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Protesting women in Kabul on September 4th: "We want freedom!"
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Anadolu Agency / Anadolu / Getty Images
On September 4th, just a few days ago, a small group of women protested in front of the University of Kabul.
They demanded equal rights as the men in their country.
Ever since the Taliban came to power, they rightly fear violence and lack of freedom in Afghanistan.
Unfortunately, most of the men on campus just stood there and watched the women.
Didn't join her choir.
Only a brave man jumped to the protesters and supported them.
This man, who protested, who raised his voice, is just as much at risk of being visited and beaten by the Taliban as the women.
To speak your mind, to stand up for the things that matter most to you, that is what the new old rulers in my homeland fear most.
It's what they'll try to nip in the bud sooner or later.
In other places in Kabul, too, we see women protesting on the streets these days.
A brave group in the center wore their usual clothes.
No burqa, this veil that covers women from head to toe.
And now wear women again many times.
This group of women shouted loudly that they too were demanding their rights as an equal part of Afghan society.
She soon had to vacate the place: the Taliban used violence against her, tear gas was sprayed against her so that the women could finally be quiet.
I also saw clubs on videos that the women were threatened with.
Where is the oh-so-friendly face of the Taliban that they showed shortly after the invasion of Kabul?
None of my friends in town ever bought it for them.
How often, I ask myself, when I see this violent crackdown on protests, will women still dare to resist in the future?
The women who support the Taliban come from the Koran schools
Women, it is often said now, are the leaders of the resistance. Interestingly, however, it is also women who, according to the report, show support for the Taliban: a few days ago, small groups of women were walking through the streets of Kabul; they insulted the other protesters as puppets of the West, they praised the Taliban. These women wore all black hijabs. These headscarves are not typical in Afghanistan. They're more like Arabic.
Many of these women come from the madrasah, the Koran schools founded by the Ministry of Education - with money from the USAID fund, by the way.
The Ministry always emphasized that the Koran schools in Afghanistan are founded so that children do not learn what is taught in the ultra-conservative Koran schools in Pakistan.
The Afghan concept is, so to speak, a modern counter-model to the Pakistani one.
The truth is: Even at the Afghan Koran schools, a kind of brainwashing was carried out among the students;
Anyone who went to school there as a girl is extremely receptive to the extreme worldview and teaching of the Taliban.
These young women then have the same opinion as the Taliban about the right way of life.
In some cases, even families' views of their own daughters became too extreme.
I live according to the principle of freedom of expression. So I can accept that these women live in their own way. But I have a problem as soon as they become aggressive and attack women and men who have a different view of themselves and the world. Your own freedom stops where it endangers one or another.
Overall, today's protests remind me of 1979 when I took to the streets in Kabul and protested. I took part in a demonstration against the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union. We stood and raised our voices, boys and girls from high schools, students from university. The regime then was just as violent as it is today. They beat us, they locked some up, some disappeared forever. In the end they killed two girls, I still know their names: Nahed and Wajhia.
The difference between then and now is that in 1979 we were many.
Today the number of protesters is comparatively small.
The seeds of violent repression from then are still growing today.
Because people still remember back then, they know: whoever defends himself is in danger.
That's why they give up faster today.
I am very concerned that our civil society is getting smaller and smaller.
The more often the violence returns and the repression.
Will people stop resisting at some point?
Editing and translation: Maria Stöhr
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