Taliban ban chess being played in Afghanistan as it’s deemed ‘un-Islamic’ – Daily Star
Since the Afghanistan government’s collapse in 2021, the Taliban movement have progressively worsened human rights and imposed strict laws on everyday life. Banning chess is the latest in a stream of restrictions targeting the country’s entertainment and leisure.
Declaring the game “haram” (not permissible by Muslims), chess is now entirely forbidden in Afghanistan, and the Afghan Chess Federation has been disbanded. Many Muslims believe that partaking in haram activities is an act of sin, that can lead to spiritual decline.
A spokesperson for the Taliban’s General Directorate of Physical Education and Sports, Atal Mashwani, told local media that the justification for the ban was “Sharia-related reasons”
The Telegraph quotes an official from the now-defunct Afghanistan National Chess Federation as saying, “This is a suspension, not an outright ban, but it feels like the death of chess in Afghanistan. Chess runs in the blood of Afghan society. You’ll find it in homes, cafes and even village gatherings. Afghans love chess, we’ve won international medals, and the game is part of our cultural identity.”
The Cambridge Dictionary defines “endgame” as “the last stage in a game of chess when only a few of the pieces are left on the board”. One of the last remaining pieces of Afghanistan’s cultural identity that was other than “Islam” has fallen. Afghanistan is entering the endgame.
Purity spirals are not limited to Islam – a well-known Radio 4 documentary made by Gavin Haynes covered how even the cosy communities of Instagram knitting culture and young adult novels were consumed by the frenzy – but Islam is so prone to them that I am tempted to say that Islam is not a medium in which vortices form but a vortex itself.
I respect the culture of Afghanistan. It’s their country. They live how they want to live.
We don’t owe any of them and shouldn’t give any of them asylum.
I see nothing to respect about a shithole like Afghanistan. The place is beyond redemption. It’s only valuie is as an exemplar of Sharia taken to it’s logical conclusion.
I don’t resoect the right of anycollective to impose its illiberal will on people who are
minding their own business, and have harmed no one. What aspect of the Afghan culture do you find to be worthy of respect, Stuart Noyes?
–line from an old Pashtun song.
So, basically in a land where you can’t even look at a woman without “honour” based antics the buggering of young boys is the only pass-time.
I mean there’s fuck-all else to do. The Taleban also banned flying kites. Oh, they do allow lads to compete in reciting the Qu’ran (in Arabic) without knowing Arabic – they just memorise the sounds.
That is Afghan culture and worthy of respect because all cultures are equal apart from Western ones.
The fact that NATO blood and treasure was spilled trying to “sivlize” these degenerates is enough to make Darth Vader vomit with rage.
As the great American philosopher Carl Carlson said, “Yeah, even the boy in the bubble had a deck of cards”.
‘This film is dedicated to the gallant people of Afghanistan’ – Rambo III, 1988.
Coming soon to an island off the coast of France.
Once upon a time Afghan hospitality was legendary.
I saw a depressing post on Twitter that consisted of a series of pairs of photographs. The first photo of each pair consisted of a woman enveloped in a black burqa, her features invisible. The caption said, “This is not traditional [Afghan/Syrian/Iranian etc.] dress.” Then it said “This is:” and the next photo showed a woman (a different one each time but all of them were attractive and most were smiling) dressed in what was once the national costume of that country. The costumes varied quite widely but most of them featured brightly coloured fabrics and intricate embroidery.
Even if we wanted to conquer countries such as this to provide liberty and order, if not democracy, there are simply far too many of them and far too few of us. China and India are too wise to try and pick up the mantle of global policeman, and have no problem defending their borders robustly. Best we can do is start defending our borders equally robustly and let the rest of the world’s troubles wash out as they may.
There is no attractive solution to the problem of Islam.
One of the least unattractive would be for the President of the United States, ideally with Western allies, to call a summit of the leaders of all Islamic countries and say to them:
‘We will not interfere in your countries, but the next time, if there is a next time, that any Islamic attack occurs against any Western country or its interests we will obliterate Mecca, Medinah and every one of Islam’s holy sites, and we won’t worry about the death toll.
We will make an exception for Islamic holy sites in Israel; those we will simply demolish rather than destroy by bombing.
