(Untitled)

[lessmess]

We watched Ghosts of Rwanda last night, and I don't think a documentary has every made me angrier. I wanted to reach through the television and throttle Madeline Albright and Kofi Anan and Bill Clinton and all their talk of strategic interest and uncertainty about the situation, all their gritting of the teeth and their "I wish we'd known," even

Comments

[sea_w]

The world is very depressing, I agree. The news gets me down.

I love tutoring. I was an Upward Bound tutor in college--loved it so much I forgot I was being paid. I often think about volunteering to do it again, but haven't yet.

[lessmess]

You should try the Godman Guild if you're interested. They have youth work and adult tutoring and mentoring. They also have a camp somewhere here in Columbus called Camp Mary Orton.
I'm scared to work with kids, but working with the adults has been fun.

[implodes]

We studied the Rwandan genocide extensively in my Human Rights Activism class. If I remember correctly, Ghana was the only country in the entire world who volunteered troops to help (Belgium might have sent a few...can't quite recall) but they lacked the equipment to be really effective at all. No one wanted to deal with the problem because there was no immediately self-serving motive to intervene; the U.S. is seen as the most culpable (after the UN, in my opinion, though) because, of course, we had the capability to effectively intervene but didn't. We could have at least acknowledged that there was a genocide (though the convention states that any nation that becomes aware of a genocide must do all that is necessary to stop it--and of course no one wanted to deal with it). No one actually privately denied that a genocide was occurring, because the situation clearly fit the bill

[lessmess]

The movie seemed to back up what you're saying here. According to the film, the UN general in Rwanda actually got a tip from a Hutu extremist that they were planning a mass murder of Tsutsis, so he contacted Kofi Anan a WEEK before anything happened. Anan said they couldn't trust any old intelligence, which makes sense, but I saw no indication that the UN took any steps to verify or disprove the claims. I think the UN is the most culpable because theye didn't even bother to pressure the US to do anything. But, of course, everybody is responsible. Europe wasn't exactly throwing troops in that direction either.

I want to take a Human Rights Activism class!

[tricknology]

have you seen hotel rwanda? is this the one and the same?

[lessmess]

Ghosts of Rwanda is a PBS documentary, but I think Hotel Rwanda is based on real events in Rwanda during the genocide. I've been wanting to see it, but it's hard for me to get Zach to watch any movie that's bound to be depressing.

Did you see it? What did you think of it?

[tricknology]

it is excellent, horribly excellent. my girlfriend will not watch it again because of how sad and disgusted with people it made her. it is excellent, you must watch it.