A year ago, the whole world witnessed the return to power of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. Condemned by the women who finally began to emerge from the shadows, this new regime brought them back to a life in decline, a life reduced to nothing. This new regime ended women’s education, freedom, the right to emancipation and personal development.
The burqa and veil (the same veil recently promoted by the HEC) quickly regained their rightful place. These men, like the seafarers of old, found only the sail to tame the headwinds and steer their course.
Nuanons with the HEC you say? No, no nuance is desirable in relation to non-compliance with human rights. Anything that symbolizes the enslavement of women should be criticized loud and clear and without nuance.
In short, while these courageous women still claim the right to liberty, today they are confined to imprisonment. Those whose spark was rekindled when the Taliban were incapacitated are now dead, and for a long time.
Affected from within
Since the Taliban took power, the daily lives of these Afghan women have been disrupted. However, we must be clear that this goes far beyond the external living conditions they encounter, it also affects what they carry inside, in their chests.
Imagine for a moment that you are a pregnant woman living in these conditions imposed by violent men. Now imagine that you are pregnant with a little boy who will become a man in a few years. What emotional paradox do you think these women are feeling?
The love hate
Under these conditions of woman’s total bondage to man, a mother’s instinctive love for her little boy is necessarily disturbed by fear of what that child will later represent.
This paradoxical feeling of “love-hate” towards a child can be felt by many women (outside Taliban society) who are victims of sexual assault, repeated sexist slurs and other forms of injustice rooted in womanhood.
In fact, growing up in a violent environment perpetrated by men can lead to a woman’s early love-hate relationship with her boy. The emotion acceptable to the woman’s conscience is love for her child, while the heartfelt and repressed is hatred of the same child, which represents all that the male can possibly express as violence.
And it’s not uncommon for adults with this “love-hate” feeling to become passive and unattached as they protect themselves from the anxiety their condition creates.
So, as a society, let us consider the troubling impact of violence against women here and elsewhere. Let us condemn all forms of violence and all the prominent signs that represent them. In this way, women’s fears of these men, who basically would not exist without them, are no longer constantly reactivated.
Frankie Berneche. PhD Professor of Psychology, Cégep St-Jean-sur-Richelieu