The Rwandan Genocide

(Image courtesy of: BBC News)

(Image courtesy of: nmyhair.blogspot.com)

The coverage of the Rwandan Genocide starting in 1994 is my earliest memorable mediated experience. Even though it began when I was five, a handful of reports remain quite clearly imprinted in my brain. As news began breaking and as footage was being released there always seemed to be massive confusion as to what was actually going on—who was murdering whom and for what reasons and even if people were being massacred. Bill Clinton--who was the US president at the time—seemed incredibly and genuinely concerned about not only doing what was possible to curb the situation, but about spreading the knowledge of what was going on as thoroughly, widely, and accurately as possible. He wanted people to understand how incredibly politically and culturally complicated and serious of a humanitarian crisis it was, to say the least.

Every morning over our strawberry-banana smoothies my brother and I would watch the morning news (or Pokemon on special days) on a tiny tv that sat on the kitchen counter (that required a smack from a wooden spoon to work). When news of killings (following the assassination of Rwandan president/dictator Juvénal Habyarimana) first began breaking, there was the initial horrified reaction from my mother, which was punctuated by mundane daily morning tasks like preparing lunches, tying up ponytails, packing backpacks. The faces of the news anchors would always be masked by looks of muted concern that could not conceal their obvious ignorance. In addition to the constantly evolving reporting on “Tutsis” and “Hutus” the actual channel, the poor audiovisual media quality limited our ability to receive uninterrupted cohesive media coverage—in addition to, of course, the busy nature of school-day mornings.

I also remember how images were flashed across the screen--the length of time they were broadcasted for was directly proportional to their degree of gruesomeness. Sometimes it was simply a photograph of armed civilians and sometimes it was a photo of (always clothed) dead bodies strewn about the ground with blood coating the dusty red-clay ground underneath them. At the time, I was unclear about who had the machetes, (other than, “the bad guys”) and who was being murdered and why (besides, “the victims”). The idea of dictatorship and warring ethnic groups was elusive and confounding. Surely there had to be more to it than these two (and really three) groups simply didn’t like each other? Had different tastes in music and thoughts on politics? The images were undeniably horrific and horrible, but the fuel for them ran for the most part, above my five-year-old self’s head.

Naturally, my perception and understanding of the events of the Rwandan genocide have changed over the years. From very early childhood on I’ve had an interest in homicide and after reading “A Problem from Hell” I’ve since looked further into the Rwandan genocide, which has probably had a great effect on my changed perception of the events. Interpersonal communication with an AP History teacher as well as fellow students has also served to reposition my feelings on the events through the lens of how to keep mass killing from continuing to happen in the future. The truly abhorrent and sad nature of the Rwandan Genocide has revealed itself over the years. It was never just a front-page story, just something to listen for, something to shake your head out--it was a massive killing off of hundreds of thousands of almost wholly defenseless people who had done nothing to bring it upon themselves. Images of the bleaching and wearing away of skin that occurs over weeks as a body decomposes began to reflect the far broader reaching impact on individuals, families, kinship networks, political factions, nations and global understandings of power and dictatorship and human rights. These are just a few of the things that the media coverage of the genocide, while at the time, was quite striking and memorable and shaping of my then-current understanding of the devastation, was unable to report on.