Now go back to your countries and control your people.’
Oh well, an old man can dream.
True I can not read Arabic – but I can find nothing in translations of the Koran or the Hadiths that banns chess.
This is not Islam (and I am not shy of saying when bad things are Islamic) and it is not the “culture of Afghanistan”.
This is a group of vicious men, the Taliban, who Western “post modern” military forces were unable to destroy in 20 years.
Just as the “post modern” doctrines the Israeli military have been saturated with, have led to it being unable to destroy Hamas in over a year and half.
These “post modern” military doctrines are going to destroy us.
War is not an episode of “Star Trek” – war is NOT about doing XYZ clever things and then “getting an agreement” or “deterring them”.
War is about destroying the enemy – one does not “make a deal” with the dead. War is about making the enemy dead.
Jay Thomas – Afghanistan conducts it’s affairs as they think fit. Our ideas of democracy aren’t theirs. Our ideas of personal liberty and freedom aren’t theirs. They do them. We do us.
So they’ll have to play ‘blindfold’ like Magnus Carlsen, leaving no trace of the game and no boards or pieces to give the game away.
The problem their opponents have in that country is the same as in the Krikkit Wars in the Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy, as Ford Prefect put it: ‘They care; we don’t; they win.‘.
Problem is, “they” is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. “They” are mostly the few very powerful mullahs who let everyone know that Allah insists that they be slaves to those same mullahs, and enforce it with their wealth and arms.
I imagine that the typical powerless Afghani bricklayer treasures his own fate and freedom as much as I, but I’m lucky enough to have some personal power with which to guarantee it for myself.
I’m not pro-invasion, or even pro-police-action, but I don’t want to conflate the lives and desires of the lowly with the rich warlords. Sending in hit squads against those mullahs would actually be a pro-liberty act.
Meh. Westphalia. What other people do in other countreis is entirely the business of those other people in other countries. We have absolutely no right to interfer, let alone insist on then doing what we tell them to do. Don’t people remember the century-long struggle to throw off foreign yokes?
Mutatis mutandis, the same could be said of the EU, US, and UK; and most if not all the rest of the world.
Adam Curtis’ 2015 documentary Bitter Lake included this scene where befuddled Afghan women are being taught about Marcel Duchamp’s Dadaist toilet as an example of western art. This was being funded by the good folk at USAID.
True.
But . . . . “Life is hard” could be said to be universally applicable mutatis mutandis, but the difference in degree of applicability is not insignificant.
I had to drive a few miles to find my ribeye for dinner. They have to find the rare goat in a wasteland and then . . . 😉
@James Strong
‘We will not interfere in your countries, but the next time, if there is a next time, that any Islamic attack occurs against any Western country or its interests we will obliterate Mecca, Medinah and every one of Islam’s holy sites, and we won’t worry about the death toll.
That is completely ridiculous. The problem with a lot of these shithole countries is that they divorce individual actions from individual responsibility and individual consequences. Killing thousands of people who have no hostility to you and destroying things they hold precious is just as horrific as killing westerners because they don’t bend the knee to Allah. When people do bad things we punish them not their family or their kin. A billion people in the world pray toward Mecca. The large majority of them are the poor and oppressed who have absolutely no hostility toward you or I and no plans on becoming bombers. Killing them out of outrage is no answer.
Sometimes, when normal police function is impossible war is necessary. But even in war one should not relish the death of innocents or the destruction of their property. On the contrary, decent people have an absolute obligation to try to minimize this that is so euphemistically called “collateral damage”.
Rather the answer is what President Trump is doing right now. Friendship and commerce, mutual understanding, building links that share our humanity. Or to put it another way — profit. All societies do not share many things in common, but perhaps the most common shared virtue is that we’d rather be rich than poor, rather feed our families than not. Of course there are exceptions to even this low bar. The religious nuts we will always have with us, but religion can be neutered by self interest, in fact it usually is.
I am not even sure that playing such board games is banned in the Koran. You have to wonder at this point whether these joyless bastards just like making doctrine up and want to ban anything that smacks of enjoyment or mental stimulation.
To call it a death cult is too kind. Zombie cult might be more appropriate.
Our ideas of personal liberty and freedom aren’t theirs. They do them. We do us.
