In Bread and Roses, the documentary executive-produced by Malala Yousafzai, an Afghan woman named Taranom finally makes the painful decision to flee her birthplace for Pakistan. “May history remember that, once upon a time, such cruelty was permitted against the women of Afghanistan,” she says in a moment that is particularly haunting. “Before the United Nations. Before human rights organizations. Before the whole world.”
The documentary—also produced by actor Jennifer Lawrence and directed by Sahra Mani—was created thanks, in part, to the cellphone footage from three Afghan women in Kabul speaking out against the Taliban’s inhumane laws. In addition to Taranom, the film follows Sharifa, an ex–government employee who is forced to live out her life indoors, and Zahra, a woman who organizes activists in her dentistry practice.
I spoke to Yousafzai about what compelled her to be part of the documentary and how dire things have become for women since the Taliban takeover in 2021. Yousafzai also expressed the desperate need for Canada to continue its efforts in the evacuation process to resettle Afghan women still trapped in the country—especially those whose lives are under threat. She is pushing for the world to treat the Taliban’s actions as gender apartheid—in this case, laws, decrees, and policies exclude girls and women from public life and spaces. Her campaign is appealing the United Nations to draft gender apartheid into a Crimes Against Humanity Treaty so that the de facto government can be held accountable.
How did you get involved with the documentary?
I have been involved in activism with other Afghan women to bring attention to the crimes that the Taliban are committing by imposing restrictions on women [such as by taking away] the right to work and the right to an education.
I’ve been most recently involved in this gender apartheid campaign: gender apartheid needs to be codified into a Crimes Against Humanity Treaty so that the Taliban can be held accountable. We need a better international system to recognize the scale of the oppression that Afghan women are facing. These current laws fall short: they’re important and they need to be happening in parallel, but we need to do more.
When I came across this documentary about three Afghan women coming forward to tell how their rights have been taken away by the Taliban, I immediately wanted to be part of it. It is so important to centre Afghan women’s voices because that is exactly what the Taliban are working to silence. They are trying to remove and erase women from public life and any form of participation.
You must see something of yourself in the three women. Did their experiences and seeing the film, perhaps for the first time, trigger any PTSD of your own—especially the Taliban attack on you in 2012?
For me, seeing how things have reversed in Afghanistan in the past three years has been extremely challenging. It’s been emotionally heartbreaking to think about my life as an eleven-year-old girl, when the Taliban banned education just because we were girls.
Then they attacked me and attempted to kill me, but somehow I survived. All I could think about is that this should never happen to anyone again. This should be a story that stays in the past.
But now this is the reality for Afghan women and girls. They’re always being punished—for wanting to be in school, for wanting to work, for even just leaving their homes to go to a park or to visit a doctor—because they don’t have a male companion. It’s all absolutely absurd.
As an activist, when I think about the work I have been doing and what many other Afghan women have been doing, we have a simple wish: Let’s call it a crime at the international level—and hold those responsible accountable.
As you know, Canada has taken in many Afghan women since the United States withdrawal from Afghanistan and subsequent Taliban takeover, but there’s a strong push for the country to do more.
Canada can play a critical role in supporting the activism that is led by Afghan women and girls. Of course, Canada has welcomed Afghan women refugees, and we want them to support more women activists, especially those facing threats.
Recently, I had a meeting with [Prime Minister] Justin Trudeau, and I conveyed this message to him on behalf of Afghan women activists. Canada should also step forward and play a leadership role in the codification of gender apartheid. I also appreciate the role that the ambassador of Canada [to the United Nations, Bob Rae] has been playing in calling the subjugation gender apartheid. We also need more countries to come forward.
There’s a scene in the film where one of the women talks about people who malign her by creating fake Facebook accounts and using images from the women’s groups to bring her morality into question. Did you ever go through something similar after you stood up to the Taliban or later on for your own activism?
No, but we live in a world where anyone can make a fake profile in someone else’s name. Now we are witnessing the Taliban changing tactics and making use of technology. Perhaps this wasn’t something that was done in the past, around 2009, but it’s different now.
The use of technology seems to be a new way of punishing or threatening women—as a deterrent, as if to say we will defame you in the community. Women are being beaten and harassed and put in prisons. You see that clearly happening in the documentary. Technology is a way to blackmail women dissidents, and they are using any method at their disposal.
In August, the Taliban issued an edict proclaiming that women’s voices aren’t allowed to be heard in public. Last month, there was a new edict proclaiming women are banned even from hearing each other’s voices. This includes reciting the Quran in the presence of other women. Can you respond to this?
I think it’s ridiculous. The Taliban have issued more than a hundred decrees and edicts, and the majority of them limit women in some way.
Asserting control over a woman’s voice is extremely disturbing. It just shows how women are objectified and how women are regarded by the Taliban: women are denied every possible right, opportunity, and dignity.
Giving a platform to Afghan women, such as how we’re doing with this documentary, is so crucial because when you hear the voices of these women, I see it as a form of resistance against the Taliban. When you see photos of these women, I see it as a form of resistance against the Taliban.
The more we can bring Afghan women’s voices to the stage, the more we can include them in conversations and give them global attention. That will help us to make sure that it is Afghan women who are deciding the future of their lives as they see fit—and not the Taliban.
