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Progress of Afghan Women (2002)

Progress of Afghan Women


This movie is part of the collection: Open Source Movies

Sponsor: US Dept of State
Audio/Visual: sound, color
Keywords: Afghanistan; women

Creative Commons license: Public Domain

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Reviewer: Telephone Toughguy - - April 9, 2007
Subject: Hey Umar get real
Only an idiot would actually try and stomp out any positive results of policies you do not agree with on the sole basis that the person you voted for lost in an election. It's over and you lose and we win. Wackjobs are blowing up schools because girls are going... get real man. I use the term loosely. And yeah, we shouldn't have to kick in doors with M16's but those idiots won't even stand and fight in uniform without covering their faces because that is what criminals do. When you roll up to a bank during a robbery and one guy has a mask on and the other a uniform, you go to the freedom fighting bank robber and be his friend... please. Good for those chicks over there, now they can get implants and have abortions.

Reviewer: UmarOMC - - February 10, 2006
Subject: ...how we forget...
I find it aggregious that so many people whom elect themselves as knowledgeable of the history of the middle east, and in this case Afghanistan, do not bother to do a little sleuthing on Google to recall that it was America that put the Taliban into power... and when they refused to sign an agreement with the oil company that their present "elected" president, Hamid Karzai worked for (!), THEN it suddenly became important to "liberate" Afghanistan.

It's also aggregious that SO-CALLED "womens' lib" organizations would promote war in these countries where, again, a little- just a LITTLE- bit of brain work would have one recall that war promotes, besides wonton murder, terrorizing violence, violent and unchecked RAPE by soldiers upon the women of a conquered land along with the promotion of the cheap trade of young, "liberated" girls into the bondage of prostitution- you're full of crap if you think otherwise!

eltatero and others akin in thought have made up a fantasy world around themselves... mindfucked by their history books and close-minded ideas hidden behind terms like "liberal".

Perhaps someone kicking your door in, M-16 in hand and a hard-on for the girls in your house is YOUR idea of "liberation"... not for anyone with a brain, though... anyone that really contemplates the polemics of war... that certainly hasn't been the womens' organizations whom supported the wars... and subsequent rapes.

Reviewer: eltatero - - March 9, 2005
Subject: Progress, not dictatorship
Somehow I'm not surprised that I am the first to rate this short film. This film reveals a lot missed by the mainstream media, which is currently busy feeding conspiracy fools the food they want... blood, US failures and folies, bombs, more blood, and how evil Bush is.
Women under Taliban rule in Afghanistan had a 200% higher childbirth mortality rate than women in the US. Women were tortured for trying to sell bread in Kabul to feed themselves and their famillies. Women were not allowed to be educated. All of these things are now in the past. Women are free.
Most disturbing about this lack of feedback on such an extraordinary film is the lack of feminist praise for the US's work in Afghanistan. Women are voting, removing veils, working, going to school, and everything else the feminist movement has griped about in the region for years.
Perhaps today's feminists aren't so woman-oriented after all.... perhaps they're just "liberal"-oriented.

Segments

Synopsis:

Under the Taliban, a generation of Afghan women lived as second-class citizens hidden by burqas, forced out of school at age 8, and prohibited from working outside the home. Now, women’s rights are a priority for the new democratic government. Aid from the U.S.-led coalition is helping women acquire skills to give them financial independence, attend classes, and participate in government as elected members of the Loya Jirga. In a matter of months, the women of Afghanistan have made vast leaps toward realizing their hopes and dreams.

TRT: 5:33

Channel 1 – mixed audio

Channel 2 - nat sound

Titles:

Karmal Hadi (she has two soundbites), Teacher, Dhe Kaipak Secondary School

Dr. Abdul Bashir Sakhizada, Karteh Seh Hospital

Mazia Baasel, Loya Jirga delegate

Script:

Narrator:

It doesn’t look like much, and it’s nothing you can eat or take shelter in. But the cargo on these trucks is eagerly awaited aid from America to Afghanistan. Its destination: The Ministry of Women’s Affairs in Kabul. Its content: sewing machines and bolts of cloth.

A sewing machine and the skills to use it can take a woman from poverty to self-sufficiency, from depending on assistance to making a contribution to the rebuilding of Afghan society. The sewing machine opens doors for Afghan women after years of being shut away by the Taliban.

This young girl is being measured for a school uniform, the first she has ever had. Under the Taliban regime, a girl’s schooling ended when she was 8 years old. Now this child may choose to go to university. The seamstresses are learning a vocation and earning an income. Small but vital steps for Afghan women and their country after more than 20 years of war and repression.

Soundbite: (in Dari) Karmal Hadi, teacher, Dhe Kaipak secondary school

"During the Taliban, school was available only to a limited number of students, and only boys. Now that opportunity is open to all girls too. They have come with a lot of enthusiasm to begin their studies."

Narrator:

The rush to learn has swamped this school. It copes with nearly 3,000 students by teaching them in three shifts per day. School children are the only thing in abundance. Foreign aid provides the most basic school supplies. Under the Taliban, the literacy rate for women was estimated at 15%, compared to almost 50% of men.

Soundbite: (in Dari) Karmal Hadi, teacher, Dhe Kaipak secondary school

"Now that the schools are reopened, I see a brilliant future for our students. My hope is that if a student works hard and is given the opportunity, he or she will have a bright future."

Narrator:

Afghanistan lost thousands of its educated women to emigration in the past two decades. The ones who remained behind are eager to pick up where they left off. Women who had been valuable professionals in years past are acquiring new tools to regain their self-confidence--and contribute to the modernization of Afghanistan.

Equally urgent to the future of Afghanistan is the recovery of its healthcare system, especially for women. The Taliban banned male physicians from examining female patients. Women were 200 times more likely to die in childbirth than women in the U.S. Infant mortality soared. Doctors long out of practice are being trained to catch up on current medical technology. The ravages of war and lack of healthcare have lowered life expectancy to less than 47 years.

Soundbite: (in English) Dr. Abdul Bashir Sakhizada, Karteh Seh Hospital

"Under the Taliban, we had many problems to treat patients, especially female patients and also the children, because Taliban refused to let us see female patients. Our main patients are the family and the children."

Narrator:

Life for Afghanistan's women has been so hard for so long that restoring the right to bake and sell bread is saving lives. This has traditionally been widows’ work, their sole means of support. There are an estimated 50,000 war widows in Afghanistan with no male relative to take care of them and their children

These bakeries also fed a quarter of Kabul’s people until they too were banned by the Taliban. American and allied aid is putting needy women back in business.

It is a vast leap in a matter of months from second-class citizenship to participation in the Loya Jirga, convened to decide the direction of Afghanistan. But the changes demanded by emboldened women are resisted by a traditionally male-dominated society, unaccustomed to treating women as equals.

Soundbite: (in English) Mazia Baasel, delegate to Loya Jirga

"I have dedicated myself to be a member of parliament, if God grants me the wish to be a member of parliament, to ring great changes in the constitution of Afghanistan, especially regarding the laws of Islam, especially the freedom of women."

Narrator:

President Hamid Karzai is determined to make womens’ rights a priority. When he opened the schools this spring to include girls, the day was celebrated by women and their daughters with enthusiasm and high expectations.

Outward changes come slowly, and burqas still conceal most Afghan women in public. But no longer all of them because now the burqa is not the law, it is a choice.

Perhaps the biggest change is the belief that a woman’s hopes and dreams can be her own.