Well, that is moral relativism, on steroids. “Our ideas of mass murder aren’t theirs….”
At the very least, if they so much as give us an evil look or seek to interfere with us, then they can expect the worst from us.
Is chess really banned in Afghanistan, or merely professional chess events banned by the Afghanistan Chess Federation?
Trying to be fair, I looked up the arguments that chess is harem (forbidden by Islam).
The difficulty is that these arguments cite texts which, when I looked them up, referred to drinking, gambling and swearing false oaths.
Basically they were citing texts almost at random – seemingly hoping that no one would actually read them.
The closest they got to a real argument was when they said that chess is harem if it distracts attention from a person’s obligations – but those texts apply to anything (anything at all) that distracts attention from obligations.
Basically – do not be so obsessed with something (anything) to the extent that it leads you to neglect your obligations.
Nothing specifically that applies just to chess.
The Taliban are swine (pigs) – and their only real “argument” is “Islam is what we say it is – and if you argue against what we say, we will murder you and your family”.
No one should “respect” the Taliban or the “culture” they impose by violence.
It is not just the Sunni Taliban – it is also some of the Shia who argue (or rather – state) that chess is Harem.
But no one produces a real argument to show that chess is harem – it is, basically, “chess is harem because I say it is – and now I will cite some texts that, if you bother to read them, do not even discuss chess”.
“Space core regulation 21 part D clearly shows that I am in command”, “but space core regulation 21 part D is about toilets” – “shut up or I will shoot you”.
Wikipedia:
Pundits speak of ‘polarisation’ but perhaps we should analyse why so many tight purity spirals have evolved recently. Is the interwebs? Is it the drive to supress nuance? Is it just the drive of authoritarians to control others?
Perhaps we should be more willing to say “Don’t be so f**king daft” even though the thought police may come knocking at your door.
Let the banning of chess be the worst crime the Taliban commit.
From here it seems a “majority” of “scholars” think that playing chess is haram.
Note this quote…
Now, that is very odd isn’t it? What does that say about studying much of mathematics for example?
Emphasis mine.
NickM – it is indeed utterly bizarre.
Mohammed (which is how the computer wants me to spell the person’s name) said nothing about chess – the “majority of scholars” are just making stuff up (like modern judges when they want to impose their opinions, but can not find any legal statute or clause of a Constitution that supports their opinion). They are no better than the character “Rimmer” in “Red Dwarf” – citing regulations which, when checked, do not say anything like what he claims they say.
Again – note the confusion between gambling for money (“playing dice”) and playing chess.
Yes, I did note that Paul. It would appear the “scholars” kinda took dice as bad and extrapolated to ALL GAMES. Which is weird because you can gamble on anything. It is particularly odd that the scholars suggested riding instead (and indeed other hobbies suitable for training for for medieval warfare) and we all know where riding takes us! To horse racing and that leads to the bookies!
NickM – yes indeed.
This, 100%.
You have more in common with your average Afghani citizen, or than you do with the politicians that rule your own.
We all disagree with many of the decisions made by our own rulers, but in most cases, none of us are rising up and attempting to do anything serious to depose them. The most that we do, by and large, is to attempt to “exit” by living in a way where those rulers affect us the least possible. And we have, in the anglosphere, far more freedom to do so than those suffering in far more oppressive regimes, and much less to lose.
I have enormous sympathies for those living under such regimes, and am certainly not about to tar the average citizen with the same brush that I might tar their leaders with, any more than I will tar a citizen of the US or UK with whatever I might feel about living under a Democrat/Republican/Conservative/Labour leadership (delete as appropriate, depending on your political leanings) who isn’t actively taking up arms to depose them.
Loving the fact that Fraser essentially just said “no war but class war”
(I approve, and you’re right)
One way or other, all governments govern by consent.
There’s also donkeys. Goats too.
Yes. Extensively. Much of what people *think* the Koran says actually comes from the Hadiths, which is partly why there are so many sects. They pick and choose which Hadiths to follow according to their own predilections and pre-existing (often tribal) norms.
