The Taliban demolition of the huge Buddhas in central Afghanistan earlier this year was only one of the cultural destructions they engaged in.
They walked through the National Museum here last year, inspecting each object to determine which ones depicted living beings. And then they raised their axes and brought them down hard, smashing piece after piece of Afghan history into oblivion. It was such a high priority that the Taliban minister of information and culture, Mullah Qudratullah Jamal, and the minister of finance, Aghajan Motasem, led the wrecking crew, witnesses said.
Over three days, as the Taliban ministers walked from one artifact to another, an Afghan archeologist and a historian followed at a respectful distance, pleading for mercy as if begging for the lives of their own children.
I know that I should burn with much more outrage at the mistreatment of people under the Taliban regime than in the the mistreatment of museum artifacts. But these things are a part and parcel of the cultural history, the background, the blood of the people of Afghanistan, not to mention all humanity. In doing these things, the Taliban acted like wanton children. Like barbarians — like Vandals, in metaphor if not in name.
Chalk it up to my being a history junkie. This just really chaps my hide.
(Via Andrew Sullivan)