Genocide

Art Spiegelman’s Pulitzer Prize winning graphic novels, Maus I & II, are about the Holocaust of the Jews in WWII. Spiegelman tells his father’s story of his WWII experience, from handing over his business to being sent to Auschwitz death camp. It is the story of one of the world’s worst genocides from a victim’s point of view.
The film Hotel Rwanda is a similar tale about a hotel owner in the midst of a different genocide. Paul, the hotel owner, risks everything he has, including his life, to save the lives of over one thousand refugees by sheltering them in his hotel. This genocide involves the Hutu’s and the Tutsi’s, two racial groups in the country fighting an old battle of superiority. When the Hutu’s become the majority they begin to slaughter the Tutsi’s with the intent of wiping them out. Both of the above cases happened very far apart, and while they are different in many ways, they are also very similar. The big question is, what makes genocide?
Propaganda is a big factor in most genocide situations. Propaganda tells the people what to believe, so it is easier for them to kill without feeling. In Rwanda, the main propaganda came from the radio station that constantly told the Hutu’s that they were superior, and encouraged them to protect what was rightfully theirs from the rebel Tutsis who would try to kill them. It was very similar in Germany, but it was more widespread because an international war was also being fought. The Nazis also used the radio, but they also used newspapers and newsreels to completely bash the Jews. The media is a very effective way to transmit propaganda to the people, because as we all can tell even today, people will believe anything they see on TV.
Another ingredient of genocide is nationalism. This rallies the people around the cause and silences dissent. In the cases of Rwanda and the Holocaust, the nationalism was embodied in the phrase, “retaking what is ours.” Even if this is not true, if the country rallies around beliefs that support it, reality doesn’t matter. The Hutu’s believed that they had been oppressed by the Tutsi’s in the past and that this “revenge” of sorts would prevent them from ever coming to power again, leaving it rightfully to the Hutu people. Hitler and the Nazi’s did an incredible job of convincing the German people that the Jews were responsible for all their problems. This was quite a feat, but it helped that nearly all the German people were impoverished, and Jews owned many of the businesses. The Nazis could portray the Jews as outsiders, and when their shops were ransacked, it could be said that the Germans were taking back their towns and economy from the Jews.
Perhaps the most important aspect of genocide is dehumanization. This allows people to kill, without feeling, unprecedented amounts of people for no real reason. Through dehumanization, the victims of genocide are made less than human in the eyes of the oppressors. In Rwanda, this was linked directly through the propaganda, because the average citizen was the one taking to the streets with a machete. The radio announcer referred to the Tutsis as “Tutsi Cockroaches,” and before long, the “Tutsi” part came off, leaving only “Cockroach.” The Tutsis have been reduced to insects. They are now disgusting the oppressors, making it all the easier to eliminate them. In Germany, it was not the people but the army that was doing the exterminating. Once the Jews were in the camps, the Germans did things like taking away the Jews names and assigning them numbers in order to dehumanize. They also shaved all their heads and gave them identical clothing, making them completely uniform. By taking away all Jewish individuality, it was much easier for the soldiers to kill without remorse or regret.
Propaganda, nationalism, and dehumanization are present in most genocide, and are very important to recognize because every country is susceptible. They say history repeats itself, and they have been correct, but we can try to do everything to prevent this from happening again (or more than it already is, see http://www.savedarfur.org/content).