Jo van der Spek on Mon, 8 Apr 2002 15:48:37 +0200 (CEST) |
[Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]
<nettime> Afghan Eyes |
watching "In search of the Afghan girl" on National Geographic channel in Holland incited this comment: In search of the Afghan girl. The mystery of the burqa is presented to the western eye as an icon of banality. The banality of Islam. No difference made here between a Burqa and a scarf. However, the Burqa, also inspires voyeurism. Triggers a desire for revealing. If not revelation of the banality of western eyes. Or ripping it off. In a semiotic sense, it appears that once again women are raped twice. First they were forced to disappear from the street, the public space and the public eye, by men like Mujahideen and Taliban. Next, that is after 911 they were forcibly brought back into the media landscape by western camera's. It happened before. Remember the western reporters visiting camps for Bosnian refugees back in 1992. "Anybody raped here and speaks english?". Now this is epitomized by National Geographic. Photographer Steve goes back to Pakistan to catch the girl that made him famous in 1984 through his photo of her impressive green eyes. It made the cover of NG Magazine. Seventeen years after, like a mediated Indiana Jones, he is struggling with cultural constraints like being dependent on a husband for permission to see his wife. To verify if she is really the one he can buy assistance from elders and local journalists. But he has to do some serious symbolic masturbation, while waiting for permission. He goes to his favourite barbershop, where they do a decent head massage. He goes round in Peshawar looking at the pirated copies of his photo. When he begs for a "special price" for his own photo, and only gets 20 percent off, you feel he would like to kill the salesman. But he doesn't, in front of his own camera. He remains polite, although cynical enough in his comment. Of course, the final proof is not looking into the eyes of the girl. "Cultural constraints" stand in the way. The girl is too shy. No need for further explanation or investigation. No attempt is made to go beyond flying in and out the camp to get her picture and the proof that she is what she is dubbed to be: the girl wit the green eyes, the symbol of suffering of a nation. We, western eyes, know enough We don't really want to know who she is, or what she went through. We don't want to hear her story. Her comments or conclusion. We are her for eyes only, remember? So we take another photo and rush off to our lab to check and compare the iris scan with our advanced verification technologies. Gotcha! Commando Solo has struck again. (commando solo was the nickname of the Pentagon sponsored radio program aired from over the Indian Ocean to the wind-up radio's that were dropped on Afghanistan, together with cluster bombs and food parcels) -- Jo van der Spek, radio journalist, program maker & tactical media consultant H. Seghersstraat 46 1072 LZ Amsterdam, the Netherlands tel. +31.20.6718027 mob. +31.6.51069318 jo@xs4all.nl http://www.xs4all.nl/~jo ************************************** better a complex identity than an identity complex # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@bbs.thing.net and "info nettime-l" in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net