Tuesday, July 14, 2009

How To Win an Argument on Afghanistan

Warmonger: The Taliban oppress women so we have to fight them.
You: Malalai Joya, the Afghan women's rights leader, says the main reason for the oppression of women now is the Northern Alliance fundamentalists, who are mentally the same as the Taliban but physically different, who have come to power.

The Saudi Arabian dictatorship prohibits women from driving and requires them to get the permission of their male possessor to work. Sudan publicly flogs women who wear pants. When did you say were you enlisting to invade and overthrow these two dictatorships?

Warmonger: The Taliban are brutal thugs. They publicly flog women who violate their strict religious morality. They murder girls who go to school or throw acid in their faces.
You: These are relatively isolated incidents by extremist factions and criminal rogue individuals in the Taliban. Many Taliban condemn these excesses and support the right of women to education. You distort and exaggerate incidents like these to mislead people and justify your own killing of Afghans. Shame on you.

The Northern Alliance fundamentalists are U.S. "allies" and part of the new Aghan government. The group is responsible for murdering about 2000 Taliban prisoners of war they captured in 2001 by suffocating them in airtight shipping containers and firing bullets into them. Saudi Arabia beheads people. Singapore whips people in multiple sessions with canes soaked in water for maximum effect, often to the point of unconsciousness. So you are calling for invasions of Saudi Arabia and Singapore?

Warmonger: If we don't destroy the Pakistani Taliban, they're going to take over the country and get control of the nukes.
You: The Taliban control less than five percent of Pakistan territory, in the traditionally independent Pashtun tribal areas of western Pakistan. They have virtually no support in the rest of the country which is not Pashtun, not fundamentalist and is even secular. The chances of the Taliban taking over the country are just another disingenuous paranoid scare tactic you use to justify your destructive wars. Shame on you for misleading people.

Worse, your attacks in Pakistan are creating hatred of the United States and threatening to divide the Pakistani army into pro-Taliban and anti-Taliban camps, which would seriously destabilize the country. While the Taliban aren't going to take over the central government, other factions might. You are creating the nightmare you claim to avoid. You are endangering the security of the United States homeland and the future of my children with your policies. Stop it.