The Price of Going to Class

Imagine your daily routine. Wake up, eat breakfast, take the train, get to school, complain about work, go to lunch, play lacrosse, go home, eat dinner, do homework, and go to sleep. We often complain about how horrible our lives are until we consider the lives of others. Specifically, we read an article about girls in Afghanistan who were told not to come back to school, but returned anyways because of their desire to learn. 11 girls and 4 teachers were attacked by 10 Taliban militants who were employed to throw acid on the faces of these courageous women. Can you imagine going to school and being brutally attacked? These men, The Taliban, are afraid of young women learning to read and write. Shamsia Husseini said, being brutally attacked by the Taliban and receiving many scars, "The people who did this to me don't want women to be educated. They want us to be stupid things." I don't understand how anyone could be so brutal and vile. The Taliban are some of the most powerful men in Afghanistan and they are afraid of young women. What would our society be like without women and allowing them to get an education? Education has come a long way in the U.S. but it also faced hardships along the way. Including mandatory public education, integration of women in education, and finally the integration of blacks and whites in school during the Civil Rights Movement. I believe that the Afghanistan government needs to rid the Taliban from their beautiful country. They are corrupting the education for women and bringing violence to the country side. This situation reminds me a lot of the one in Germany in the early 1930's. After Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany, the Nazi party was now the official party of Germany. History teachers often ask, "Why even study history?" And one of the main responses is that we need to learn from our past mistakes. And I believe that this point relates to the current situation in Afghanistan and even Darfur. In the past there have been brutal homicides such as the Holocaust and the Armenian Genocide. Other governments should step in and rid the Taliban once and for all. During the Holocaust the U.S. knew what was going on in Germany and didn't step in while millions of Jews were being slaughtered. When they finally decided to join in the war effort it was too late; the damage had already been done. Now it may only be schoolgirls and teachers, however the Taliban could spread and there presence could affect the entire world.