Journalistic ethics that do not apply to Afghanistan, the problem of self-orientalism and the responsibility of the Taliban

It has been 45 years since Edward Said's treatment of Western fantasies and perceptions about Islam in Covering Islam. Of course, such perceptions did not begin 45 years ago either. Orientalism ultimately constitutes the sum of Westerners' perceptions, imaginings and literatures about the East. That this sum became an operational tool for Western colonialism, that it worked like an exploratory arm of colonialism, was made possible by the tragic equation between knowledge and power. Even interests that are apparently innocent and aimed at gaining information cannot refrain from defining things according to their own expectations and fantasies, and therefore from producing power. That is why Orientalism cannot remain innocent even in its most innocent form of seeking information.

THE PROBLEM IS THAT THIS ORIENTALISM HAS BECOME CAPABLE OF AFFECTING US TOO

That is, we ourselves adopt the knowledge Westerners produce about us. We see ourselves as they see us and look from the window they look from. I have bad news: we have adopted and internalized Orientalism so deeply today that we have begun to regard and produce even knowledge about ourselves as knowledge about third persons. We do not even attach this descriptive language to ourselves when speaking of Eastern societies. Because we have drifted so far from ourselves, we position ourselves so thoroughly in the West.

Note, though, that I am not saying we have become Westernized. I am saying we have put on Western spectacles and see ourselves as third persons, through the eyes of Orientalism. A long time has passed over us for such an internalization of Orientalism, a long period and process of application, a process that has levelled us out badly. Sadly, even our Muslims cannot be free of this perspective.

DOESN'T AFGHANISTAN DESERVE SUCH A LOOK?

The Afghan people, who for 20 years made things hell for NATO and the US, which today are trying to flex their global hegemony with all their arrogance, and who ultimately drove them out of their country, not just as a figure of speech but literally "as they came," deserve in every circumstance to be closely followed, understood and, of course, greatly appreciated. All the more so, after this victory, a country that has provided within 5 years complete stability, a secure environment, and a social peace without revenge, without drugs, without violence should be drawing attention beyond the contrived stories, repeated every other minute, about "not educating girls."

In a world where even a blood feud between two families cannot be resolved though everyone comes together, how was the Taliban able to resolve with a single decision a conflict environment in which there could be at least a million blood feuds? Shouldn't this question alone be an extraordinary event that would require all the sociologists and anthropologists of our age to go after it?

And how did it resolve the problem of drug addiction, which even the most modern countries with the most contemporary scientific treatment methods have been unable to solve, by pulling at least 1-2 million people out of its clutches within a few years? How did it cope with mafias with state-level power that may have invested in this sector and cut off its production and trade like a knife? Wouldn't this question alone attract attention?

FOR 50 YEARS GIRLS WERE BEING PUT UNDER THE GROUND BEFORE THEY REACHED SCHOOL AGE

Anyway, when we ask such questions, we become people who "cannot finish praising Afghanistan." Nobody even wants to look at the extraordinariness in these events. All that matters is that girls cannot go to school. For 50 years tens of thousands of girls stepped on mines or had bombs rain on them and fell under the ground before reaching school age, and nobody cared so much. The savagery inflicted on those innocent, oppressed girls did not trouble so many consciences as the girls' not being able to go to school does. Besides, there are reports that even this situation is not as it is supposed to be, in our observations and in the scene we have relayed.

We said that when it comes to the Taliban, a great right arises for certain people to invent everything. In fact, if the most standard ethical rules of journalism and research were applied here, verifying these things would not be that difficult.

"OPPONENTS WILL BE EXECUTED FROM NOW ON," YOU SAID?

In the reports based on the Criminal Procedure Directive for Courts published by the Taliban, for example, the news that "opponents will be executed from now on" is spreading in all its sensational presentation. It occurs to no one to ask. After the Taliban drove NATO-US forces out of the country, it declared a general amnesty. It declared a general amnesty covering not only opponents but even people who had for years committed crimes against humanity against its own members, and not a single violation of this amnesty has been recorded in 5 years.

(To be accurate, two Taliban members killed someone who had done them a great deal of harm under the former regime, but these two Taliban members were immediately caught and put in prison, and are being tried for violating the general amnesty rule of the Islamic Emirate.) After the Taliban took over the administration, it recognizes all the people who fought against it under the former regime, and not the slightest prosecution of any of them has occurred. Even the former regime's administrators and people who were not merely opposed to it but hostile are now able to continue their normal lives in Kabul.

THE DOCUMENT SAYS "REBEL," NOT "OPPONENT"

So what might the statement on which this news is based be? Of course, when we learn that it speaks not of "opponents" but of armed "rebels" and correct the statement accordingly, the news has no sensational effect left. But from whom are we to expect even this much honesty?

As for the reports that society is divided into statuses, this is in fact a provision that can easily find its counterpart even in the legal systems in our country or in the West. We have said it before; let us proceed with the clearer statement of Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid. The matter is only that certain ta'zir practices distinguish between people who have made committing crimes a habit in society and people who have committed a crime for the first time:

"Some people can be dissuaded from a crime merely by warning and admonition, since they have social standing and high self-respect. Others are repeat offenders and therefore may require heavier, even physical, punishments. Some are reformed by being summoned to court and addressed, while for others a prison sentence may become necessary. Since the structure of society differs, ta'zir practices may differ too. These rulings were not arbitrarily produced; they were taken verbatim from the detailed provisions of Hanafi jurisprudence.

Here the notion of 'lower level' is used for those who commit the crime continuously and do not give it up despite warnings. In such cases the judge may impose a prison sentence, taking into account the person's past and the possibility of corruption arising in society.

On the other hand, for those who commit an error but understand from a warning, who have honor and social standing, and who hold a respected position in society, only a serious admonition may suffice. Such an admonition can have as deterrent an effect on these people as a prison sentence. Consequently, the authority of ta'zir has been given to the emir so that he may consider how people can be reformed more effectively."

THE TALIBAN'S LANGUAGE IS OF COURSE NOT WITHOUT PROBLEMS

Of course, there is still an aspect to the language of the said "Criminal Procedure Directive for Courts," which is used as a pretext for debates, that can always fuel controversy. In fact, Mujahid's statements reveal this aspect as well. The directive expresses, by translating as it is, the language of the perhaps never-updated fatwas of classical and traditional Hanafi jurisprudence. For Afghan society, which lives in its own history and within its own culture, this language may have no problematic side whatsoever. But when this language is translated into other languages, it is not simply translated; it also runs into an incommensurable criterion of judgment. In this age, when nobody even listens to anybody properly and everyone gets stuck on the prejudices in their own head, expecting people to understand the language of traditional jurisprudence on which the Taliban rely within its own cultural-historical conditions would be expecting too much of the people of our age. For it is quite clear that we live in an age devoid of the mind of fiqh.

THE TALIBAN'S RESPONSIBILITY: CONSULTATION WITH THE WORLD'S ISLAMIC SCHOLARS

In this situation, a greater responsibility falls on the Taliban. Even if they live without compromise in their own cultural and historical conditions, all their actions and their language are heard and perceived all over the world at the same moment and attributed to Islam. Being in closer communication with the ulema of the Islamic world and being more open to consultation on ways in which fiqh can be made flexible, updated and expressed in a new language now gains greater urgency.