Capitol Hill Blue Forums Political Issues Iraq & Afghanistan Interesting read - maybe

Just heard an interview with Thomas Gibbons-Neff. He served two tours in Afghanistan, then became a journalist and returned there, reporting for the New York Times.

I thought he was shopping a book but apparently he was interviewed because he is the new bureau chief in Kabul. His columns are available through the Times site and possibly elsewhere.

He is interesting for a number of reasons. He freely (and sadly) admits that the US lost the war. He interviewed a Talib who was (apparently) his chief enemy while he was a Marine.

The one point - the “maybe” part of the title: the interview was well underway when the interviewer, Terry Gross, asked about the Taliban’s attitude towards girls going back to school. Gibbons-Neff stumbled around and said something about “Maybe next year.” She followed up with a question about basic freedom for women - the ability to move around unescorted, for example. He fumfered around some more and finally said something about that being held as playing card for the Taliban in future international negations.

It makes me nuts that he wasn’t prepared for these two questions, and it makes me doubt his ability as a journalist. If you’re reporting on a society, and you see that society as “people” and also “women,” you’re going to miss a lot of valuable information.

If you’re interested, the interview is available on NPR.ORG.

I heard that very same NPR interview last night.

My take on what Gibbons-Neff said, is the Taliban will be held accountable to the advancement of girls and women only because the Taliban wants to be able to be trade partners etc with the global community and the global community is demanding the continued advancement of girls and women from the Taliban.

Yep. But what ticked me off was that he had to be prompted to address that question. He didn’t seem to regard it as important at all, nor did he have prepared answers.

I get your point now. Yup, I agree. The issue of women and girls inclusivity in society in Afghanistan, should be #1 on everyone's mind. There is no excuse for it not to be.

Why do I think it wasn't for Gibbins-Neff?

• White male privlege
• Ex-military
• Probably conservative

Doesn't his book focus more on the interview that he had with the Taliban guy who wanted to kill any US military and now the Taliban guy is " we're not at war any longer...let's sit down for some Chai tea and be friends."

I will admit my first reaction was “Marine,” but that may not be fair. If his experience in Afghanistan was more in military conflict than with non-military civilians, his focus is understandable — but it still makes him a crap reporter.

On the other hand, non-western gender expectations are an important religious and cultural thing for the Taliban. Crapping on people's deep beliefs is not going to get you interviews, no matter how offensive you find them. A reporter's job is to interview, not to criticize or educate their interview subjects about why their beliefs are obnoxious.

No one said anything about criticizing. Educating is another thing entirely.

A reporter’s job is to report. Interviewing is one tool used to accomplish that task. If no one had been reporting, we wouldn’t know about the issue in the first place.. If all the reporting from Russia came from interviews with Putin we’d be missing a lot of the story.

Reporting is not the same as “crapping on people’s beliefs.”

The Taliban reads Western stories. If you deeply offend them in your article, it might be good reporting, but it's the last interview you ever get. And don't plan on remaining in Afghanistan either. A reporter can easily just report the facts on the ground and let their readers draw their own conclusions, without closing their access to people we don't like. The reporter's job is to educate his readers, not the people he is interviewing.

I have Muslim friends in the US. One couple in particular consists of a male software engineer and a female physician. Any gender-role beliefs they hold seem to be pretty harmless. So I don't see Islam as being all that misogynistic. I think the real problem is conservatism. We have gun-worshipping alt-right groups in this country that hate women to the point of mass shootings!

Exactly my point. During this interview the reporter did not address the facts of Taliban misogyny, until asked. The original post said only that the reporter was missing (or ignoring) the facts on the ground.

I’m glad you have Muslim friends. The misogyny in Afghanistan originates with the Taliban; it would be a serious mistake to attribute it to Muslims in general.


Richard Nixon had an “Enemies List.” When the list was released, Daniel Shorr read it on camera and was clearly surprised when one of the names he read out was his own. He didn’t have access to Nixon but that didn’t keep him from being a good reporter. If the reality was that Shorr didn’t write anything bad about Nixon because he was afraid he’d be added to the list, he wouldn’t have been a great newsman; he’d have been a toady.