You will likely have seen the original cover (top) and may be interested in this shameless rationalization TIME printed. The editors insist: "We do not run this story or show this image either in support of the U.S. war effort or in opposition to it. We do it to illuminate what is actually happening on the ground." Right. You ought also to see the second, photo-shopped version (Thanks Stan!) and read the reasoning of the fellow who took license with the original (scroll down the comments). His claim is only modestly less credulous. For some sensible discussion go here.You might ask: So, you oppose the war? What about the Taliban and women's rights? Good questions. But, yes, I still oppose the war. And my simple, visceral retort is "What about, say, the Catholic church and women's (or children's) rights? What about the medieval attitudes that our own fundamentalists display regarding women's rights?"
My more complicated retort is, "OK, we can agree that the Taliban are fundamentalist thugs. But we are not going to get rid of them in any plausible scenario. And the ineffectual and corrupt Karzi regime is hardly an enlightened replacement. You might say the same of "our" fundamentalist allies in Pakistan. And, oh, by the way, let's have a graphic TIME cover story on the many various families we have bombed into oblivion in predator drone attacks - you know, the people we treat as collateral damage - and then talk support for the war." After all, we are deploying the drones mainly in hopes of avoiding American military casualties! I suppose Afghan lives are not worth quite as much?
This cover story is propaganda, pure and simple. TIME hardly is a font of feminist politics when it comes to our own relatively comfy lives. And, whether they admit it or not, they've adopted a moralistic stance in the service of a losing war.
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P.S.: The cover photo was taken, in the words of the TIME folk, "the distinguished South African photographer Jodi Bieber."
