Mike Harris
Responding to Genocide

October 12, 2005- A nameless crime for so long, it took a single dedicated man, named Raphael Lemkin, to gee the world to recognize the neologism known as genocide. Stemming from the Greek word geno meaning tribe and cide meaning to kill; Webster defines it as the deliberate destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group. It is difficult and terrible to imagine how such a horrible crime against humanity could occur, but it has, numerous times. The most well known event was the Holocaust in Europe, it was supposed to be the last but it was not so. After the holocaust there was Cambodia, the gassing of the Kurds in Iraq, Bosnia, Rwanda, and Kosovo.

It’s hard to believe because it’s not in the news, Be A Witness, but there is a genocide going on right now in Sudan. Sudan is a country in northern Africa. It is made up of Muslim cattle herders and ethnic African farmers. Following the droughts in the late 90s, the Muslim government in Khartoum started seizing the land belonging to the African farmers forcing them into internal displacement camps. On the way to these “camps” whole groups of people: women, children, and men alike, disappear. Women are being raped and people are being tortured, starved, mutilated, and murdered while the Khartoum government looks on. So far, the Janjaweed, the Muslim militia responsible for most of the killings, and the government, have forced 1.8 million people from their homes and it is estimated that almost 300,000 people may be dead. Other estimates have said that over 200,000 people have fled to the neighboring country Chad.

There are two types of people in the world when it comes to responding to genocide: activists and bystanders. Activists, despite the negative connotations of that word to some, do something about it. Genocide is the greatest crime against humanity ever perpetrated and it is everyone’s business. Activists try to do something about it. Bystanders sit by and do nothing while people suffer and die because of who they are. They go about their lives uncaring and unphased by the atrocity. Which group will you join?