From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1996:
“Caged birds have been outlawed by Afghanistan’s new Taliban rulers,”
Christopher Thomas reported in the October 8 edition of the London Times. “Pet canaries
flutter hungrily about Kabul, the capital, waiting to die in the fast-approaching winter.
Mynah birds bred in captivity sit bewildered and starving in the trees. Women have been
beaten on the street for simply being there, regardless of whether they are veiled, because
of a rule confining them to the home except when shopping.”
The Taliban shocked other leading Islamic fundamentalists as much as anyone.
As many hastened to argue, the stated intent of Mohammedan law circumscribing female
freedom of dress and movement was to protect women from male predation. Though obviously
reinforcing patriarchal customs now widely recognized as abusive in themselves,
Mohammed plainly did not intend his laws to increase violent abuse. Likewise, as some
scholars pointed out, Mohammed opposed keeping caged birds because he opposed the
cruel capture of wild birds; his decree was not meant to incite cruelty.
Indeed, the Kabul bird release coincided with World Wildlife Fund distribution of
Islamic journalist Abrar Ahmed’s expose of the capture for sale of more than a million live
birds a year in India, just so they can be released as a display of faith by Hindus, Jains,
Parsis, and Sindhis, as well as Moslems, whose teachings on the subject are parallel.
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