifyingly in Afghanistan every day. Once that’s addressed, we can assess nuance. Nuance is also a constant undermining abuse, a washing away of the shoreline and by all those complicit structurally and directly/ interrelationally.

I'm not deliberately courting an argument here, or at least not trying to. I get what you're saying about the discursive function of nuance. But it's also true that the reality of womens' lives in Afghanistan is very nuanced. I mean, there is a lot to say about it, underneath the basic fact that it's a very patriarchal structure. I think it's alright to talk about that. I'm mentioning it here because I find the general thing of not being allowed to talk about these kinds of details tricky to navigate.

 

[shakahislop]

The conflict between who? Because it seems like that’s all there ever is in most places. You could replace the word taliban for tory, starmer, small town estate agent, truck driver, OAP, libertarian non mask wearer, etc.

I mean the conflict in Afghanistan that's been running for about 40 years now. I think I've said on here before, I think this is the best way the understand whats going on in Afghanistan, as a long-running civil war between different parts of afghan society, with a whole range of other countries coming in to support one side or other over the years.

I would support a war on small town estate agents

 

[HannahB]

I mean the conflict in Afghanistan that's been running for about 40 years now. I think I've said on here before, I think this is the best way the understand whats going on in Afghanistan, as a long-running civil war between different parts of afghan society, with a whole range of other countries coming in to support one side or other over the years.

I would support a war on small town estate agents

So would I. Yesterday I won one for example, at emotional cost - which has put me in such a bad mood I feel warlike. Then it comes down to what is allowed or not allowed in a societal structure and within. Then which societies are non patriarchal - none. And then all the bs we indoctrinated ourselves with in the 90s pick n mix spiritualities on monitoring ‘self’ behavior…. I don’t really have a point except war begins in your own back yard, it’s brutal, a total waste of time, but everyone’s at it! You just have to leave your house - if it’s not being bombed by a patriarchal bully or a complicit woman or person who has all kinds of lengthy internal deconstructions needed. I am also totally uncomfortable speaking about ‘war in Afghanistan’. It’s so fucked.

 

[...]

There seems to be a bit of a clear direction of travel for the taliban government now, and it looks like they're going to do exactly what they want regardless of what other afghans and other countries want. I had been a little more hopeful at first, but there's been very little compromise.

Or as George Mosse wrote, "here was a mistake typical of our time: underestimation of ideology. Most people in our age living pragmatically orientated lives find it difficult to believe in ideological commitment but they find it easy to believe that men want power...it is an obsession with desirability of power for its own sake which blinded men to the real object of National Socialism."

 

[HannahB]

Or as George Mosse wrote, "here was a mistake typical of our time: underestimation of ideology. Most people in our age living pragmatically orientated lives find it difficult to believe in ideological commitment but they find it easy to believe that men want power...it is an obsession with desirability of power for its own sake which blinded men to the real object of National Socialism."

Which was?

 

[luka]

Putting up swastika stickers everywhere

 

[thirdform]

I mean the conflict in Afghanistan that's been running for about 40 years now. I think I've said on here before, I think this is the best way the understand whats going on in Afghanistan, as a long-running civil war between different parts of afghan society, with a whole range of other countries coming in to support one side or other over the years.

I would support a war on small town estate agents

Yes, islamism is very modern, and much more attuned to the needs of your average peasant and worker than socialist groups are in the middle east and Asia. Sadly and unfortunately. But that's just the way it is.

The danger of Western observers is to see modernism as always progressive, a bad liberal and anarchist habit. Forward movement always encloses in itself a double alienation (sir Karl illustrated this in 1867 at the latest.) Islamism is technologically modern (which separates it from old school quietist traditionalism) but culturally very regressive. But it is that very modernism which gives it fuel to be so regressive.

 

[shakahislop]

Yes, islamism is very modern, and much more attuned to the needs of your average peasant and worker than socialist groups are in the middle east and Asia. Sadly and unfortunately. But that's just the way it is.

The danger of Western observers is to see modernism as always progressive, a bad liberal and anarchist habit. Forward movement always encloses in itself a double alienation (sir Karl illustrated this in 1867 at the latest.) Islamism is technologically modern (which separates it from old school quietist traditionalism) but culturally very regressive. But it is that very modernism which gives it fuel to be so regressive.

i've been saying to people for a while that one of the problems the US had in afghanistan is that they tried to reterritorialise before deterritorialising.

there are very few people who understand what i'm on about, it's maybe the most pretentious thing i've ever thought

 

[shakahislop]

actually a couple of months ago i was singing french poetry over improv piano at a liberal arts college, that's the most pretentious thing i've ever done. i can't speak french or play the piano though

 

[woops]

actually a couple of months ago i was singing french poetry over improv piano at a liberal arts college, that's the most pretentious thing i've ever done. i can't speak french or play the piano though

would it be more or less pretentious if you could do both?

 

[HannahB]

this came today from 2012:
“General Khatool Mohammadzai is 45, is a parachutist with 572 jumps, and has been wearing the Afghan Army’s uniform for 30 years. And, most of all, she is a woman. During her career, she has faced death more than once, she had to spend years confined at home during the Taliban regime, she had to bury her husband, killed during the Soviet war. Yet, she managed to become the country’s only woman general. Today, she has a desk job at the Ministry of Defense in Kabul. When she goes home every night, she changes in civilian clothes, buys rice and groceries at the local bazaar, and she cooks dinner for her son and her nephews, who sometimes spend the night at her place. She made her last parachute jump in 2006, during a military parade in Kabul, and ever since she’s been longing for the time “when I will be able to jump again in security”. Photos: Sergio Ramazzotti”
I guess militarist modernism also a vaguely more adrenalized or joyful respite from cooking rice 🍚 or maybe not at all

 

[version]

Inside the CIA’s secret Kabul base, burned out and abandoned in haste

A Taliban commander invited the media to inspect the site where America plotted killing raids and tortured prisoners

www.theguardian.com

 

[Murphy]

 

[Clinamenic]

That ones great.

 

[DannyL]

Yes, islamism is very modern, and much more attuned to the needs of your average peasant and worker than socialist groups are in the middle east and Asia. Sadly and unfortunately. But that's just the way it is.

The danger of Western observers is to see modernism as always progressive, a bad liberal and anarchist habit. Forward movement always encloses in itself a double alienation (sir Karl illustrated this in 1867 at the latest.) Islamism is technologically modern (which separates it from old school quietist traditionalism) but culturally very regressive. But it is that very modernism which gives it fuel to be so regressive.

It occurs to me you could say the same about lots of elements of the Christian Right as well. Culturally medieval - literally so with the Qanon eschatology - but using modern technology to spread the madness. Off topic so carry on.