EDITORIALS Short attention span Another day, another genocide

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette (Little Rock)
August 8, 2005 Monday

THERE’S ONE thing you can always count on when the subject of genocide
comes up: Nobody gets too worked up about it. The dead are certainly
beyond caring. Survivors might be interested, especially surviving
family and friends. But in general the living, most of us anyway,
have other things on our minds.

A short news item out of Rwanda once again brings to mind how easily
the deaths of hundreds of thousands can become nothing more than
a footnote in the bloody pages of history. It seems the Rwandan
government has okayed the release of 36,000 prisoners, most of whom
have confessed to participating in the genocide in that country more
than 10 years ago. End of story.

What genocide? Well, over a period of about 100 days in 1994,
800,000 Rwandans were murdered by their countrymen. The massacres
arose out of tension between the majority Hutu and the minority
Tutsi. Most of the deaths were among the Tutsis, although Hutus also
were slaughtered. Sometimes by fellow Hutus who thought they were
soft on the Tutsis. It will all sound familiar to students of 20th
Century Europe.

The prisoners being released now were mostly foot soldiers in the reign
of terror, rather than leaders and organizers. Rwanda’s government
says the ex-prisoners will go back to their homes in the villages
where they committed their acts of violence. There they are supposed
to face local tribunals set up to allow for reconciliation-confession
and forgiveness. Not a bad idea, and it’s about as much justice as
can be mustered in Rwanda right now.

There’s a case to be made for the release of the prisoners. Rwandan
prisons are known for their horrific conditions. They were built to
hold about 30,000, but until this release there were more than 80,000
inmates crowded together. Food and shelter are lacking. Disease is
rampant. Some of the prisoners have been held for 10 years or more,
with no prospect for trials any time soon. Many have already served
longer sentences than they would probably have received if tried.
Many were minors when they participated in the killings. Others are
elderly. Many are sick.

>>From the point of view of the survivors, though, such humanitarian
concerns are misplaced. A massive release of prisoners puts them
back among the same people they once terrorized. One survivor voiced
her fear of what would happen, even with the prospect of village
tribunals. The released prisoners, she warned, will stick together
and hide the truth. And the survivors will rightly fear further
retaliation.

Those scholars who keep up with the world’s genocides tend to have the
same concern. The worry is that mixing the perpetrators and the victims
could re-open old wounds and lead to yet another round of mass murder
in that Central African country. And they suspect that the huge number
of prisoners being released will overload the reconciliation process,
meaning many never have to acknowledge their crimes. In short, the
release could create more problems than it solves. But it’s hard to
get the world to care.

Even in 1994, when the killings were known to be happening, nobody on
the outside showed much concern. Reaction from the United Nations was
feeble. Elsewhere, the reaction was non-existent. Another outbreak of
violence in Rwanda is likely to draw the same immense lack of interest.

Besides, Rwanda is so yesterday. Today’s genocide is happening in the
Darfur region of the Sudan, but few know the details, and fewer still
are trying to stop it. Rwanda is joining the long list of genocides
that escaped attention while they were occurring, then slipped from
human memory.

“Who remembers the Armenians?” as Hitler was supposed to have asked
when making his own genocidal plans. For that matter, who now remembers
the Bosnians or the Cambodians? Even the 20th Century’s most notorious
genocide, the Holocaust, has produced its deniers. How long, after all,
can one be exposed to tales of horror before the mind grows numb? The
Rwandans must now compete for attention on an always crowded list of
mass atrocities. And always we will have those who would minimize,
euphemize, or even excuse genocides, setting the stage for more. (One
Japanese textbook now refers to the Rape of Nanking-a weeks-long binge
of absolute horror-as the Nanking “incident.”) There will always be
those who say it’s time to move on. But often enough, that advice
comes from those who joined in the mass murders. Forgive and forget,
they say. Don’t dwell on the past. But attention must be paid if
humanity is ever to move beyond this bloody stage. The thankless
job of recording these enormities must go on. Lest we forget, and
repeat the Killing Fields of Cambodia, the slaughters of Rwanda,
the massacre at Srebrenica . . . .

All must be recorded in history, none whitewashed. No, remembering
won’t do much for the victims or maybe even for the survivors, but
somewhere, sometime maybe attention will be paid. And the future will
be better than the still echoing crimes of a terrible past.