Two years ago, as the last American troops left Afghanistan, a stark symbol of women’s erasure from public life appeared on walls and screens. Murals and advertisements that once celebrated women’s achievements were smeared with black paint or defaced. On television, female presenters vanished overnight, leaving only male faces and voices.
The black paint was only the beginning. The Taliban wasted no time in reversing the gains that Afghan women had made in the past two decades. They issued more than 50 decrees stripping Afghan women of their rights and freedoms, banning them from attending schools and universities, working outside their homes, and traveling without a male guardian. They closed down women’s organizations, clinics, and shelters that had provided vital services and support for millions. The latest decree from the Taliban targets one of the few remaining spaces where Afghan women could express themselves: beauty salons. The Taliban has ordered all beauty salons to shut down immediately, claiming that they are immoral and un-Islamic.
The Taliban’s message is clear: Afghan women should be invisible.
This is not only a tragedy for Afghan women, but for all of us who value democracy, human rights and gender equality. We cannot stand by and watch half of the population of Afghanistan be treated as prisoners in their own homes. We cannot betray the Afghan women who have struggled for their liberation over the past two decades. We cannot let them down when they need us the most.
I belong to a generation of Afghan women who grew up with a different message. We were told that we mattered so much that the world had intervened to free us from the Taliban’s tyranny. We heard First Lady Laura Bush declare on the radio that one of the reasons for the invasion was to end the oppression of women in Afghanistan. We saw Oprah Winfrey unveil a woman from her burqa on her show, exposing our plight to millions of viewers. We believed in the promise of women’s rights and empowerment.
But we soon realized that the war in Afghanistan was never about us. While some of us benefited from the opportunities that came with the foreign presence, but we never gained enough power or influence to secure our future. We were used as symbols and slogans, but we were not given a voice or a vote in the decisions that affected our fate.
The past is not a burden to be carried, but a lesson to be learned from. The world has a chance to rectify its past failures and act with urgency and solidarity. The plight of Afghan women is not a distant problem to be ignored or lamented, but a global crisis that demands attention and action.
Now, every day, we witness another blow to Afghan women’s rights. Every freedom is taken away. The world seems to have forgotten about us, or worse, accepted our suffering as inevitable.
We need to shake up the world’s conscience and remind them of the reality of Afghan women’s lives under the Taliban. We need to ask ourselves how we can tolerate a country where half of the population is confined to their homes. We need to resist the normalization of this injustice.
We need a global movement of solidarity similar to that of 2001, when the world rallied behind the cause of Afghan women. If Afghan women’s rights were important in 2001, then they should be important now. We need to use every platform and tool at our disposal to raise awareness and mobilize action and look for creative solutions that can make a difference.
Afghan women are not passive victims. They are active agents of change. They are defying the Taliban’s restrictions by attending underground schools, taking online courses and joining protests. They are risking their lives for their dignity and their future. They deserve our respect and our support.
Different actors can play different roles. Universities could offer more scholarships to Afghan women who want to pursue higher education. National governments could ease the visa restrictions for Afghan women who seek to study abroad. NGOs could find ways to make online education more accessible for Afghan women who are confined at home, and develop a standard curriculum that could be recognized internationally. Politicians could listen to the voices of Afghan women and include them in negotiations. The media could continue to shine a light on the stories of Afghan women and their struggles, so the world doesn’t forget.
Let us join Afghan women in their fight for freedom and justice. Let us show them that they matter. Let us not allow them to be erased.
Sola Mahfouz is an Afghan refugee and a quantum computing researcher at Tufts University. Her memoir, “Defiant Dreams: The Journey of an Afghan Girl Who Risked Everything for an Education,” was recently published.