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PaperclipPerfector  8mo ago (text post)   25811 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 1, 2024

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You haven't really said much about what bothers you about their way of life, and the way you talk about them seems more like a point in their favor than anything else.

see how they commit terror attacks when handed power etc

I admit to not keeping up with Afghanistan, I mostly associated terror attacks with ISIS than the Taliban...

What are you waiting for? The Taliban state has been founded. Move to Afghanistan today, while you still see things clearly.

You haven't really said much about what bothers you about their way of life

I like the people close to me having basic freedoms like my wife not needing to wear a niqab. I like being able to argue using reason and being able to counter "The good book says X, therefore you are wrong when you claim not X" without being denounced as a heretic. I like being clean shaven (yes, the Taliban imposed a beard requirement on all men the last time they were in power), I enjoy dancing and music etc. etc.

I can go on and on...

and the way you talk about them seems more like a point in their favor than anything else

Oh boy, if you don't like me you really won't like the Taliban. When I say they are my coethnics I don't just mean they have the same skin colour as me/come from the same part of the world, I mean that I, like a very large portion of them, am Pashtun (complete with tribal affiliation and all that). The values they grew up with are the same as those my parents instilled in me as a child and from where I derive my belief system today, except that I've become extremely westernised (people call me a coconut back home - brown on the outside, white on the inside - and I can't really say they are wrong). I'm like the grown up version of Kamal's son from Kipling's Ballad of East and West after the British system has completely laundered him.

Think me but fundamentalist Muslim when you think of the Taliban and then reconsider whether you want someone like that to rule over you.

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