Pictures are worth a thousand words, is the popular saying, and today, with the vast array of videos, web-based material and what not, none of which I know how to use unfortunately, that could not be truer. Who would want to spend 30 minutes of their precious time reading a paper when a 10-minute, well-edited video could efficiently and more interestingly, deliver just about the same message?
Yet there are some things that cannot be conveyed through images and interviews, there are some things that do need the power of words and well-written inspiring sentences for us to fully grasp the intensity and severity of the issues at hand. And more importantly, words do have the ability to move us beyond images.
The article “Bystanders to Genocide” by Samantha Power is the very first (academic) article/paper, I can say, without hesitation, that made me cry. It will probably be the last. (Indeed the path towards a PhD is filled with surprises – who the hell cries reading an assignment for class?)
(She later developed this article into a 600-page book, “A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide”, which I hope to read some day)
In my defense, Power’s account of the world’s blatant disinterest and of a few individuals’ sincere efforts and frustration as they saw these efforts disappear into thin air after hitting the walls of “national interests” without so much leaving an echo, is quite powerful. Maybe it was her purpose all along, to instill every one of us with a pinch of guilt for not understanding, not doing anything, not being interested in what happened to be one of the most horrible tragedies of the 20th Century.
Reading about a genocide involves many elements, each one more heart-breaking than the other: its development, the meticulous planning of it, the stories of individuals with names, faces, families and friends disappearing under other individuals’ gunshot, machete, finger, the annihilation of humanity crushed under the excuse of “national interest”, the lack of care, the drowning efforts of a few individuals who did want to ‘make a difference’…
It is sad that in the face of the worst crimes humanity can commit, Realist theories remain unabated in the world of international relations and politics; and human lives are calculated in terms of how much resource/capital it would cost a country.
Aside from Romeo Dallaire and a few other individuals, the Rwandan genocide leaves us with only bleak sides of humanity, including the unchanged stereotypes and general ignorance we have towards Africa and our reluctance to engage in global action (because governments often naturally presume military intervention is the only option) despite sufficient information. And two decades later, it doesn’t seem we have made much progress.
And for those to whom pictures still convey a stronger message:
http://www.hrw.org/video/2009/02/13/confronting-evil-genocide-rwanda-featuring-alison-des-forges
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