For example MBS, a few years ago now, as Guardian of the Two Holy Mosques chucked out 99% of the Hadiths keeping, I think, less than 100. The Gulf (excluding Qatar, who are a bunch of assholes) is not the same Gulf of 20 years ago much less 30 when Wahhabism was rampant. The Taliban are throwbacks raised through those previous Wahhabi Madrasas set up by the ISI and funded by Saudi in the wake of the assassination of Faisal in ’75 and the bombing of Mecca in ’79.
Franz Kafka has a useful observation on the score of revolutions…
BlindIo,
“A woman for duty, a boy for pleasure and a melon for ecstasy.”
neonsnake – people are NOT all the same. People have different cultures, different beliefs. Allowing large numbers of people from different cultures and assuming that the host country will remain the same (still have Freedom of Speech, the rights of women, and so on) is just wrong – flat wrong.
There is immigration where people sincerely want to join a different nation (adopt a different system of beliefs) and there is migration – where the incomers have no such intention, and (an important) neither do their children or children’s children, born into a country whose basic principles are OPPOSED to their own basic cultural principles.
Perry – what you cite may not be true of all Revolutions (think, for example, of the collapse of socialism, collectism, in Eastern Europe from 1989 – this did lead to a less collectivist society in many nations), but it is certainly true of most revolutions.
There is a vast difference between the sort of immigration the United States used to have (and which President Trump wants to have again) – namely “if you sincerely wish to adopt our principles, you are welcome here”, and the MIGRATION that the Western establishment have supported (in many nations) since at least the 1960s – seemingly out of hatred (actual hatred) of the people of various Western nations. Assimilation (the so called “Melting Pot” to become part of the national culture) is exactly what the “liberal” (which is not liberal at all) establishment do NOT want.
For example, Prime Minister Trudeau denied that Canada had any basic national culture – he declared it a “post national” state. The degree of hatred for Western culture and history (for the Canadian people as a distinct part of Western Civilisation) that this shows, is extreme.
Sadly Mr Trudeau is typical of the international establishment – he was just more blunt than most of them.
Unfortunately the “Great Replacement” is not a fantasy, a “conspiracy theory”, by a French intellectual (himself an ex leftist – he was merely repeating what fellow leftists had discussed with him multiple times – but the media treat it as a theory he himself created out of thin air), it does appear to be the policy.
Why? Why have they done this? What is the source of their hatred for various Western nations (peoples)? That is the great question.
Take the specific example of the “Afghan bricklayer” – does he believe that people should be allowed to freely leave Islam without punishment? And does he believe that people should be allowed to insult Mohammed without punishment?
If the answer to these questions is “no” then he has no business going to the United States – which is based upon the 1st Amendment. And saying “he will accept it for now – as America is presently outside the Islamic world” is just dodging the issue.
NickM: Now, that is very odd isn’t it? What does that say about studying much of mathematics for example?
Indeed. A mental game is somehow immoral because it is not “real”. Exercising the grey cells is as important as leg or arm muscles. To get away from the batshittery of Islamist fanaticism for a bit, there seems quite a lot of evidence that the risks of dementia etc can be reduced by playing mental games, doing quizzes, learning foreign languages, etc. I am sure those with far more knowledge about cognitive health can back me up, but it appears that Man has known the benefits of this for centuries. Almost every civilization we read about across time had its place for games and understood the importance of mental exercise, although it varied. Those cultures that denigrate it tend to end up dying off.
This is a depressing story that I suspect will be buried in the (understandable, perhaps) focus on the latest big stories about Trump, the EU, Putin, etc, but in a way it is a signifier of where religions and secular puritanism (which is what “woke” is, to an extent), lead us. A year or two ago, to take a different case, some Guardian writer denounce weight lifting as a sign of fascism.
Paul, this has nothing to do with what I said.
I said that I have enormous sympathies for people (ordinary people like the hypothetical bricklayer) living under oppressive regimes – specifically in this particular case, under the Taliban in Afghanistan. I said nothing about immigration.
Ignoring any conversation about migration, because it’s irrelevant to the point and wasn’t touched on, do you yourself not have sympathy, then, for people who are oppressed by autocratic and totalitarian regimes?
I wasn’t aware of the quote, but yeah, obviously, sure; I agree, in the sense that any revolution predicated on a new “vanguard” will inevitably have that effect. There’s 200 years or so* of literature from all sides of the anti-statist spectrum screaming that this will be the case. It’s not new news.
*probably more