It is almost five years since the fall of the Taliban and the burqa in Afghanistan. Though I see the beautiful colors of burqa even in my city Kabul , but it is very hard for me to see any good piece about Afghan women and her Western-definition, the burqa, in the Western press. I know that many women in the West loved to have burqa in their personal collection. Some even wore it and showed it during Taliban. Some used it in their artistic performance. Burqa for years was the sole identity of Afghan women.

Burqa was beautiful for me when I was small. Once I laughed when my sister wore it. At was long ago. She was 5. But it was not Taliban's burqa, it was a relative's gift to her, not to wear it herself, but to use it while she was playing a game of hide and seek or dolls' play with other girls of her age.

Burqa is not a problem for me and I see it as a personal matter, as far as women choose to wear it freely and as a fashion. It is not my duty to tell my sister what to wear. It is up to her. She has to decide what to wear. I cannot force her to wear this or that dress, because I don't want, because I let her to find her real identity, the identity that she must define and introduce. I only can choose what I wear. I have to see the logical side of everything. Long ago science proved that every action has a reaction. Every force produces counter force and this is true with social phenomena as well. People cannot change things by force, especially when it is not to the taste of society and personal like and dislike. Taliban gone, but burqa still rules on women. For me the rule of burqa is not an isolated or just a traditional aspect of life in Afghanistan. For me burqa is related to the position of women in Afghan society. For me there is no difference between Taliban burqa's and the burqa that women wear in today's Afghanistan . To understand the curse of burqa, we have to go outside Kabul because Kabul is not all Afghanistan and Afghanistan is not just Kabul . Few months ago I had the chance to go to remotest areas of Afghanistan . I am an Afghan and spent more than half of my life in Afghanistan ; but what I saw was shocking. It was something which I never expected to see. Sometimes I watch such life in documentaries, of course from other poor countries of the world under the grip of poverty, traditions and religious values. I hated myself because I was better than them. At least I had a clean clothe and warm jacket. I had some money in my pocket to spend and above all our host was generous enough to offer his bridal bed for me and three other friends in those two cold nights of Afghan winter.

I am not agree with Islamic views about hejab. For me hejab is the creation of male mentality and male dominance. For me hejab- henceforth burqa- is the symbol of male dominance and women's subordinate position. It is nothing to do with any kind of respect of women that some Muslims and Islamic scholars say. Unfortunately, like almost all cultures and civilizations, men were and are the dominant rulers and decision-makers. In Afghan context, the picture is much more disturbing and gloomy. In Afghan context, it is not just the question of sharia. We face the question of sharia in one side, and the grip of tradition in another side. Men never want to give Afghan women the freedom and respect they themselves enjoy. Worth mentioning that here I am not going to discuss the problem of freedom and rights in general, as Afghan people in general are deprived of their real and meaningful human rights and freedom. Here I want to focus on women issue in Afghan society, a society fully under the rule of customary and Islamic laws, a society where civil laws are not considered dominant in most parts of the country, even outside its formal courts in its capital, Kabul. Informal courts with their informal laws are stronger. Women are unrepresented in these courts and mostly the victims of their rulings.

Customary laws consider woman the property of man- man's honor and pride. If the honor is dishonored, the man is allowed to wipe out the scar, even by killing his fiancée, wife, sister and mother. The definition of honor is the definition of men mentality and his historical dominance on all aspects of life, including marital and familial relationship. He is the ultimate truth and he is the owner of his woman, in the forms of fiancée, wife, sister and mother and even female cousins and other close female relatives. He has the "divine" and traditional duty of protecting woman, not for her happiness and rights, but his satisfaction and rights. He enjoys full rights on her, but she knows only one undisputed right, that is to accept the rule of male members of her family and clan. From childhood, her mentality and domestic education (most girls are not allowed to participate in social life of society) is shaped and reared in a way to serve the man in times of sadness and happiness. If her husband meets his death, she must share the grief of him, by denouncing remarriage and personal happiness. She has to wear "appropriate" clothing and her code of dress must and always remember and revere her dead husband's memories. If he wishes to remarry, even if she is alive and young, she must obey because he needs "double happiness and excitement" and she cannot denounce it. She must laugh when he brings the second wife. Years of exclusion from social life, male-orientated domestic education, concept of honor and chastity, the "sacred and divine" duty of a wife to husband, a sister to brother, and a daughter to father form a mind-set and revered concept that is considered as a perfect womanhood, wifehood, sisterhood and motherhood.

This concept cannot be challenged from within (resistance of women) because it will (if they succeeded to change the status quo) give woman a different and contradictory identification which is not acceptable by society. Her resistance means her exclusion from family and society. She will be insulted, abused, defamed, and named "unchaste", "dishonored", "bandit", "unrespectable" and many more. The social set-up will not take her side in her resistance. She will lose hope and, in absence of support and tolerance, take unpredicted steps, such as flight and suicide. Concept of "honor" takes its toll. If caught during flight, must be killed to protect the "honor" and if found dead, the cause of her death must be unspoken and uncovered because, again, the "honor" is in stake. In both cases, she is the loser and male-made laws and concepts are the winners.

Family disputes and feuds are not uncommon in Afghan society. Again women are the main losers of much of these men-directed and men-caused disputes and feuds. The sister must be ready to give her brother his love. He needs that pretty girl of his dream. The girl's family is not ready to say yes for the marriage, concept of courage and bravery gives the boy the right to kidnap the girl and takes her to his home. The scenario is bleak. Girl's family has to protect their honor. It is all men's world. Women are pawns at the hands of men. The best solution (without blood) requires the boy's family to give a girl (probably boy's sister or even female cousins) in exchange, badal. Again the customary laws take the side of men and give them "happiness" and "honor" by depriving women of their love and right and happiness and most importantly honor. Bad is worse than badal. Bad is a woman who has to be given to solve a blood feud. She will become the property of the family and they have the full rights to use them whatever way they wish. There are not barriers to stop them of abusing or misusing her. She has to make it and take it. Her silence is the sign of her "good and modest" family education and her resistance brings more trouble to her and her family. She is weak enough to resist. Her family needs her silence to protect their right for existence and appearance in public, otherwise they must be ready to accept another death, this time theirs- certainly a man, more precious and needed than their woman.

