What is Genocide
Google Definition of Genocide: The deliberate and systematic destruction of an entire people who belong to one racial, political, cultural or religious group.The United Nations defines genocide as “any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, including: (a) killing members of the group (b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group (c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part (d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group (e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”But all these big definitions boil down to one simple thing: The killing and destruction of one group of people by another group of people.But Darfur is not the only genocide. Between 1900 to today there have been countless genocides. Some as horrible as the holocaust, one which left over 6 million people dead. Mostly jews were killed by the Nazis but gypsies and homosexuals were targeted as well. Some are as recent as the 1994 Rwanda genocide, in which heightened tensions between the Hutu and Tutsi tribes ended in the slaughtering of over 800 thousand Tutsis. The UN and the US were quick to deny this was a genocide, marking it of as a “break down” in the cease fire. Much like the Darfur situation, it is mostly ignored by the countries that could do the most to help.
For more information about the Rwanda Genocide watch Massacre at Murambi. It is a very powerful short film about the Rwanda Genocide. It focuses especially on one slaughter. It is in french with English subtitles and was made by the University of Boston.
