A Better World? Part 3: The Will to Intervene
2017 CBC Massey Lectures – Payam Akhavan’s “In Search of a Better World: A Human Rights Odyssey”
Payam placed a heavy amount of responsibility onto the Rwandan radio station, RTLM, for provoking the genocide against the Tutsi people. By promoting hateful misinformation to the general population, about the Tutsis, the RTLM impowered the violence as acts of nobility; giving orders and commands, to be executed with misguided promises of recognition and reward.
The RTLM were personally removed from the genocides, ignorantly believing that they were helping the people of Rwanda. They were self-contained and yet had the loudest of voices, and consequently, had the biggest influence. Thus, the perspectives being pushed forward, portrayed the Tutsi population as a problem: an infestation of cockroaches.
Payam strongly believed that if the RTLM were, at least, to be shut down earlier, then the genocide would have been prevented.
Without the mass of hateful broadcasts, many lives would not have been lost.
Members of political influence, those who also had loud voices, should have stepped in to stop the dehumanizing of the Tutsi people. However, I believe, the will to intervene, is heavily reliant on one’s individual interest or involvement in that particular situation. Quoting the poet Rumi, in part, “in order to give light, one must first burn.” So, to have no personal attachment to a scenario removes a person from the ability to understand the perspective of those within it.
I do agree with the level of influence the RTLM had on the genocide, however, the lives of the Tutsis were simply seen as inferior, and in turn their perspectives and opinions as well. In the “world of elites”, the personal attachment, or common place of understanding, was that “cockroach infestations” were bad and needed to go away. So, there became no need to question the so-called “problem” of the Tutsis, no need to question why the Tutsis were being treating the way the were, just that they needed to be eradicated.
“Collective demonization requires considerable skill and effort.” - Payam Akhavan
Mentalities and notions of this sort: humans being marked as anything other than just that, are finely calculated, and foster their way throughout society in whatever medium they can find – paintings, journals, economics, religion, to name a few.
Unfortunately, education on the Tutsi people was not of trending importance, which is why it is naïve to not also consider the dramatic possibility of these hateful instructions finding their way to the like-minded public one way or another; especially when movies made nowadays, like Hotel Rwanda, still incorrectly portray the true details of history.
I believe that the will to intervene must first start in a place of understanding, the understanding of self, just as equally as the understanding of others. This comes from a place of humility, and as I, myself, am still learning to this day, humility takes on many forms, at many times.
In Payam’s conversation with Eloge Butera, he asked him, “What do you teach your child?” This is a question that a lot of people, past and present, have a difficult time gathering even the most basic of answers. Although, I admire Eloge’s response of ensuring they, his children, “understand truly what the genocide against the Tutsis was, and how it happened, and what it did to us who lived through it.”
Most people are afraid or ashamed to talk about negative events, and so the reason I admire Eloge’s response, is because it highlights the importance of not ignoring the negative. Nobody wants to literally run for their life, let alone constantly be reminded of the hundreds of thousands of lives lost, but the fact remains that it happened. And if we don’t talk about the truths, if we never hear the stories of those who survive, if we never give others the chance to empathize, we will continue to live, and relive, the horrific truth of a world where people can be murders for simply being.
The key thing about talking about these difficult truths is, to not hold bias. It is the biases we carry that push oppressive ideologies into the minds of those who are most vulnerable.
“the time to intervene is BEFORE the disease of hatred becomes virulent, BEFORE manageable conflicts escalate to the point of no return.”
- Payam Akhavan
Therefore, we must continue to share the good… but also share the bad… taking in ALL perspectives, in hopes of saving the future of humanity.