Customary laws and general mind-set of society creates double-standards values and morals. Islamic verses and interpretations also give rise to double-standard values and morals. In both cases, women are the victims. In both cases, men are the judges and executioners. Men love these values because the values give them the "property right" over women. If they commit adultery, the community and family will ignore, if they drink wine, the community and family will ignore, if they elope with a girl of their dreams, the community and family will ignore, if they misbehave in pubic, they will be ignored by public, if they harass women in public, they will be ignored, but in case of women, all the above mentioned points will be considered upside down. A small mistake by women means their "social death". Family and community will scorn her and she will lose her dreams and career for future. She has to make herself ready to accept these "values" and give it "value". She cannot ignore the scourge of society and men-made laws and values, because socially she herself is the creation of men. She can be made and destroyed, but cannot make and cannot destroy. She is a property and has different owners during her entire life and she has to respect all of them, no matter who they are and how they behave her.

The overall setup of the Afghan society and traditional values that are covered/venerated by the thick cloak of religion and customary laws, regard women a toy at the hand of men. Patriarchal system and male pressure give woman a false and predefined identity. The identity she cannot resist or change, but unwillingly accept and respect. Social and familial pressure molds the brain of women and they must accept it and must be ready to change it when required by men and their needs and requirements. While at her father's house, she must act according to the needs and requirements of her father and brothers, while at her husband's home, she must act according to the needs and requirements of her husband and in-laws.

During childhood they are considered lower than their brothers. They take less food and father and mother also take the side of their sons. If there is less food, they should save it for their brothers. If money is not enough, it should not be spent or invested for girls. Sons are priority, daughters are not. According to Afghan traditional and Islamic concept, daughters are not the property of the family. Sooner or later, they will marry. Their real owners are their husbands. Therefore, spending and investing on girls is meaningless. For marriage proposal, the conditions are tough but insulting. They will not ask about girl's education and mental maturity. They will ask about what kind of food they can cook and how much obedient and male-fearing they are. In some cases, freshness (untouched and young) and beauty is considered important than education and maturity. That is why child-marriage is common. Actually the education and traditional-Islamic concepts and mentality itself force the family to say good bye to their daughters when they are young. Better if they experience their first period at husband's home. From the day they enter into their husbands' home, they should surrender themselves fully to the wishes and rules of their husbands and in-laws. Resistance is out of question. No body will take her side. She is alone in her odyssey. She must tolerate and live for others. She is not the captain of her ship in the untamed waves of male's ocean. Her presence in the ship is for her travel (transformation) from daughterhood to wifehood, and from wifehood to motherhood. Captains will be changed, but the destination is certain, making a perfect womanhood in men's world.   Poverty catalyzes this painful transformation in most cases.

Hejab will give her "honor", "grace", "good character", and "purity". She is born to wear hejab. If a man abuse or rape her, she is to be blamed. She is also responsible for all moral sins of men. It was she that seduced the man by revealing her nape, leg or hairs or face. She is responsible for her chastity and man's chastity. If she is covered, both will be secured and clean. If she is raped, she must keep quite because the law and as well as society and community will not take her side. If tortured by her family and husband, again she must keep quite because the law will not take her side, because she feels insecure to ask for legal support. Economically she is dependent. She needs food and a shelter to sleep. The family and husband will provide these things and in exchange she must obey and accept the rule of father, brother, husband and the son. Opposition means more torture and more oppression and exclusion. Uncertain future threatens her and uncertainty forces her to surrender. She is educated to accept and respect her false and predefined identity.

During war and conflicts, again she suffers the most. History has proved this in each and every culture and religion. She is unprotected during war. From 1992 to 2001 (still they continue the same acts in most parts of Afghanistan), the jehadis, the Taliban and Islamic warlords committed uncountable crimes against Afghan women. Sons of " Islam" and "jehad" proved that they can rape even a woman of 70 and a girl of 6 years. They proved that they like to see a woman during delivery in an open street and love to look at naked-women dancing. In these things they are not "Muslims" and God-fearing, because they forced women to dance and deliver their babies to "entertain" them. They are double-faced even in their Islamic values. They shout and get crazy for Mohammad's cartoons, but they forget their own actions, their own crimes and hypocrisy. They forget their history and the deeds they committed under the banner of Islam and jehad. Their jehad was not against "infidels". Their jehad was against their own Muslim people and their own Muslim women. If innocents killing, throat-slitting, stoning to death, raping, destruction and rocketing are jehad, fundamentalists and Taliban should be praised for their jehad in Afghanistan and many other Muslim countries.

Unfortunately women are educated in this way. To change women and give them security and full rights, the men-made definitions of social values and mores should be modified, and in most parts should be discarded. Until and unless, the definitions of values are changed, women will consider them "respectable" and "undisputed". "Respectable" should be made "unrespectable" and the values and mores should be given new meanings and definitions, otherwise, burqa will rule, not only on Afghan women, but on most Muslim women in many parts of the world. If a Muslim girl continues to cover her head even in French schools, it is not her fault. She is raised in this way. She got the meaning of values from men perspective. She cannot change her mind. For this change, she must be economically independent and introduce new definitions to values that are created, nourished, divined, forced and protected by men for the most part of human history.