On November 21, 2001, Laura Bush, the First Lady, spoke on national radio. She spoke mainly on the women of Afghanistan and the “brutalities” facing them, but the implications of the segment reached much farther that just the Afghan women. I chose this particular piece partly due to the fact that it was in the reading, but mainly because I found the address very interesting and very enlightening.
The main questions raised here, so eloquently, by Laura Bush deal specifically with terrorist activity in, namely, Afghanistan, and its effects on the women and children living there; the implications, however, extend, in my opinion, to a large portion of the Islamic world (including SW Asia, and Northern Africa). The radio segment was directed to an American public who had recently experienced the tragedy of 9/11. Throughout the country there was a great deal of emotion tied to the words terrorist, and Middle East, among other things. The people were outraged, with reason, and the thought of revenge, or payback, was something that was much easier to palate immediately following the terrorist attack then during long outbreaks of peace. Therefore, specific words were used, at that time, to get the public to react in a certain way. This is the case with the radio presentation by the First Lady.
Mrs. Bush used colorful language to describe, through a very Western lens, a view of life under the Taliban Regime. Phrases like “children aren’t allowed to fly kites[1],” and, “only the terrorists and the Taliban threaten to pull out women’s fingernails for wearing nail polish[2]” are mentioned throughout the segment. She also used general sound bites like “Muslims all over the world[3]” and “because in Afghanistan we see the world the terrorists would like to impose on the rest of us[4]” to not only paint a scenario of lot of the world wanting things to be better in Afghanistan, but also to justify (not that it is a bad thing) taking military action in the country.
I have no doubt that Mrs. Bush was really concerned about the conditions facing the women and children over there. The entire radio segment seemed to be a serious cry-out for the support of women in Afghanistan. When I actually heard this for the first time I was outraged. I really wanted to do something to help the women and children over there. I felt anger and sympathy at the Taliban, which was all escalated from what I was feeling after 9/11. What can I say, I am a right-wing republican with very conservative views, and I grew up that way. However, looking back, I find that I was very narrow-minded (I still am, but not quite as much), and didn’t take into account other cultures. To me, freedom used to mean America. While that statement, in certain points of view is correct, the term freedom is entirely dependent on what someone is free from.
I feel like I can sum up the First Lady’s address in one word: typical. This is just a typical statement from an American who, though shows plenty of concern for people in another place, has no idea what the people from that other place see as normal, no idea what culture and ethnicity mean to another people. Don’t get me wrong, there are things that are heinous going on in lots of countries in that area of the world. There is no “good” reason for any types of brutality towards women, children, and men but, more then just trying to stop what is going on, trying to understand why things are the way they are should take a much higher precedence.
Filed under: Middle Eastern Topics, Political | Leave a Comment
Tags: Afghanistan, Ethics, Human Rights, Islam, Laura Bush, Middle East, Muslim, War on Terror
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