Genocide: The Worst Humanitarian Disaster
I am not a refugee. I am a white, middle-class, female American. I am a student at a public high school in the suburbs. My country is not being torn apart by genocide. My parents haven’t been killed. My government does not rape me. My family does not live in a tent in the middle of the desert. My community does not get by on a $1.00 per week for food, but my desires and passions connect to those who do.
There are hundreds of us spread out on the lawn of the Washington Monument. There is plenty of room, but we all crowd together, helping and encouraging each other. We are kneeling on the grass, creativity pouring out of us and into our posters- the sounds of markers constantly being capped and uncapped clicking loudly. There’s rushed conversation, people throwing their heads back as they laugh. The overhead clouds are glowing so white; one might mistake it for sunlight shining on the nation’s capitol. From Florida to Alaska, we all took different plane routes to get to our common destination, Washington D.C. We did not know anything about each other except that we were all there with the same goal in mind.
The several hundred of us picked up where the others had left off- trying to make up for the lost time, trying to make up for that generation in between. It was evident from their Washington Monument-sized smiles on their faces, that the generations before us, and even after us, as we watched little children clap their hands and stare at us wide-eyed, are relieved to see that there are teenagers who are willing to fight for change in the world too. Some of us are aware of the world’s issues and are willing to fight for justice. It was the most empowering experience and feeling to k...
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...ures and ethnic groups; they see that everyone is human, and everyone is alike in that way. This is the age where they need to be taught that being different is not wrong, and genocide at all costs, is. “Now, courses focusing on genocide and other human rights violations developed in the early 1970s are part of a larger response to rewriting the curriculum by including subjects and issues traditionally ignored or silenced” (Aspel). Another lesson they need to be taught is the pyramid of hate. At the bottom of the pyramid is prejudiced attitudes which involves scapegoating, and then the next level is acts of prejudice which includes name-calling and ridicule. The next level is discrimination, then violence, and lastly, genocide. When prejudice attitudes and acts of prejudice are seen, they need to be stopped before the situation escalates to something much worse.
Genocide: The deliberate killing of a large group of people, especially those of a particular group or nationality. When people think of this forbidding word, their mind immediately flashes to images of concentration camps and Adolf Hitler’s army raising their arms, saluting to swastikas used during the Holocaust in WWII. But what people don’t realize is that genocide is not such a rarity. Thousands, even millions of civilians die each time genocide strikes. Genocides have been committed since the beginning of humanity, but three massacres since Hitler’s reign left the world shocked again at its own cruelty.
The biggest war the world has ever seen was World War II. What was one factor that led to such a quick escalation? Genocide. Over 45 million people were murdered during this tragic time. The question is: was it the allies responsibility to intervene? The answer: No. The Global Community has no responsibility to intervene in states committing genocide.
As of March of 2008, a total of 300,000 people have died in Darfur, Sudan due to genocide. That is equivalent to the entire population of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The Genocide started back in February of 2003 in Darfur, Sudan. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights defines the liberties set for everyone in the World. Established in 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights displays the rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled to. The situation in Darfur, Sudan is known as Genocide, Genocide is defined as a systematic extermination or attempt at exterminating a national, political, racial or cultural group. The Darfur Genocide has violated Article #3, Article #5 and Article #9 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Darfur Genocide violates article #3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article #5 has been violated by the Genocide in Darfur. Article #9 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights has been violated by the Darfur Genocide. Attacks in Darfur are mostly by a group called the Janjaweed which are an Arab based group supported by the Sudanese Government, to carry out attacks on people with different religious, economic and political views. The Darfur Genocide violates the rights of its citizens; steps should be enforced by United Nations and it allies.
The genocides of the 20th century which occurred in Rwanda and Germany had striking similarities, something that should have alerted the world to stop them. At the core of these two massacres, patterns existed that outlined how similar thinking and reasoning could lead to something as horrible as these two events. One can see how both groups used their command of knowledge as a way to control the people, how the rest of the world refused to step up to stop the killings, and how the people were thought of as less than humans to provide a just cause for such terrible acts.
After Elie Wiesel was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986, he gave an acceptance speech reflecting upon the true meaning of his novel and reflecting upon the crimes in our history. He revealed how “silence encourages the tormentor” while “indifference [is] the most insidious danger of all.” I find a lot of truth in these words and I agree with his assertion. Individuals tend to get overwhelmed by desperation, a sense of helplessness and fear in the face of acts, such as oppression and genocide. During these times, it is the responsibility of the world community to step in. This is proved to be true by the novel Night, the movie The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, and by the article called “A Secret Life.”
