About common values and women in Afghanistan

Tuesday, August 17, 2021

“Common values are essential for peaceful coexistence. These basic humanistic values already exist – they can be found across all cultures, religions and philosophies. One of them is the Golden Rule, according to which one should behave towards one’s fellow human beings in the way one would like to be treated. Another one is the Humanity Principle, i.e. the demand that all people should be treated humanely. Hans Küng summarized these and other universal values under the term Weltethos. They are considered to support the central value of human dignity as well as the human rights, but they must be made conscious, lived and passed on. Great changes begin with me – that’s why I want to do my part for a better world and fill the values with life.”

Shortly after signing the self declaration, I was reminded by the Guardian that humanity has some way to go before we will reach this goal: I read ‘Please pray for me’: female reporter being hunted by the Taliban tells her story

A non-violent, open-minded and truthful search for world-wide justice and equality is the only vaccine against terrorism, egoism, communism, capitalism, liberalism, elitism, superstition, biblicism, nationalism, patriotism, anarchism and monarchism.

But above article also says: “His village is under Taliban control and many families are Taliban sympathisers.” In other words, there are whole families who sympathize with the Taliban, after twenty years of having had a chance to build an alternative.

I wonder whether there are many women in Afghanistan who are glad that the Taliban came to power.

It won’t be easy to get a reliable answer to this question. Okay, the many people who want to leave the country indicate that the answer is “no”. But that’s not a proof. These people might be just “infected by the virus of Western civilization”. After all, the Taliban are not the only group of humans who believe that something might be very wrong with “Western civilization”. Seen like this, we might acknowledge that the Taliban are working hard to save at least some part of humanity from what they consider a pest. But what exactly is wrong, according to Taliban?

As much as I understood, the Taliban are comparable to our Estonian conservative nationalist party (EKRE). Their common bait is the statement “This is our territory and we refuse to let other people tell us how to live here”. But this attitude is possible only as long as you assume that our planet is an unlimited resource. Another symptom common to Taliban and EKRE is a communication culture based on the assumption that “We are good, those who disagree with us are evil”.

Estonian EKRE politician Martin Helme explained to his daughter why everybody is talking about Afghanistan: “It’s easy. This Afghanistan thing is a breaking point that indicates the end of the era of the American super state” (source)

My advice: Don’t elect your political representative based on their choice (or what they claim to choose) in a given controversial question, rather look at their communication culture. Don’t elect somebody who is unable to give reasonable answers to reasonable questions.