The Dispossessed of Colombia - Essay Example

Women were also looked down upon and not given enough opportunities in life. Their plight was miserable because of the government not being able to take a stance in their lives and help them prosper in any way. Thus, this paper helps to provide an insight into the socially rejected lives of Colombians who were blacklisted and not cared for by the government, and how despite being neglected by society, they tried to live their lives somehow. The book tells a number of stories mostly with respect to violence and the impact of violence on people in and around Colombia.

It is mostly about the kind of military violence that many families were forced and subjected to and how their innocence was snatched away from them as they were made to flee their homes. Every story has one single commonality – the danger of meeting death and destruction. This fear was stark in every person’s mind living at the time in Colombia. . The struggle is always present in their lives as they are not able to help any kind of situation that they have been thrust within. In one of the stories, a young girl by the name of Angela speaks out in a horrified manner, having witnessed war and crimes at a tender and early age, “My father wants to go back…because he says everything is going to be difficult here.

But I don’t want to go back.” 1 The worst part about being a part of the disposed people, according to the author and general view, is that such people can never find a place where they will be able to live life freely and be comfortable in. Fear has become imbibed in their minds to a very great extent. For them, there are no sides because they could be attacked by anyone at any point of time. According to another victim of this violence in the book by the name of Tonito, his outlook towards the situation is as such; “I thought to myself, no, it’s better to go back and look for death than wait for it to find me.

”2 (Goring, Ruth) The most interesting part about the author’s writing is that he is able to bring out both sides of the coin within the country of Colombia with respect to its violence. He says that the victims always remain the same groups of people as well as the same families, even if the people attacking might be different groups at different times. Thus, these displaced people are the ones that were hit the worst because of the guerrilla warfare that had been going on within the country at the time.

Another victim, Ninfa, expressed her views very solemnly as she saw her husband being killed in front of her eyes; a livid image that will probably never leave the realms of her mind and leave her scarred forever. She said, “The same people who