It took a few years, but I finally watched the movie “The Kite Runner”. It now makes the cut as one of my favorite movie dramas. I highly recommend it.
The story, historical fiction, was thought-provoking, compelling and inspiring. It was also very disturbing, because it dealt with the repulsive, revolting reality of the rape of children by depraved sub-human scum.
While not all Afghan leaders were or are as depraved as those depicted in the movie, all are guilty who turn a blind eye to the perverse practice.
The sexual abuse of a child is one of the most reprehensible, depraved, evil, sadistic and abominable crimes a person can commit. And no, all you immoral relativists out there: Culture is absolutely NOT a justification.
Then said [Jesus] unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences will come: but woe unto him through whom they come! It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones.
Luke 17:1-2
Any society or culture that permits such perversions is guaranteed to suffer the consequences of such evil, including the withdrawal of God’s blessings, a scarcity of charity, the disintegration of families — which are the foundation of a good society — and the subsequent proliferation of poverty and crime.
Afghanistan then and now is an example of those consequences: A cesspool of poverty, hate and crime.
The United States of America, by fighting and nearly defeating the Taliban, offered the good people of Afghanistan hope. But we fell short. Unfortunately, that shortcoming was foreseeable when we failed to make it part of our mission to eradicate the evil of child sexual abuse.
Instead, U.S. commanders turned a blind eye to the abuse, and ordered U.S. soldiers to do the same.
According to National Public Radio’s Ailsa Chang:
A 2018 report by an independent government watchdog … shines a light on a very troubling aspect of U.S. military policy in Afghanistan. The report lists 5,753 cases of what it describes as gross human rights abuses by Afghan forces. Many of those abuses involve the routine enslavement and sexual abuse of underage boys by Afghan commanders.
Ailsa Chang, NPR
The New York Times reported:
In his last phone call home, Lance Cpl. Gregory Buckley Jr. told his father what was troubling him: From his bunk in southern Afghanistan, he could hear Afghan police officers sexually abusing boys they had brought to the base.
“At night we can hear them screaming, but we’re not allowed to do anything about it,” the Marine’s father, Gregory Buckley Sr., recalled his son telling him before he was shot to death at the base in 2012. He urged his son to tell his superiors. “My son said that his officers told him to look the other way because it’s their culture.”
Rampant sexual abuse of children has long been a problem in Afghanistan, particularly among armed commanders who dominate much of the rural landscape and can bully the population. The practice is called bacha bazi, literally “boy play,” and American soldiers and Marines have been instructed not to intervene — in some cases, not even when their Afghan allies have abused boys on military bases, according to interviews and court records.
New York Times, 9/21/2015
Adding injustice to iniquity, in cases where U.S. soldiers did the right thing and intervened, they were punished.
Sadly, this U.S. policy in Afghanistan was simply an extension of the immorality that is tolerated and, in some cases, even celebrated in our own country. To our everlasting condemnation and destruction, the sexualization and sexual grooming of children is becoming commonplace and is often defended by pundits and politicians. Some examples include:
- Sex Ed for young elementary school children.
- Drag queen story hour.
- Netflix Cuties.
- Sexually explicit cartoons and shows targeted at children.
- Pornography in children’s libraries, even going so far as depraved depictions and descriptions of adult-child sex.
- Persuading impressionable children to question their gender and transition.
Such things are not justifiable under any moral code and must not be tolerated. Make no mistake, the intentions of the people who are behind these perversions are to sexualize and groom children, and to ultimately legalize sex with children. These perverted, depraved adults must be opposed, condemned and prosecuted, not condoned and celebrated. The proverbial millstone should become their lot, in terms of their acceptance in society and the consequences of their actions. Indeed, it would be better if a millstone were hanged about our neck, and we be cast into the sea, than that we should turn a blind eye to these offenses against children.