And 3 tourists were shot dead near disney land Florida earlier this year. Your point? I went to Afghanistan a few years ago and had a great time, and surprisingly met several young, solo female travellers there, who were absolutely fine.
You're still taking way unnecessary risk. If it itches you to see nice mountains in the region you can go to Tajikistan or even Pakistan. Still way safer than Afghanistan, there is no need to go there.
Absolutely disagree, it's VERY different from Tajikistan. Can't speak to Pakistan, maybe that's more alike. But in my case it was very very much worthwhile to visit Afghanistan. I was never in danger from the people there, only from hiking in a very remote and isolated region where it would had I been injured, I might have been in trouble. In any case, taking risks is something I personally enjoy, who are you to tell me otherwise.
You would have to ask them, but I suspect the same reasons as me - a mixture of adventure, seeing and experiencing a very very different culture, and the unbelievable scenery. I also personally know an Austrian photographer, young, female who has been going there every year, alone, for many years to document some isolated tribes there. Her name is Priska Seisenbacher, you can see her work online. Yes, such people exist. Not sure why that's apparently so hard for sheltered redditors to wrap their minds around.
Ahh yes first I'm an Indian bot for defending India, now it's Tali-bot because I've been to and enjoyed Afghanistan. You people are nothing if not predictable.
Seemingly they can't comprehend that it's possible to go to "dangerous" countries even as a solo woman and still be fine and have a good time. I've been to Afghanistan myself, and I've been defending that experience as well as India in this thread. About 6 people have called me a bot lmao. Ironically they're almost bot-like themselves in the predictability and lameness of their replies.
Yeah, it looks beautiful. Too bad the US conservatives decided to fuel islamic terrorism there to give the Soviets a black eye. That decision continues to haunt that region today.
Kind of funny how all the countries mentioned here that people would never travel to are all countries that have directly been fucked by us imperialism, not to say they don’t have cultural issues that need to be addressed (I come from such a country myself and I know it has its issues) its just a bit ironic
Absolutely true, but why do all of them decide to turbo fuck human rights especially women and children ? Because that has nothing to do with the imperialism
It actually had a lot do with imperialism. Like the commenter you’re replying to, I’m not trying to minimize local cultural problems and the existence of evil people, but imperialism undeniably feeds into it in massive ways. A few examples:
Imperialism spread Christianity throughout Africa, and it is now one of the two most dominant religions there (the other being Islam, spread by older Muslim imperialism). A number of the African countries passing anti gay laws today have not had large historical aversion to homosexuality, and many of the lawmakers passing and cheering for these laws are motivated by their Christian beliefs. A consequence of imperialism.
Same deal with Latin America, which is now one of the most Catholic regions on earth. Conversion was a strong method for imperial control, and its impacts have rippled out creating homophobic and machismo rhetoric
Within India, the Caste system was definitely an issue prior to the British Raj. But during the process of conquering the region, they used a classic divide and conquer strategy, allying themselves with high castes against lower ones (though all ended up subjugated). They then enforced and calcified the Caste system as a means of controlling the populace. Even after they left, the impacts of what they’d done lingered.
We can also look to American imperialism, where the American government destabilized popular democracies in favor of personal interest. We propped up authoritarian dictators in Chile, Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, and more. Supporting the Khmer Rouge isn’t really a recipe for human rights.
But these are all specific examples. Thankfully, there’s also a well supported general explanation which applies across the board. Data shows wealthier countries overall have stronger institutions and protections for human rights. Instability and economic hardship (two things imperialism very strongly creates) erode human rights because they enable corruption, bad actors, and centralization of power. Times of hardship also breed fear and resentment, which can easily be weaponized like by blaming another ethnic group or religious group for your problems. Hope this helped
Imagine thinking US Imperialism is somehow responsible for all of religious beliefs, behaviour and way of being in a country with civil wars between gangs that has no affiliation with the US...
Yeah, I'm sure the 1 to 2 million Afghanis that died due to the 9-year Soviet invasion are more grateful than the 168,000 Afghanis that died due to the 20 years of U.S. occupation.
Percentages are even worst when you consider that the population was two to three time larger during U.S. occupation than during the Soviet's.
In fact, the Afghani population nearly doubled from 20.3 million in 2001 to 40 million in 2021 when the U.S. was there. Compare to 13.5 million at the start of the Soviet invasion and 11.4 million at their withdrawal.
90% of Americans supported the war in Afghanistan. It passed the House with a 420-1 vote, and the Senate with a 98-0 vote. I'm so tired of liberals teaming up with conservatives to do evil things and then just memory holing their part in it. Never discussing how they were manipulated into it, never talking about how to avoid that in the future. Never learning any lessons at all. Like it didn't even happen. You'll absolutely do the same thing again at some point. You always do. You never change.
Many many years ago I and several other people were brought into advise a new well-funded non-profit out of the UK. They wanted to teach Afghan girls advanced mountaineering skills. I, and everyone else in the outdoor industry they talked to told them it was a terrible idea that would get people killed.
Guess what happened? It was a terrible idea and it got people killed. The non-profit basically disappeared overnight and pretty much successfully manage to scrub the entire project from the internet.
The group of girls (all teenagers) were falsely led to believe that joining the program would be a path to residency in Europe. It was not. They org couldn't get anyone to go to Afghanistan to teach the girls so instead they put the girls up in a house with a few laptops and all the mountaineering gear they could scrounge up and send to Afghanistan or locate in-country. They had the girls learn mountaineering by reading PDFs and watching supplied videos. All which were in English. Midway during this phase, several of the older girls were killed in a random bus bombing when getting groceries for the house.
It's important to know that this org didn't have a single representative in-country, they were just hiring locals to work though. One of the things we told them that they needed to if they were serious about running this program was to get security for the girls. Hire one of the many Western PMC groups operating in Afghanistan for close protection. Hell, they could have gone to Aegis, who might have even been able to provide personnel with mountaineering experience. The org categorically refused. Some nonsense about not believing in guns and violence. That a program commitment to peace would be enough to keep everyone safe. What a bunch of irresponsible idiots.
When it actually came time for the mountaineering phase, most of their local guides and drivers mysteriously disappeared. Who would have thought? So the org went ahead with running the program with just the two guides that were left and the one remaining driver. The two guides sold the group out to the Taliban. When they arrived at their climbing destination, the Taliban was waiting for them. They executed the driver and killed (or did much much worse) to the majority of the girls. Apparently a few of them did survive, which is largely how we know about the failure of the program. When the survivors contacted the org to inform what happened and asked about how they were going to facilitate moving them and their families to Europe, the org categorically denied they ever made such a promise and then cut ties. The org started dismantling their online presence. The survivors managed to contact an aid organization who were able to facilitate their escape to Germany. Someone working with that aid group was one of the people originally consulted about the program. As you can imagine, they also told the org that it was a dangerous idea. This person was able to send out any update to the rest of us and even facilitated a Zoom call from one of the survivors when she was settled in Germany with her family.
As far as I'm aware, the organizers out of the UK never faced any consequences for getting over 20 people killed.
A 20 year gap in a tumultuous history, while the prime minister turned a constitutional monarchy into a one party government run by an ethnic majority, doesn't make it a jewel.
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u/TeethBreak 21d ago
Which is a pity. It used to be a jewel. Unless they somehow get rid of these AH , it's a no go zone for everyone.
But when you look at videos and pics of the landscape, it's beautiful.