The Rwanda Genocide - Essay Example

?English 1A August 2, The Rwanda Genocide Xenophobia, the hatred or fear of certain targeted ‘outsiders,’ is one of the most destructive group phenomena in human history. Various incidents in our collective past portray how xenophobia has negatively impacted the lives of so many people. One of the most outright and horrific displays of this destructive force was seen in the German treatment of the Jewish race before and during the Second World War. These events were part of the holocaust, associated with the Nazi notions of racial superiority especially in contrast with their notion of Jewish inferiority. Racial superiority has caused much violence and many deaths for those who have been labeled by the ‘superior’ as ‘inferior.’ This violence has been spawned mostly by an extreme hatred for those viewed as different or inferior. Furthermore, such feelings of hatred have been translated into outright acts of violence against those viewed as inferior, and this at times often prompted retaliation against their oppressors, such as the case in Rwanda. With these premises, the world has been witness to various acts of violence, including the massacre of a significant number of people, all in the name of racial superiority. The concerned countries of the world have often refused to act in time to stop these events even though ample signs of trouble were apparent. Racial superiority has traditionally been an issue for various countries at one point or another in their history, but none worse than that displayed by the Nazis over the Jews and by the Tutsis over the Hutus in Rwanda. Similarities can be seen between the events of the Holocaust and the Rwandan genocide. “Rwandan genocide took place between April and June 1994. During this tragic period of 3 months some 800,000 Rwandans died, the majority were ethnically Tutsis murdered by their rival countrymen the Hutus” (BBC News). However, where the Holocaust and the persecution of the Jews were spread out over the years of the Second World War, the Rwanda genocide was spread out over the span of three months. In the case of Rwanda the Hutu uprising against their countrymen was triggered when Juvenal Habyarimana, a Hutu, the Rwandan president at that time was killed when his plane which was shot down during a rocket attack near Kigali airport on 6th April 1994. The blame was placed firmly on the shoulders of Tutsi leader Paul Kagame (who is now the current Rwandan President, but then leader of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (BBC News). This was denied by Kagame who blamed the attack on Hutu extremists. Nevertheless, within a few hours of the attack, violence broke out all over the country; and such violence would not wane until three months after the assassination of Habyarimana (BBC News). By then nearly a million Rwandans would lose their lives. The persecution of the Jews began in the early 1930’s. Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany in 1933. The persecution continued and built up into and through World War II, finally ceasing in 1945 when war in Europe finally ended. It is believed that some 6 million Jews died, as well as members of other minorities such as Gypsies. During this time, six million Jews in Europe were murdered, the rest were persecuted and tortured, and 5000 Jewish communities were destroyed (Perry 67). The deaths did not begin as soon as the Fascists came into power. Time was spent first in spreading propaganda across Germany against those seen by the government as the enemies of the Aryan race; at the same time, life for the minorities was made very difficult. The aim was to encourage Jews to leave the country. To some extent, this succeeded; however, Hitler could not wait and in 1938 came Kristallnacht – these were the state sanctioned riots aimed at the Jewish population (Gellately 45). It seems then that xenophobia can be about more than feeling other people are different, or even inferior, but can also be about poor self image and the resentment of other people’s success. Rwandan genocide and Holocaust showed how xenophobia can lead to huge changes in human life and the world. Many people died on both sides as a result. Media is one of the strong tools and starting point of the progression that led to genocide. “The propaganda of Nazis basically revolved around the idea that the Jews were the misfortune of the Germans. These Jews were also featured in their publications as hooked nose and apelike” (Holocaust Memorial Center). Media projections of the physical attributes of Jews resembling those of the “apes” are classic examples of the first stage in turning the German population against them. Moreover, Jews getting highlighted as German liabilities constituted part of the published Nazi propaganda of those times. With the propaganda pot kept boiling, the aim was to incite hate, to levels where atrocities were committed, fuelled by public participation, en-masse; the stage was thus ideally set for mass genocide. Media also played an important role in Rwanda genocide and xenophobia. “Radio was extensively utilized as the support medium for sowing the seeds of deep hatred against the Hutus in the penultimate stage, by projecting them indiscriminately as liars, thieves and killers” (Kellow). Hutus as a race was thus subjected to intense stigmatization; their eventual annihilation as the only solution, for the successful culmination of the last and final stage of their extermination was evidenced by the Rwandan genocide. Using the media in whatever form serves, to some extent, to dehumanize the target group, by degrading and stigmatizing them. The most trivial crimes against the larger group would be exaggerated so that the whole target group would become the enemy. Then there is a move to carry out a more systematic propaganda, to state sponsored hate and so on towards public support for mass crimes and to genocide as being the only way forward. Violence, persecution, and genocide directed against minorities often occur when a minority group is being blamed for some social ills. “The Hutu extremists argued before and during the genocide that the Tutsi were to be blamed for the economic crises. The Tutsi were blamed for over-population, poverty and environmental crises” (Midwinter 46). This showed how Tutsis were portrayed as the scapegoats for every crisis. The Tutsis were portrayed as the scapegoats for every crisis, just as the Jews were in the Europe of the early 20th century. Generally, the scapegoating theory explains xenophobia in terms of broad social and economic factors. Scapegoating has been created because of ongoing deprivation and poverty. The anger caused by deprivation led to mass crimes which targeted the minority group – the group which were seen as different and therefore against