Taliban Bans Women From Hearing Each Other’s Voice In New Bizarre Restrictions | See Details
The Taliban in Afghanistan has issued a new directive restricting women’s voices.
According to reports, the Taliban forbids women from hearing other women’s voices in its latest attempt to restrict women in Afghanistan, even further, banning them from reciting the Quran aloud when other women are present.
In a voice message on Monday, October 28, Taliban official Khalid Hanafi, the country’s minister for the promotion of virtue and prevention of vice announced the bizarre new restriction on women’s behaviour.
Hanafi emphasized that women must refrain from performing Takbir—an Islamic prayer—or reciting the Quran aloud when in the presence of other women.
Hanafi defended the new rule, stating that if women are not allowed to perform Takbir, they should certainly not be allowed to sing.
The regulations now require women to cover all parts of their bodies, including their faces, and silence their voices even within their homes.
Although precise details of the Taliban’s ruling are unclear, Afghan human rights activists have warned it could mean women are effectively banned from holding conversations with one another.
In his message, minister Khalid Hanafi said:
“Even when an adult female prays and another female passes by, she must not pray loudly enough for them to hear.
“How could they be allowed to sing if they aren’t even permitted to hear [each other’s] voices while praying, let alone for anything else.”
He said these are “new rules and will be gradually implemented, and God will be helping us in each step we take”.
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In addition to the voice restriction, the ministry has also banned visual images of living beings in public broadcasts.
As the Taliban banned living beings from being shown on television, the minister’s message was delivered via voice recording instead of a television broadcast.
This announcement has provoked widespread outrage among Afghan women and rights advocates.
Samira, a midwife in Herat, shared her frustration:
“I have been working in clinics in remote areas for eight years, but in these last two months, the Taliban’s oversight has intensified.”
She explained that health care workers are now barred from speaking with male companions of female patients, further complicating their work.
“They don’t even allow us to speak at checkpoints when we go to work,” she added.
Women’s rights activists have condemned the directive, saying it cripples women’s ability to live normal lives.
One activist remarked, “How are women who are the sole providers for their families supposed to buy bread, seek medical care or simply exist if even their voices are forbidden?”
“Whatever he says is a form of mental torture for us,” an Afghan woman in Kabul told The Telegraph.
“Living in Afghanistan is incredibly painful for us as women. Afghanistan is forgotten, and that’s why they are suppressing us – they are torturing us on a daily basis.”
“They say we cannot hear other women’s voices, and I do not understand where these views come from,” she added.
Since taking power in Aug 2021, the Taliban has systematically restricted women’s rights in Afghanistan.
Women have already been ordered to cover their faces “to avoid temptation and tempting others” and refrain from speaking in the presence of unfamiliar men who are not husbands or close relatives.
“If it is necessary for women to leave their homes, they must cover their faces and voices from men” and be accompanied by a “male guardian”, according to the rules approved by the Taliban’s supreme leader.
Afghan women have also been ordered not to speak loudly inside their homes, to prevent their voices from being heard outside.
Women who defy the new rules will be arrested and sent to prison, the Taliban said.
The Taliban’s supreme leader has also vowed to start stoning women to death in public.
“They [the Taliban] are waging an all-out war against us, and we have no one in the world to hear our voices,” a former civil servant told The Telegraph from Kabul.
“The world has abandoned us,” she added. “They left us to the Taliban, and whatever happens to us now is a result of Western government policies.”
“I feel depressed. The world is advancing in technology and having fun with their lives, but here we cannot even hear each other’s voices,” she said.
“They want us not to exist at all, and there’s nothing we can do about it,” another woman in western Herat province said.
“They may succeed at some point, as many are taking their lives due to the pressure,” she added
“They think ruling Afghanistan is only about suppressing women – we didn’t commit a crime by being born as women,” she said.
Below are some of the things the Taliban has said Afghan women are not allowed to do:
1.Drive a car
2.Speak in public
3.Speak loudly inside your house
4. Travel alone
4. Own a smartphone
6. Wear bright clothes
7. Wear high-heels
8. Go to high school or university
9. Sing
10. Read the Quran aloud in public
11. Look at men they don’t know
12. Attend a protest
13. Go to the gym
14. Go to the park
15. Work in the civil service
16. Ride in a taxi
17. Go abroad
18. Show their faces in public
19. Speak to a male doctor
20. Play sport
The United Nations and various human rights organizations have condemned the Taliban’s systematic rollbacks on women’s rights, which have left Afghan women with almost no freedom.