British Media Argues Afghan Men Have No Choice But To Sell Off Daughters
A Tuesday post from the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is accused of depicting the Afghan fathers “forced” to sell their own children as victims, while their daughters pay the price.
Read more San Diego Mosque Shooters Hated Basically Everyone, Possible Manifesto Shows
The article says Afghan men are so “desperate” due to the nation’s poverty that they are willing to sell their underage daughters off to be married.
Saeed Ahmad told the BBC that he has been “forced” to sell his 5-year-old daughter, Shaiqa, for $3,200 to pay for her appendicitis surgery.
“I had no money to pay the medical expenses, so I sold my daughter to a relative,” Ahmad said. (RELATED: Trump’s $40 Billion Hormuz Insurance Play Falls Flat)
The BBC said there is an “evident” bond between the 5-year-old daughter and her father, although she will be handed off in marriage when she turns 10. Ahmad said the relative would have taken his daughter immediately, but he opted instead to take the payment in two parts to draw out the sale of Shaiqa.
“Giving away your child at such a young age carries a lot of anxiety,” Ahmad said. “Underage [marriages] have their problems; however, because I couldn’t pay for her treatment, I was thinking at least she will be alive.”
An Afghan refugee family living in Pakistan arrives outside the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) repatriation center, some 25 Km from Peshawar on October 25, 2023, as they return to Afghanistan following Pakistan’s government decision to expel people illegally staying in the country. Hundreds of thousands of Afghans living illegally in Pakistan have been given until November 1 to leave voluntarily or face deportation, the interior minister said on October 3, a crackdown on Kabul’s embassy in Islamabad called “harassment.” (Photo by ABDUL MAJEED/AFP via Getty Images)
The BBC said daughters are preferred to be sold over the sons of the family because sons are viewed as prospective breadwinners, particularly because of the Taliban’s laws against education and work for girls and women. The BBC also noted that selling their daughters often comes with a marital gift from the groom’s family.
One man told the BBC that in the last six weeks he has only been able to find three days of work, earning roughly $3 each day.
“I got a call saying my children hadn’t eaten for two days,” another man told the BBC.
“I felt like I should kill myself. But then I thought, how will that help my family? So here I am looking for work.”
The BBC’s sharing of the article on X was accompanied by a community note saying the news agency frames the fathers’ selling of their daughters sympathetically, focusing on “fathers’ distress over outcomes for the girls (rape).”
Read more Illinois Sued Over Firearms Licensing Scheme
A former writer and producer for the BBC, Phil Craig, responded to the post. He asserted that the agency may have reached a new low point, suggesting that if its head does not fire everyone involved by the end of the day, “I may have to give up on the organisation entirely.”
“A culture in which women and girls are tradable commodities less valuable than cattle. A man selling his own tiny daughter to be raped by a paedophile,” Craig said. “And we are meant to have sympathy?”
U.K. broadcaster and journalist Andy Jones also responded, noting the examples were of fathers selling their daughters to men.
“Afghanistan has one of the highest rape rates per capita in the world; no legal age of consent; and child brides are common,” Jones said. “Not going to link all these things??”
British women’s rights and child safeguarding activist Paola Diana, chair of the Women’s Policy Centre, said the fathers were not given an impossible choice, but an evil one.
“Shame on each of your journalists for creating such a sympathetic story,” Diana argued. “Those fathers should die of hunger instead; they should fight the Taliban instead to free their women. Nothing, and I repeat, nothing, can absolve you for selling your baby.”
The Taliban rejected the idea that their ban on women working has contributed to the nation’s poverty. A spokesperson for the foreign terrorist organization blamed the U.S. for the country’s economic hardship in a statement to the BBC.
“During the 20 years of invasion, an artificial economy was created due to the influx of US dollars,” the Taliban deputy spokesman told the BBC. “After the end of the invasion, we inherited poverty, hardship, unemployment and other problems.” (RELATED: Your Chinese-Made TV Could Be Spying On You)
The author of the article, the BBC’s South Asia and Afghanistan correspondent, Yogita Limaye, has won two Emmy awards and an Amnesty Award, according to Amnesty International.
An editor’s note at the bottom of the article said the piece had been updated to “explain why daughters are more often sold than sons in Afghanistan.”
The BBC has not responded to the Daily Caller’s request for comment as of publication.
Post Comment