Human Rights in Film - Essay Example

Discuss how film can effectively address the problems associated with genocide. a. Identity Genocide – despite of its horrific nature that directly assaults humanity in an attempt to make another group of people extinct or just a wanton carnage of mass murder of another group of people does not often have an identity. Governments, including us, tend to look the other way around and become bystanders as if it did not happen. It is difficult to ascertain why and we can only surmise that perhaps by looking the other way around, we will not be bothered by its ugliness and thus be saved from the discomfort of witnessing murder of exponential proportion. With regard to governments, they tend to look the other way around because it does not serve their interest to intervene and adopts the neutral mentality. This reinforces the resolve of those who commit the genocide for two reasons. First, it perpetuates the murder because genocide is best committed in isolation where it is not known and thus, no opposition will hinder the carnage, be it political or military. Second, there is no deterrence for those who execute the carnage because those who are capable of stopping them does not care. Films best give genocide an identity not only identifying who the perpetrators and the victims are, but also the atrocities committed by those who perpetuate it. For example, nobody would have known the genocide committed by the Ottoman empire (now Turkey) against the Armenian if not for the movie Ararat. The carnage would have been forgotten because Turkey kept on denying that such genocide was ever committed. Until the film Ararat picked an authentic historical figure in that atrocity by the person of Arshile Gorky, who is Armenian artist who actually lived through Armenia’s genocide in 1915. This put a face on the atrocity of the Turkish against the Armenian that they could no longer deny. b. Memory Films have the power to highlight the drama of a genocide that leaves a moving impression to its audience. Through its real life rendering of the genocide, the murders that were committed ceased to be just a number but are given face and remembered, that they once existed as normal human beings whose lives were cut short by genocide. Films leave an imprint among the audience about the horrors of mass murder that it could teach that in no way it could be justified. Through the films such as Night and Fog, nameless victims such as those who perished during the holocaust were no longer just a number of 2 million victims. When the film actually showed the busloads of Jews who were gassed in Hitler’s concentrate camp, we saw that the victims were not just numbers but included children, women and elderly who were mercilessly killed. Bodies were piled up for us to witness that we may remember the Holocaust and learn from it. c. Genocide denial Governments, institutions and including us typically looks the other way around even if evidences that genocide is already happening is presented to them. Desperately, most try to adopt the non-intervention and neutral policy while hundreds of thousands die. And they would only act if the pressure to act is already too much to ignore and not out of compassion of those who were murdered. They would like to deny guilt by their non-participation but in fact they could be faulted as well because they could have done something to stop the genocide had they genuinely cared for the people and intervened. This was the experience of UN despite its seemingly humanitarian mission. The institution was at some point, guilty of blatantly ignoring the reality of genocide and can even be categorized as callous because it witnessed carnage of which it has the mandate to stopped yet it did not. The film Shooting the Dogs was a metaphorical slap on the face of UN because it showed how UN soldiers just watched carnage as it happened that dogs feasted on human bodies because its leaders adopted a neutrality policy. And because they adopted the neutral policy, their soldiers did not stop the Hutus carnage of the Tutsis in Rwanda in 1994 that they can only shoot the dogs who scavenged on the dead hence was the title of the film. The film showed the horror that will happen if governments and institution will not act to stop genocide and encourages government and institutions to act by shaming those who hesitated. d. Reconciliation and justice Films in a way help to heal the wounds of genocide by pointing out the perpetrators of the carnage and catching the public and government’s attention to put them into justice. Victims can now reconcile with their past atrocity having known that their pain and suffering has been acknowledged by putting the perpetrators into justice. Justice is important because true and meaningful reconciliation can only happen when justice is served. Reconciliation was best portrayed in the film Grbavica where it adequately portrayed the dilemma wrought by atrocity. In this film, it talked about systematic raping of Bosnian women by the Serbs that the protagonist Esma was impregnated by the rape. She kept the child (Sara) until she grew up not knowing the circumstances of her conception and birth. She does not know her father and had the vague idea of her past. Until finally Sara confronted her Esma leaving the mother no choice but to tell the bitter truth. It was difficult but the daughter and child had reconciled with their unspeakable past and made them closer. The drama of the film is a metaphor of many men and women who had sufferred from the war who are also seeking for reconciliation with themselves. Finally, the showing of these films that heigthened the public’s awareness against genocide and those who perpetrated it helped bring justice to the pain of the victims by acknowledging what they endured in addition to persecuting the the perpetrators. The audience, including the policy makers in turn learn something from it to do everything in their power not to let it happen again. And that those who are capable of stopping it should intervene instead of looking the other way to prevent further violence and save human lives . 2. See No Evil: Why America Doesn’t Stop Genocide I totally agree with Samantha Power’s contention that America tend to look the other way around even if it is already presented with evidences that genocide is already happening. It only deliver patronizing speeches such as genocide will never again happen but its action in fact does not coincide with its words because more often than not, it adopts a policy of neutrality and does not intervene to stop genocide. Power observed in her researched that despite of this statement, its President’s stance had always been neutrality even if it is already a superpower. In fact, President Clinton’s intervention in the Balkans had been America’s boldest intervention of which she complained was not enough during her coverage during the Balkan wars. America cannot also excuse itself that it does not know about the atrocities because in Power’s interview, the policy makers in America in fact knows that a carnage is already happening yet it chose to look the other way around. It cannot also put the blame on the government’s bureaucracy because when President’s decide to intervene, it always had the support of its bureaucracy and military. Sadly, America’s foreign policy is often dictated by self-interest more than humanitarian reason. Unless it serves its interest, America rarely intervenes. It believes that it does not serve its interest nor it can do anything effectively in stopping genocide. In fact, if it serves her interest to ignore genocide, it will ignore it as experience have shown. For example America maintained an amicable relationship with Saddam Husseim during the early part of his reign because she has trade interest in supplying Iraq with wheat and other food items. Meanwhile, Saddam was poisoning the Kurds and United States knew it all along but let him be so that business will be as usual. America did not budge as long as it is not harmed. It only moved to stop Saddam when it embarked on expansionist policy of annexing or invading Kuwait by claiming it to be Iraq’s province. Still, America did not intervene because it genuinely cared for the Kuwaitis. It did intervene because Saddam is threatening the stability of her supply of oil that propels her industry. Again, when Saddam was defeated and had America’s supply of oil stabilized, America left Saddam alone to be back on his tyrannical and murderous ways. Until of course 9/11 which made America pre-emptive because it was already harmed by terror to the point of paranoia that it begun to hunt Saddam for allegedly harboring weapons of mass destruction that could be used for genocide. It was proven untrue yet America justified her action of bringing Saddam to justice when it looked the other way around when Saddam was committing the atrocities. And all along America knew about it. Read More