The definition of genocide as given in the Webster's College Dictionary is "The deliberate and systematic extermination of a national, racial, political, or cultural group." This definition depicts the situation in 1994 of Rwanda, a small, poor, central African country. The Rwandan genocide was the systematic extermination of over eight hundred thousand Tutsi, an ethnic group in Rwanda, by the Hutu, another ethnic group in Rwanda. In this essay I will briefly describe the history of the conflict of the Hutu and Tutsi, the 100 days of genocide in 1994, and the affects of the massacre on the economy and the people of Rwanda.
Since gaining its independence in 1956 from the United Kingdom and Egypt, Sudan has been a
It’s amazing how a small spark of hatred can grow and grow only to become a wildfire causing mass destruction. The horrific acts of humanity, now universally dubbed as genocide, occurred to frequently throughout history, and action for complete and absolute prevention should be taken at all times.
In the article, “Columbus’s Legacy: Genocide in the America’s,” by David E. Stannard, the theme can be identified as contrary to popular belief that the millions of native peoples of the Americas that perished in the sixteenth century died not only from disease brought over by the Europeans, but also as a result of mass murder, as well as death due to working them to death.
The United States needs to look more into the perspectives of other genocides in the past. The past genocides will make people understand why genocides needs put to an end and never happens again. There were many events that made people understand to stop genocides and to prevent them. America can look back on the the Holocaust, end Japanese Aggression in 1937, and how the U.S. should treat genocides in the future more better. The United States should be responsible for stopping future genocide
Wouldn’t it be scary if someone suddenly decided that you should disappear because he thinks you do not have the right to live because of your race or religion? Scary yes, but definitely possible. The word genocide, which is also known as ethnic cleansing, is certainly not uncommon to anyone living in this not so perfect world, full of violence, hatred and discrimination. Throughout the decades, genocide has taken place in more than one occasion, causing wars, slaughters and mass destruction of cities and towns. I think that genocide is by far the worst crime in humanity. Hatred, superiority and personal memories are all behind genocide.
This week’s assigned content discussed the different genocides and terrorist attacks against Srebrenica, Rwanda, and the United States. The Srebrenica massacre was a defining moment that occurred in 1994, Christiane Amanpour, explained the massacre as according to her it brought out the best from the ones who survived. In addition, she was well known for her famous confrontation with President Clinton, as she explained her frustrations over the U.S not doing anything about the genocide that was occurring in front of everybody’s eyes. Moreover, the Rwandan genocide occurred, to spread anti-Tutsi, such as survivor Gilbert Masengo Rutayisire described his fear during the genocide as he saw many people being taken and killed. He was rescued among 1,700 others that were hiding, he emphasized that the government should maintain the security for genocide survivors as he not only lost majority of his
In the 21st century, the thought of genocide seems absurd. Genocide, a premeditated and systematic campaign to exterminate an entire people, today? Some people wouldn’t even be able to comprehend that in 2015 but prior to what people know there have been many genocides besides the infamous holocaust. The holodomor in 1933 when the Soviet Union starved over a million Ukraine and Kazakhstan citizens to death, Native Americans getting killed out of their land by Christopher Columbus, and the Haiti Massacre in 1804, where Jean-Jacques Dessalines led a massacre resulting in the deaths of up to 5,000 French Creoles of all ages and genders, trying to remove all Caucasians from Haiti, are all examples of genocides and attempted genocides but the
Genocide is the extermination of a cultural or ethnic group, according to Lockard. According to the United Nations in 1941, genocide is intending to destroy parts or the whole of different nations, ethnic, racial, or religious by killing, causing harm bodily or mental harm, physical destructions of the religious buildings, preventing procreations and relocating children to another group. Genocide is different from other mass deaths because genocide targets a particular group and mass death is killing everyone.
“They prod and probe until I am awake and in a startled moment I realize that I am lying at the bottom of a pile of rotting corpses” (Keane 2). This quote is from a Tutsi civilian that was experiencing a dream out all the bodies that piled up once the killing of the Tutsis had commenced in the little country of Rwanda. To begin, the term genocide is seen differently through the eyes of all the people involved and requires specific steps. In Rwanda, different cultural views caused division amongst the Hutu and the Tutsi. All the premeditated stages of genocide can be connected with the events that occurred in Rwanda. Finally, in order to do away with genocides, global intervention must happen for the sake of the people.