I really thought that the Afghanistan Taliban couldn’t do more harm than they have already done. But earlier this week I was shocked to the core to read their latest rulings. They have now banned women from speaking in public places. Yes, you read that correctly – women are not allowed to speak when out and about. It’s not about public speaking, which they were already banned from doing, but rather the simple act of using their voices.

It was already horrendous for our sisters in that country. They are forced to wear a burqa when out of the home – an uncomfortable thick garment that effectively renders them invisible. Most feel intimidated into having a male guardian with them when out. They are banned from secondary education and from employment. I can’t imagine what life must be like for them, especially as many of them had already been to University and taken up professional roles.

Now, according to the new laws their voices, literally, must not be heard in public.

Whenever an adult woman leaves her home out of necessity, she is obliged to conceal her voice, face, and body.

According to The Guardian:

Women’s voices are also deemed to be potential instruments of vice and so will not be allowed to be heard in public under the new restrictions. Women must also not be heard singing or reading aloud, even from inside their houses.

How on earth can women be expected to do any task outside the home – shopping, attending a medical appointment, visiting a friend – if they can’t speak? Presumably they will have to have a male guardian with them to speak for them.

The consequences of breaking these rules can be horrific, since the Taliban has now introduced flogging and stoning as punishments.

The rationale for these rules, under the twisted Taliban logic, is that women’s bodies and voices tempt men into vice. This is, of course, the ultimate form of victim blaming.

Not surprisingly there has been widespread condemnation of these practices by international human rights organisations. They are also opposed within the worldwide Muslim community and within the country. The President of the Afghan Lawyers Association is quoted as saying:

From a legal standpoint this document faces serious issues. It contradicts the fundamental principles of Islam (where) the promotion of virtue has never been defined through force, coercion, or tyranny.

This document not only violates Afghanistan’s domestic laws but also broadly contravenes all 30 articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Blaming women for men’s unbridled sexual desires has a long, long history. Indeed, it lies at the base of one popular, though inaccurate, interpretation of the story of Adam and Eve, which appears in the sacred text common to Christians, Muslims and Jews. Eve tempts Adam, but it is not sex that she is offering – they were already “one flesh” – but the (banned) knowledge of good and evil, ie a code of morality. As a result they have to abandon their simple life in paradise and experience the complexity of self-aware human life. It is a myth about the origins of consciousness.

But how often is that story framed as a woman knowingly sexually tempting a man to the point where he can’t resist – so she is to blame for his lust?

This view of woman as the tempter and man as the powerless victim has resonated through history. There are even remnants of it in our culture and judicial system today. We still hear of rape trials where the victim’s sexual history, or style of dress, or visibility late at night is relentlessly questioned. This must stop. As an extreme case, we can imagine scenarios, from escaping domestic violence to mental health episodes, in which a woman walks down a street naked at midnight, but that does not in any way, ever, justify a man raping her. The Taliban, of course, embody the extremist version of this fallacy.

Sadly much of the world has remained silent while women’s rights have been eroded in Afghanistan over the last three years.

The Guardian also quotes Shukria Barakzai, a former Afghan parliamentarian and Afghanistan’s ambassador to Norway:

It is concerning that international organisations, particularly the United Nations and the European Union, instead of standing against these inhumane practices, are trying to normalise relations with the Taliban. They are, in a way, whitewashing this group, disregarding the fact that the Taliban are committing widespread human rights violations.

We must join the voices condemning them.

* Mary Reid is a contributing editor on Lib Dem Voice. She was a councillor in Kingston upon Thames, where she is still very active with the local party, and is the Hon President of Kingston Lib Dems.