Our Vaginas are not WMDs by Diane Gee

I take the murder, rape or abuse of women seriously.  I do.  But, I really, really tire of our female gender being used to ramp up the wholesale slaughter of humans of any gender for the purposes of the Profiteer Class.

Like the missing white girl syndrome, this entire Malala Yousefzai story is wholly disproportionate to the reality of the World at War.  The women raped, boys abducted, orphans and abandoned elderly of the Congo comes to mind.  Or the effects of Depleted Uranium on a whole generation of children born in Fallujah. If the malnutrition and suffering of the Palestinian people as a whole isn't enough to garner outrage, what of the use of White Phosphorus targeting civilians and even a school in Gaza melting people right on the spot?

What of Nadia? 

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Nadia, age ten, whose mother and father were both killed in a US drone strike on their house, why no outrage for Nadia?  What of the other young girls, who are left homeless, have to grow up without parents, without food, let alone education because the rain of bombs from the sky under our reign of terror over their lives?  They grow up in constant fear, total uncertainty.  The linked report to the The Civilian Impact of Drones has many stories like Nadia's.

One glance through Afghanistan After Democracy's page will chronical story after story like Nadia's.

A man from Kunar in Eastern Afghanistan: this man lost ever member of his family in 2006. "my name is Abdul Karim. I lost every member of my immediate family. I lost my wife and five children. The American bombers destroyed my house completely. The Americans reported that they killed large number of insurgents when in reality they killed civilians. After the bombing I have developed breathing problems. I went to local government hospital and the doctors said to get medical care for which I have to go to Pakistan, how could I go to Pakistan for medical care when I can not afford three meals a day. I really do not feel like living any longer. The Americans have taken everything from me and I will never forgive them for their crimes against my family." He said the following when asked what message he had to the American people: "what can I say to people who applaud their airmen and soldiers when they killed my family members. I am tired and very emotional, please do not ask me any more."
An orphan girl: this child lost her father to the US bombing. This girl is from Maidan Province located 20 KM southwest from Kabul.
"The Americans killed my father. My father went to Kabul to get medicine for my brother who had pneumonia. When the Americans bombed, my father was killed. He did not return to bring medicine for my brother. So my brother who had pneumonia also died." This young girl said the following when asked if she had any message to the American public: "do American children love their fathers? I miss my father very much. Every night I cry and my mother tells not to cry because my father is in paradise, but I still miss him. I don't like the Americans."
She, her mother, and her siblings live in abject poverty.

We seem to be able to ignore all this, the very fabric that creates radicals - radicals that we fund and train when it is useful to us.
What of a young boy, who wished only to go to school and become a doctor, who is now blind and crippled because of the drone hit "double tap" we inflicted on him as he came to try and aid the injured from our bombing?
"Oh, that's tragic too," you may sigh, "but they oppress women there.  And something about Malala's story just speaks to me..."
It got me thinking. Wondering.  Why?
Why is it that we value stories of young girls over that of young boys?  Why is it that a young mother isn't as tragic?  Why is it that the stories that go viral are always about the plight of a young and virginal girl?  Especially one trying to become "Westernized?"
It speaks directly to our need to "protect" a being with a vagina over one with a penis.  It says women are weak and helpless.  It triggers a Pavlovian response in us that belies our Patriarchal brainwashing at such a subconscious level that we rarely can see it in ourselves.
They are selling us Malala's "plight" like a child bride for sale, like a marriage dowry, like a vaginal pawn to make us rush to War in her defense. Worse?  Her story is suspect.
Of all the injuries in Pakistan on a daily basis, how did this one get rushed to a British hospital and immediately make International News?  How did the Taliban, trained soldiers, miss at such close range?
Why is she seen walking with her father to the waiting helicopter, bandages on her shoulder, not her head?  Why, post-surgery, does she have a full head of hair - not a sterilized, clean shaven pate, as would be in a head injury?
Before you accuse me of donning the heavy duty tinfoil, remember this has been done before:

1990 Testimony of Nayirah: A 15-year-old girl named "Nayirah" testified before the U.S. Congress that she had seen Iraqi soldiers pulling Kuwaiti babies from incubators, causing them to die. The testimony helped gain major public support for the 1991 Gulf War, but - despite protests that the dispute of this story was itself a conspiracy theory - it was later discovered that the testimony was false. The public relations firm Hill & Knowlton, which was in the employ of Citizens for a Free Kuwait, had arranged the testimony. It turned out that she had taken acting lessons on request of the CIA and was actually the niece of a major politician in Kuwait. Nayirah was later disclosed to be Nayirah al-Sabah, daughter of Saud bin Nasir Al-Sabah, Kuwaiti ambassador to the USA.

