The Sounds of the Silenced

It used to be just book burning but now in the province of Herat, Afghanistan, the Taliban has started burning musical instruments.

A ‘voice of an angel’ has been replaced by the ‘instruments of the devil’. As was obvious with worries about the gyrations of Elvis the main cause of ‘moral corruption’ was probably youthful hormones not an instrument of the devil. Music is a ‘gift from God’ and yet the Taliban cannot see that in their blinded world.

There might be some instruments we could get by without, the bagpipes, any badly played violin and certainly the ukulele and yet many love them. Perhaps the range of instruments and voices could serve as an example of the diversity of people in the world but if only they would listen.

Don’t listen to the sounds of silence.

 Dennis Fitzgerald,

Melbourne, Australia