the rights and benefits of the majority. The result is blame, justified or otherwise and bubbling resentment which in both cases cited exploded into genocide. Resentment fuelled by the continuance of discrimination led to the Holocaust and Rwandan genocide. The resentment in Rwanda was primarily directed against the Tutsis who were labeled by their Belgian overloads as being a race which was superior to the Hutus. When the Belgians took charge in 1916 they classified the resident peoples and issued identification cards. The Tutsis were willing collaborators and so were seen as being of higher caste in what was a virtual apartheid system (Africa Union 53). This supposed ‘superiority’ worked out as having better educational and employment prospects for Tutsis. This caused much resentment on the part of the Hutu majority. There were riots in 1959 which resulted in the deaths of some 20, 000 Tutsis and in the Hutu’s taking charge of the country (Africa Union 67). Resentment against the Tutsis continued, and just as the Germans felt the rights of Jews should be curtailed, the Hutus felt the same about the Tutsis. In Germany, The Nazis depicted the Jews to have corrupted and contaminated the pure German culture (Holocaust Memorial Center). Xenophobia translated here to the German’s dislike for foreigners, for the ‘wandering Jews’ who were diluting and contaminating their pure and aristocratic blood lines. The Jews had been discriminated from the society. They were further portrayed as evil, cowardly, as opposed to the Germans who were diligent and honest. This propaganda against the Jews created the racially based anti-Semitism. In this anti-Semitism through process, the superior race included the Aryans or the Germans and others who based their culture on the Aryan influence and the inferior race included the Semitic ones. Following such discriminatory labeling of the Jews, the Germans also supported their beliefs using Darwin’s evolutionary theory on the survival of the fittest, with the ‘fittest’ being the Germans and the Jews being the weakest and therefore bound to extinction (Holocaust Memorial Center). The Jews were further restricted in German society. Darwin’s theory was sometimes viewed as a racist principle because it seemed to justify the concept of ‘might makes right.’ In the case of Rwanda and Germany, the might displayed by the Nazis and by the Hutus against the Jews and the Tutsis respectively represent a display of might, and by association, of ‘right’ (The BioLogos). The might displayed against the Jews was seen in various ways including the burning of their books, the removal of Jewish scholars from schools; and the confiscation of Jewish businesses. Much dehumanization was seen during these times. The people were stripped of their dignity, treated as animals, and with little value given to their lives. The Nuremberg laws formed the basis of all their actions against the Jews. Just as many Tutsis fled Rwanda with violence breaking out against them, many Jews also started fleeing Germany as the violence against them started to break out. They migrated to Belgium, Czechoslovakia, England, France, and Holland (Strauss 343). However, many countries had immigration quotas for them and this compromised their attempts to flee Germany. In the case of Rwanda, refugees were spread out in neighboring countries which also had their own financial and political issues troubling them. The migration for the Jews and the Rwandans fleeing persecution was resented by many of those who stayed. This can be analyzed in terms of the “us-them” dichotomy, the “us” which stayed and the “them” which fled. The “us” were seen as good and the “them” as bad for leaving their people to suffer and for not being subjected to the same sufferings as their people. In order to prevent in the Rwandan genocide from happening, there are many instances where the international community could have stepped in. The country was after all in chaos and was a therefore a danger to itself, and that issue could have been used as a reason enough to intervene in the country, resolve its impending issues, and curtail the spread of violence. During the genocide, there was no firm solidarity among the UN members because the members had differing opinions and a distinct stand on the issue (Trinity College). Most of these UN members also had no solid investments in the country, and therefore, most of them had no financial considerations at risk in Rwanda. Three members of the permanent Security Council had their reasons for refusing to interfere (Trinity College). The US would have nothing to gain by interfering in Rwanda; and France and China were actually supplying the guns in the country. And yet, early action from the international community could have stopped the incident from escalating and could have prevented the deaths of many Rwandans. The close coordination and the more altruistic goals adopted by the international community would have prevented the incident from happening or would have allowed the incident to be resolved immediately (Trinity College). Instead, the lack of solid action from the international community, their profit-driven goals, and their lack of interest in the incident weighed heavily on the lives of 800,000 individuals. The US refused to lend jamming equipment to the UN as a possible means of stopping the propaganda movement by the Hutus. In the future, more cooperation and coordination needs to be established with the US and other concern countries in order to help control and manage these situations better. Such equipment could have been used to monitor communication between the parties involved and to control any inciting words which would trigger the people’s participation. These measures would have been able to establish a more effective management of the incident and possibly have prevented the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Certainly there are some similarities between the Rwandan genocide and the Holocaust. Both incidents have caused thousands of lives to be lost and dehumanized; and both were carried out against a race or a group of people with similar traits, in this case, against the Jews and against the Tutsis. Events leading up to the incident represent turbulent times for both countries in both the economic and the political sense. Racial issues arose because of the feelings of superiority felt by one group over the other, and of one race clinging to their xenophobia. As a result, such resentment spilled over and created violent and fatal repercussions against the more ‘inferior race’ who were also used as scapegoats for the problems of the times. Only with the coordinated management of these incidents by the concerned countries of the world can future outbreaks of violence such as this be prevented. Read More