So, lets talk about Malala and our rush to War.

Veteran's Today reports: (worth reading in its entire)

We have a New York Times reporter throwing the limelight on Malala just a month after her blog entries for the BBC -> the young girl becomes a celebrity overight -> Pakistani media gets abuzz with the student -> NGOs, etc. come in -> too much exposure -> then there's a continued development, in between we have Generals Allen and Dempsey pressurizing General Kayani for an unwanted offensive in North Waziristan -> sudden new wave of terrorist attack "traced to TTP militants" and finally -> attack on Malala and classfellows, out of nowhere a minister traces the leads to North Waziristan, exactly where the Pentagon and Langley want Pakistani forces in.

Scott Creighton did some investigative journalism and found her father is invested in for-profit private schools with western investors, and far from being a progressive man, would not allow his wife to be present or spoken to by anyone.
And I find this image disturbing in many ways, not the least of which is the blue outfit and red outfit changes on the girl in the stretcher, but the fact that the stretcher is empty heading to the plane, the girl walking in it.  I wish I read the language.  The poster of this image said this:

Kishver Niazi "It was all staged she never got shot and recovered very quickly tongue no one from the media saw her and the bullets fired at her neck and head at such close range well funny how there is no visible wounds on her neck and even the dressing is on the wrong side.....oh and it even gets better she walked with her father to the helicopter, nice one by the Obama and Zardari to divert the attention of the world for their election campaigns and operation in Waziristan."

Back to the title of my post.
It is common practice to use Children in Propaganda.
But using young women has become the real clincher. The Left is easily drawn into the need for War by the meme of "women are repressed there," as justification for "saving them" by bombing them.
Think about that.  Every single nation that embraces Islam have become MORE radical, rather than less, after our interference.  OUR actions have caused the fire and brimstone nut cases to be their only hope against our invasions.
Of course, with our mindset, we refuse to think that these women embrace their love of God with the same passion as a Catholic Nun in her habit.  I had one woman tell me that while she does not, cannot drive?  By Islamic law her husband must see her every need provided for, and if she needs to go to the store, he will leave his work and attend to her desire to shop.  She laughed and said she lives like our rich, with a "limo" in essence at her command.  Her daughters are more Western than she, some choose the hajib, other's do not, and all were attending University in Iran.  She fears that destabilization will cause that to come to an end, like it did in Afghanistan.  
So, here we are, being called to War over a little girl who may or may not be CIA connected, to "help" her crusade for Charter Schools run by the West.  And somehow, by killing their men, bombing their homes, leaving women and girls with no income or food, we will be "saving" her from the Taliban?
The Taliban WE created?
I have a son.  I have no daughter.  I would like to think that if I did, that her life would not be more valuable than his; that her story would not mean more than his.
I'm sorry, no matter how easily we are manipulated by the Virgin Girl-Child in distress propaganda?   We should not, as women, allow this crass and sloppy "smoking gun" to provoke us into supporting another war.
Yes, the gender war is real... but we cannot claim our power as females as long as we allow our gender to be used as a pawn for men to start wars.  Our Vagina's are not WMD's.
Our vaginas are bringers of life, and as such?  No life should be less sacred. Every child, every woman, and every man young and old should be under our protection.  Feminism must embrace all life.
So, I plead to you....  stop talking about Malala and get back to the ANTI-WAR movement. Do not let one girl's name become the curse of generations to come because the US used her as a champion and lie to kill her Nation.
Protest war, protest drones, protest military spending.  Those are the REAL WMD's.