Mind-bending photos by anonymous cousins show the pain and dreams of Afghan women

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Mind-bending photos by anonymous cousins show the pain and dreams of Afghan women

May 24, 20268:40 AM ET
By Diane Cole


This photo, from a series of pictures by two anonymous cousins, is entitled "The Music of Poverty and Violence." The subject is playing an automatic weapon as if it were a string instrument.
Mahnaz Ebrahimi|January 2026

Do these photos depict fiction or reality ... or both?

A bicyclist whose dark, flowing burka enfolds her body from head to ankles sits with hands perched on the handlebar, seemingly undaunted by the meshed veil that covers her eyes and restricts her sight. Her determination is suggested by the photo's title, "It will not stand in my way."


This photo of a woman wearing a burka while riding a bicycle is titled "It will not stand in my way."
Somayeh Ebrahimi/February 2025

A similarly clad figure swirls so swiftly that the billowing fabric appears to lift her into the air like a bird in flight; scribbled in Farsi across the brick wall in front of her is the phrase, "I dreamed that my homeland was prosperous."


"Courage means being afraid and trembling in the face of adversity, but with the courage, dance!" says photographer Somayeh Ebrahimi.
Somayeh Ebrahimi | February 2025

A third burka-draped figure places an automatic rifle on her shoulder as she would a violin, "bowing" it with a long wooden stick as if to make music. The photo's title is "The Music of Poverty and Violence."

{snip}

[brer cat]

1. K&R

[Irish_Dem]

2. When will women be free and safe on this gd planet?

[CaliforniaPeggy]

3. Thank you for posting these remarkably heroic and scary photos, my dear mahatmakanejeeves!

These women demonstrate their courage and conviction by their actions.

I hope someday that they will be properly rewarded. And I mean that in only the best ways.

[GiqueCee]

4. It takes a particularly...

... repulsive, weak little goat turd of a man to treat half the population worse than they treat livestock.
And, no, I'm not prejudiced against Muslims; I despise all religions equally. They're ALL exclusionary and depend on stoking the fear of "The Other" to fuel their power over their adherents.

[progree]

5. Selling his 5 year old daughter to a relative to be married at 10 years old, for a kidney operation to save her life

and end her severe pain...

I Googled "Afghan man sells daughter to another man so that she can get a medical operation for some kidney problem. I heard this on NPR radio"


I found this one on Bing that's from 5/18/26 from BBC (via MSN, no paywall):

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/selling-children-to-survive-afghan-fathers-forced-to-make-impossible-choices/ar-AA23vG27
it includes the story I'm talking about

Saeed Ahmad tells us he has already been forced to sell his five-year-old daughter, Shaiqa, after she got appendicitis and a cyst in her liver.

I had no money to pay the medical expenses. So I sold my daughter to a relative," he says.

Shaiqa's surgery was successful. The money for it came from the 200,000 Afghani ($3,200/£2,400) she has been sold for.

"If I had taken the whole sum at that time, he would have taken her away. So I told him just give me enough for her treatment now, and in the next five years you can give me the rest after which you can take her," explains Saeed.

. . .
"If I had money, I would never have taken this decision," Saeed says.

"But then I thought, what if she dies without the surgery? This way at least she will be alive."

. . .

Just two years ago, Saeed was getting some help.

Back then, he and his family – like millions of other Afghans - received food aid: flour, cooking oil, lentils and supplements for children.

But massive cuts in aid over the past few years have deprived a large majority of this life-saving assistance.

The US – once the top donor to Afghanistan – cut nearly all aid to the country last year. Many other key donors have also significantly reduced contributions, including the UK. Current UN figures show that the aid received so far this year is 70% lower than in 2025.

Severe drought . . .

What I heard on NPR 5/19/26 emphasized the pain she was in, and that without the operation, death was a near certainty.

ETA - to make this post more in line with the main theme of photos in this Photography group, I'm adding a picture


There are several other such pictures in the above MSN link

[progree]

6. Photo added above. EOM.