Essay on Holocaust and Rwanda Genocides

“Why is the killing of 1 million a lesser crime then the killing of one

The application of Nazi ideas and ideology was based on two types of force against individuals and social groups. One of these took the form of propaganda and indoctrination, the other was based on terror (Kühl, 2002). The Nazi ensured that not to appear

For years, Rwanda has been a hotbed of racial tension. The majority of the Rwandan population is made up of Hutu's, with Tutsi's making up the rest of it. Ever since European colonial powers entered the country and favoured the Tutsi ethnic group over the Hutu by putting Tutsi people in all important positions in society, there has been a decisive political divide between the two groups. This favouring of the Tutsi over the Hutu, and the Hutu subjugation as an ethnic lower class resulted in the civil war and revolution of 1959, where the Hutu overthrew the Tutsi dominated government, and resulted in Rwanda gaining their independence in 1962.

Never ending battles have occurred over the past sixty years in Rwanda due to their atrocious economy. It has been the Tutsi and the Hutu, two out of the three ethnic groups in Rwanda, that have been battling for the government spot. As the years went on, the fighting kept getting more brutal. This brutality ended up being an all out massacre in Rwanda from the Hutu. It has been argued whether if the killings were an act of genocide or an act of war. But what are exactly genocide and war, and which one relates to the conflict in Rwanda? Because of the way the Hutu went through with there harsh brutality towards the Tutsi provides enough evidence to prove that the Hutus actions were an act

First of all, propaganda initiated brainwashing, indoctrination, and distortion in the people, causing them to allow the genocides to occur. One example is shown in the Holocaust. The Holocaust was a mass extermination of the Jews and others, led by Hitler and the Nazis from 1933 to 1945. Before the Holocaust occurred, propaganda was the main cause that influenced many Germans to agree with getting rid of the Jews. They were brainwashed into thinking that Jews were evil and should be erased from their country. In Night, a documentary by Elie Wiesel, Wiesel states, “The gypsy looked him up and down slowly, from head to front. As if he wanted to convince himself that this man addressing him was

Many times we may hear but not respond, we see and don’t move and having the ability to take action we don’t even move a finger until the situation is out of control. It’s amazing how ignorant and stubborn the human race can be. This is exactly the response of many nations when it comes to genocide. Genocide is the systematic killing of all the people from a national, ethnic, or religious group. Two of the most recent genocides in history are the genocide of Rwanda and the genocide of Cambodia.

Propaganda for the Rwanda Genocide began when the RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front) invaded Rwanda in 1990. Thus, the Hutu Power Movement began. A group of government officers and officials began a magazine called “Kangura”, which spread anti-Tutsi propaganda. The Hutu Ten Commandments, which were published in the Kangura, was an example of racist guidelines for the Hutus if they ever came into contact with a Tutsi. By 1990, the Rwandan army began arming its civilians with swords and clubs under the pretense of self defense. These weapons became the main tools used in the genocide. After the ceasefire between the Rwanda government and the RPF in 1992, Hutu extremists in the Rwandan government and the army began to plot against the President in fear of allowing the Tutsis to participate in governmental issues. The extremists began a new radios station named “Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLMC), which broadcasted racist propaganda against Tutsis. Hutu extremist leaders also staged or reported false events to convince the Hutu population that the Tutsis were accomplices of the RPF. (Propaganda and Practice) The Holocaust, on the other hand, utilized many more ways of propaganda.

The Rwandan Genocide took place over a period of just one hundred days, and in that short amount of time over 800,000 Rwandans were killed (BBC News). The Rwandan Genocide was a mass slaughtering of the Tutsis by the Hutus, even though these two ethnic groups had coexisted in peace for many years prior. Eventually they had different ideas about who should be superior in their country, and the Hutus later used the power that they had to try and kill off the entire Tutsi population. This is similar to The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, a play known for its story about the Salem witch trials that took place in Massachusetts during 1692. In the play Miller presents different characters who use power for their

Genocide is a powerful word. International law requires intervention if something is deemed genocide. There is no doubt that the Holocaust is the most famous and most studied case of genocide, although there have been numerous throughout history. One of the more recent is the Rwandan genocide, in which 800,000 people were killed (United Human Rights). The two have several similarities and differences in their origins, exterminations and aftermath.

The many tears that stream down my face cry for the generations of my kids to come. I sit here as an innocent victimized Tutsi woman, to tell you my story of the Rwandan genocide and how it impacted my people. Through many years of pain and suffering I sit here before you to relieve my anger and install my knowledge of why the Belgium through colonization only installed more love in me toward my people and hatred towards me for not being able to help my people. My name is Immaculee Ilibagiza a Tutsi woman and this is my survival, comfort story.

In the end of the Boy in the Striped Pajamas, it says “ Of course this happened a long time ago and nothing like this could ever happen again.” (Boyne, 2005, page 216). This statement is irony at its best. Genocide is the deliberate and systematic extermination of a national, racial, political, or cultural group. This killing of entire groups of people has happened all through history, if you think about how long humans have been on the earth, the holocaust which happened from 1933-1945, is not that long ago, and there have been many genocides between then and present day, including Cambodia 1975, Al-Anfal 1980, Rwanda 1990, and Bosnia 1991. For instance, the Darfur genocide 2003-20011 wasn’t even 10 years ago. There are also many similarities

Genocide is “the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, ethnic, political, or cultural group”. In Rwanda for example, the Hutu-led government embraced a new program that called for the country’s Hutu people to murder anyone that was a Tutsi (Gourevitch, 6). This new policy of one ethnic group (Hutu) that was called upon to murder another ethnic group (Tutsi) occurred during April through June of 1994 and resulted in the genocide of approximately 800,000 innocent people that even included women and children of all ages. In this paper I will first analyze the origins/historical context regarding the discontent amongst the Hutu and Tutsi people as well as the historical context as to why major players in the international

Human rights are known as “inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled to simply because he or she is a human being”. These rights are known to be universal and are the same to everyone living on earth. These rights are said to exist in both national and international law. The Universal Declaration of Human rights, which is supported by fifty countries across the globe, attests to this definition and backs up the idea that all people are equal and have the right to pursue happiness no matter who they are, where they are from, their skin color, age, or sex, etc. If these countries believe these things to be true, why was there not a mass intervention when

In the tumultuous period leading up to World War II, a series of laws were devised in Nazi Germany that subjected the Jewish people to prohibitory and discriminatory forms of treatment. Although the Jewish people only accounted for 503,000 of the 55 million occupants of the country, Adolf Hitler’s dictatorship preached the incorporation of anti-Semitism into law and practice in order to quell the people he considered to be the enemy of the country.

Raphael Lemkin coined the term "genocide" in 1944. According to Lemkin, genocide signifies the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group and implies the existence of a coordinated plan, aimed at total extermination, to be put into effect against individuals chosen as victims purely, simply, and exclusively because they are members of the target group. This coordinated plan is committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group. According to the United Nations' definition of genocide in their 1948 declaration of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, genocide is a crime under international law and classified as such: