• Star Wars Enjoyer @lemmygrad.ml
    33·
    2 months ago

    Loathesome Dongeater mentioned it, but it’s important to realize that the Taliban existed as they did for 20 years to fight against American (and western) Imperialism in Afghanistan, and when the US pulled out of their country they became the dominant political force.

    Though the Taliban isn’t a group MLs should be rooting for, they are the legitimate government of Afghanistan, and they have been committed to fighting ISIS - a US-grown insurgency in the Middle East & Northern Africa.

    Western publications benefit more from just putting “the Taliban” into their headlines than they do from posting “the Afghani government”. The fear-mongering associated with two decades of imperialist war in Afghanistan helps their arguments monumentally.

    • cayde6ml@lemmygrad.ml
      5·
      2 months ago

      I think it’s really unfair to describe fears over the Taliban as being fearmongering. Maybe exaggerated, but not without merit.

      I also think it’s really unfair to the general population of Afghanistan to describe the Taliban as the “rightful” government, given the decades the people suffered under the bootheel of American imperialism and now the far-right theocratic nutjobs of the Taliban that view women as objects.

      I feel disgusting even saying these words, but I can tolerate Russia working with the Taliban, since the Taliban are at least trying their hand at operating a state, and can’t govern the country as a complete dictatorship without risking being overthrown/kicked out by the Afghan people or being overthrown by an Amerikkkan-aligned invasion.

      • SadArtemis🏳️‍⚧️@lemmygrad.ml
        20·
        2 months ago

        I think it’s perfectly fair to describe western publications’ fearmongering about the Taliban as what it is, though. Criticism of the Taliban is more than warranted- but when it’s coming from the same countries that were celebrating the mujaheddin (even in their movies) only a few decades prior and flying Islamic extremists in from all over the globe- when it’s coming from the countries which then afterwards militarily occupied Afghanistan for 2 decades while having tribal warlords/cartels as their collaborator-regime and which continues to destabilize the country through the bloody ISIS (ISIS-K)…

        Yeah, western state, mainstream media, and NGO (granted, may as well have said “western state” 3x) crocodile tears about the Taliban are fearmongering. The Taliban is what the west inflicted on Afghanistan, and then everything they have inflicted since has managed to somehow be worse. Criticism of the Taliban from leftists and the global south is valid, but western media doesn’t have a leg to stand on, actually it’s worse than that, the west offers Afghanistan nothing but terrorism, dictatorships, and destruction, and they’re to blame for everything wrong with the Taliban and then some.

        • cayde6ml@lemmygrad.ml
          2·
          2 months ago

          All very fair points, and I wasn’t trying to say that the Taliban aren’t the fault of the west, I was speaking from the perspective of if I lived in Afghanistan.

      • Sodium_nitride@lemmygrad.ml
        11·
        2 months ago

        I think it’s really unfair to describe fears over the Taliban as being fearmongering.

        Fears of them doing what exactly?

      • Star Wars Enjoyer @lemmygrad.ml
        10·
        2 months ago

        your quotation is wrong. I said “legitimate”, not rightful.

        “Legitimate”, as in they’re the dominant governing body within the country and have been accepted by nearly every country as the genuine government of Afghanistan.

        And it is fear-mongering. I was in kindergarten when 9/11 happened, I grew up seeing the US villainize Islam and Arabs in real time. In my youth, we were told that the Taliban were the greatest evil to ever walk the planet. There is a lot to criticise about the Taliban, they’re not leftist and their interpretation of Islam is heretical. But they’re not the human embodiment of the devil Americans so desperately want to believe they are.

        In the instance of this headline, western news publications want people to think “Taliban = hate”, then think “if Putin works with the Taliban, that means he endorses them”. Thus stoking anti-Russia sentiments by using the decades of anti-Muslim fear-mongering they’ve been giving us since the 1990s.

        • cayde6ml@lemmygrad.ml
          2·
          2 months ago

          I am aware that you said legitimate and not rightful. It still has a bad taste in my mouth.

          Yeah, I grew up during the post 9/11 hysteria too. Shit was dark.

          I agree with your point about Amerikkkans linking Taliban and Putin as a shortcut to mean “evil” brown people.