Bread & Roses

1/2/2025

When the Taliban resumed control of Afghanistan with its takeover of Kabul in August 2021, virtually all of the progress that had been made in bringing democracy and a more open-minded outlook to the nation was wiped out in a heartbeat. That’s particularly true when it came to the regime’s treatment of women. Despite representing half of the country’s population, women and girls were systematically subjugated to the autocratic rule of the Taliban’s brutal misogynist warlords. Women were forbidden from working, forced to stay at home, and girls’ schools were summarily closed, their hopes of better lives dashed. And those who refused to comply with these dictates were routinely beaten, imprisoned or killed for their actions. This was especially true among the rising tide of activists who fou