Afghan Feminist Thought, part 2

Editor’s note: Part one argued that a heavy dose of feminist thinking would improve the Afghanistan economy. Failing to educate girls and confining their contribution to home labor hinders the economy by locking talented people out of the workforce. Part 2 discusses how politics and the judiciary also lock out women’s views.

Today, Afghan women hold few powerful positions in government. Politics is a male-dominated environment where women are not made welcome and women’s political input is usually ignored or dismissed as emotional. 

Although there are 249 seats in the Afghan parliament, women are eligible to occupy only 64, and in recent years few women have dared to run for parliament. Those who do run receive many threats from insurgents. 

Many female candidates who put up their posters for election are considered immoral for allowing their faces to be shown with simple make-up. And although Afghan women have a legal right to vote, many men do not allow their wives to do so. The situation is worse in the areas outside Kabul. 

According to the voter registration roles, women began voting in bigger numbers in 2005, and by 2010 women made up 39 percent of the voters. But there is much evidence of voter card fraud so the official figures have to be viewed with a great deal of skepticism.  

An institutionalized lack of justice for women in the judicial system discourages Afghan women from entering any realm of politics.

For example, one young woman in Kabul who wanted to get divorced from her abusive husband took her request to court. The judge took her aside and told her that he would help her get a divorce under one condition: that she sleep with him.  

That happened in 2010 and that woman told me, “After I saw the judge’s action, I went to live with my abusive husband since the world outside seemed worse.”  

There can’t be any trust when you have a corrupt system of justice where a judge dares to break the law, and humiliates and devalues a woman like that. And with no judicial support, Afghan women are discouraged from pursuing their feminist ideas. They give up. 

The Afghan social system routinely gives male citizens privilege over women.  

Take the case of 19-year-old Gulnaz, reported last year by the New York Times, and you can understand how Afghanistan’s system works against feminist thinking and in favor of men. The Times recounted how Gulnaz was imprisoned for adultery after reporting to police that she had been raped. She gave birth to the child in jail. Although she was at first sentenced to three years in prison, at a second trial her term was increased to twelve years. The judge, however, offered her a way out: to marry her rapist. This was in Kabul. 

This report upset human rights activists around the world.  

In December 2011, President Hamid Karzai pardoned Gulnaz and asked for her to be freed. It is no wonder because it was a big shame for the government. But what is the future for many other women like Gulnaz who remain in prison? Gulnaz was fortunate that her case received media attention, including a documentary film, but many rape victims have been either shot and killed by their family, or imprisoned where they are likely to be sexually assaulted by prison officials. And what will Gulnaz’s future hold? She may end up living in a shelter, or she may end up with her attacker.  

A woman who has been sexually assaulted in Afghanistan is not considered a victim by Afghan society, relatives, and even her closest family members. In fact everybody blames the girl for it. As a result, there is no support system that encourages women to engage in politics, to stand up for feminist ideals, or to work toward justice. 

By Mahnaz 

Coming next: The ideological dimension.

Photo from NBC News: Gulnaz, an Afghan rape victim who was jailed for adultery, has now been pardoned – on the condition she marries her rapist. She is seen in her jail cell at a women’s prison in Kabul with her daughter on Dec. 3, 2011.