Afghan women without a voice

It was a farewell to all that had been achieved; a return to a past that not only ignores them, but also forgets them, punishes them, tortures them... It is hard to live what one does not expect to live; to return to a time of life that you thought was already past; to go backwards instead of forwards. But we don't learn, we don't want to learn. 

Women's rights are being eroded at the same time as their dignity is being eroded. Anything goes in this world of extremist men who embrace the so-called law of morality to dictate incomprehensible and inhuman orders. The last thing that has been taken away from them is their voice. 

Listening to a woman sing or recite verses at a public event is against morality. That is the main reason that the Taliban used a few months ago to push them further into a corner in a country, Afghanistan, which in three years has regressed decades. 

We live in turbulent times where nothing is certain any more, where everything can change, even if there is no meaning, where radicalism is growing rapidly, where the crystal-clear waters of rivers can overflow, change colour or dry up. The implausible is suddenly real. What is now or is there may not be or may disappear in an instant. 

Don't forget the images of the Taliban entering Kabul. The horror, the fear... the people fleeing, that airport, the withdrawal of US troops... It is now three long years since the rapid countdown began. The population is suffering the consequences. To be born and to be a woman in this corner of the world is to be nothing. 

Afghan women's voices are not to be heard, but neither are they to be seen. They have already been forced to cover themselves under the full veil. No clinging clothes, no clothes that might insinuate... No make-up or paint on those faces that must also be hidden, perhaps so that the tears of frustration, the look of sadness and indignation, the terror of what is happening again cannot be seen either. Outside also that perfume that could remind us of other women in other lands where they do enjoy the freedom, the rights that any person should have.  Laws and more laws that can even kill in the name of morality. 

Afghanistan is the country of rules that restrict; there are no rights other than those that do not exist, impositions and obligations that erase the senses, that do not let you see or hear, feel or smell... or live with dignity. 

To be born a woman is a disgrace. And how sad this statement is. Girls over the age of 12 must interrupt their studies. They are forbidden secondary education... and the illusion of going to university is out of the question.  They are not interested in educated, educated, educated women. Manipulation is easier when there is ignorance and ignorance. Illiteracy with a woman's name is back, so many illusions buried! 

Let us not be silent, let us not forget, let us not allow the voices of these women to be silenced forever. Let us give up ours to raise and shout what they cannot. Let's put verses in the air so that they flow, so that they fly, even if the wings of their authors have been clipped, so that hope does not die. Let us denounce and remember as the actress Meryl Streep, who spoke about this situation before the UN in New York, or the Spanish Writers‘ Association (ACE) who, on the occasion of Women Writers’ Day, read texts by Afghan women authors collected in ‘The Suicide and the Song, a work translated by Clara Janés’. Small or large acts that add up and add up. 

If their voices have been silenced, let ours be theirs.