Shahid Afridi faces backlash for not allowing his daughters to play outdoor sports

Shahid Afridi’s autobiography ‘Game Changer’ has been gathering a lot of attention ever since its launch.

 

The cricketer has been under fire for lying about his age and exposing a lot of senior cricketers including Javed Miandad, but, people have also been angry about the fact that he said his daughters aren’t allowed outdoor sports at all. According to the book, Shahid Afridi wrote that he had taken this decision based on ‘social and religious reasons.’

 

The excerpt from his book reads: “Aqsa is in the 10th grade, Ansha is in the ninth. They’re both great at sports and even better in academics. Ajwa and Asmara are the youngest and love to play dress-up. They have my permission to play any sport, as long as they’re indoors. Cricket? No, not for my girls. They have permission to play all the indoor games they want, but my daughters are not going to be competing in public sporting activities. It’s for social and religious reasons that I’ve made this decision and their mother agrees with me. The feminists can say what they want; as a conservative Pakistani father, I’ve made my decision.”

Ummm, feminism kahan se aa gaya beech mei? It’s a basic human right yar. As soon as the excerpt was shared online, people expressed how disappointed they were in him.

 

Sorry but these girls won’t get to be like their dad!

 

Tweets poured in from across the border too!

 

Exactly!

 

But hey, no outdoor sports for my daughters

 

Great at sports but no sports for them!

 

He’s disappointed all of us man.

 

Yaaaaaas!

 

Sad…

 

We couldn’t agree more!

 

Some people also called him too weak to be protecting his daughters

 

Honestly though, the number of people supporting him is absurd!

 

And some tea was spilled…

 

The thing is that when you’re writing a book; know that it’s going to be read all around the world. Girls from your country are breaking records in sports and you want to come out and say that my daughters aren’t allowed outdoor sports WHILE mentioning how good they are at sports? What even? Not trying to teach you parenting here, but this particular excerpt was pretty unnecessary and uncalled for. You dictating your daughters’ lives is not Islam, it’s the patriarchy and internalized misogyny that you’ve contracted from the society.

 

 

1 Comment
  1. “LALA” did absolutely right thing not to allow thier daughter to play outdoor sports….. Well-done LALA

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