The Holocaust vs. Rwanda: Perceptions of Genocide

It's a sad reality that the phrase "Never Again," which rose from the ashes of six million lives lost during the Holocaust, is, in many ways, an empty one. Although there has not been such an industrial, systematic attempt at wiping out an entire group of people since WWII, there have been many genocides that followed and, in some instances, are still continuing.

So, it needs to be asked: What makes Cambodia, Rwanda and currently, Darfur, so much different than WWII? Why, despite all of the lessons learned and policies passed, has the world been so slow to react to other acts of genocide?

In July I finished reading an extremely intense book that really got me pondering that very question along with the different perceptions of genocide. "We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families" is an in-depth examination of the 1994 Rwandan genocide that delves into the personal stories of survivors in addition to peeling away the many layers of political red tape and cultural unrest that led up to the genocide and hindered the recovery process after its devastation. But it also puts the reader face to face with the complete lack of response from the rest of the world.

Written by Philip Gourevitch, the book covers a lot of ground and I have to admit it may take a second read to truly grasp a better understanding of Rwanda. But, nonetheless, it opened my eyes to some of the problems surrounding international aid as well as perceptions of genocide in general.

The most noticeable factor when examining these mass killings, at least to me, is the developed Western world versus the underdeveloped third world. The Holocaust was so shocking and appalling to the world not only because we had never seen anything like it, but also in a sense because the Western world views itself as such a civilized society. The Holocaust was barbaric, repulsive and inhumane--surely something a cultured and refined people would never even dream of, never mind actually carry through.

Then there is Africa. A place where tribal and ethnic groups span across the massive continent living a very different way of life than many Westerners. Unfortunately, these tribal lives can sometimes be viewed as barbaric or uncivilized to our culture when really, it is simply just another way of life--neither better or worse--than our own.

But it may be that very mindset that changes how people perceive the Holocaust versus Rwanda or even present day Darfur. When ethnic or tribal clashes lead to something as devastating as 800,000 murdered in only 100 days in Rwanda, it is sometimes seen as just another day in Africa. A lack of understanding on the Western end leads to a dismissal of human life. It is viewed as just one tribe killing another tribe which then brings retaliation and a vicious cycle ensues. There is no rationalizing with such savagery so it is best is to leave them to their own devices:

"Except for the names and the landscape, it reads like the same story from anywhere in the world: a tribe in power slaughters a disempowered tribe, another cycle in those ancient hatreds, the more things change the more they stay the same...The generic massacre story speaks of 'endemic' or 'epidemic' violence and of places where people kill 'each other,' and the ubiquity of the blight seems to cancel out any appeal to think about the single instance. These stories flash up from the void and, just as abruptly, return there. The anonymous dead and their anonymous killers become their own context. The horror becomes absurd."

Hitler's "Final Solution" was no less absurd so it is distressing to see complete indifference to the other attempts at ethnic cleansing. Gourevitch notes that despite the stark contrast between the Holocaust and Rwanda, they both tell disconcerting tales about the capabilities of human behavior, which should raise a red flag for all of humanity:

"It has become a commonplace in the past fifty years to say that the industrialized killing of the Holocaust calls into question the notion of human progress, since art and science can lead straight through the famous gate--stamped with the words "Work Makes You Free"--to Auschwitz. Without all that technology, the argument goes, the Germans couldn't have killed all those Jews. Yet it was the Germans, not the machinery, who did the killing. Rwanda's Hutu Power leaders understood that perfectly. If you could swing the people who would swing the machetes, technological underdevelopment was no obstacle to genocide. The people were the weapon, and that meant everybody."

Gourevitch's observations came years before Darfur's crisis erupted but they are still just as relevant today as they were in 1998 when the book was published. The mantra "Never Again" still rings loud after over sixty years and efforts such as the Genocide Convention that have sprung forth from the total devastation of the Holocaust have served more as a nice piece of decor in the house of politics than as a functional tool. Its idealistic premise to protect humanity has turned a blind eye to many human lives, leaving blood on the hands of many nations and Gourevitch boldly asks, "Whose world were the drafters of the Genocide Convention--and the refugee conventions, which soon followed--thinking of?"

It certainly has not been victims of genocide.
_______________________

Speaking of Darfur, be sure to read this editorial in today's Boston Globe, written by Eric Reeves, a professor at Smith College who has devoted years to research and advocacy about the genocide.

The Constant Battle for Women in Darfur

A while ago, I ran across this article in the Boston Globe discussing the recent study by Cambridge-based Physicians for Human Rights and the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative (HHI) which examines the long-term impact of rape and other sexual violence experienced by Darfuri women refugees. I've been meaning to bring some attention to it and while I'm a little late in doing so, I still see the importance of it.

The interesting focus of this study is not the numbers of how many have been raped or abused, (although it is no secret that the numbers are high in Darfur) but rather the effect it is having on the women who continue to live in fear every day. Eighty-eight women who fled to Chad from Darfur in order to escape the attacks on their villages, were interviewed for this study and were physically examined. While some were raped in Darfur, others were raped in Chad where they are seeking refuge.

Not only do these women have to deal with the repercussions that come with being a rape victim but they are also constantly dealing with the looming threat of sexual abuse even after. There is no relief and, as the study has found, that can have dire effects for these women both emotionally and physically.



To view the report and see the work that Physicians for Human Rights is doing for Darfuri women, click here.

A Multimedia Look Into Darfur

Returning to my journalistic roots, I'm impressed by some of the multimedia I've recently stumbled across that examine the atrocities in Darfur. Human Rights Watch (HRW) has an in-depth display of interactive journalism that really educates people in a more stimulating manner than just reading a news article or watching a two-minute news segment on television (not that these basic journalism methods aren't important).

Released in August 2008, Failing Darfur burrows deep into the five-year conflict with eye-capturing timelines, videos, photo essays and maps along with informative Q&A's and HRW Reports that have chronicled Darfur throughout the years. One of its more compelling displays is "Smallest Witnesses" which looks at the damage caused through the eyes of children in Darfur. In 2005 HRW investigators gave children paper and crayons to keep them entertained only to find that the drawings they created reflected the unwavering violence and destruction they had experienced.

The first child Human Rights Watch encountered, an eight-year-old named Mohammed, had never held a crayon or pencil before. So Mohammed gave the paper to his brothers. They drew—without any instruction—pictures of Janjaweed on horseback and camel shooting civilians, Antonovs dropping bombs on civilians and houses, an army tank firing on fleeing villagers.

In addition to Darfur, HRW has some other compelling displays that look at the dire situations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia and Georgia.

The value behind this type of multimedia is that it is a powerful education tool as it is a one-stop shop of visual and engaging information. I wonder if classrooms, whether at the high school or collegiate level, use sources like this when examining foreign affairs, conflicts and genocides. Are these valuable tools able to reach a broad audience or are they staying within a more niche audience of human rights activists?

Another interesting attempt to educate people about Darfur is a viral video game that launched in 2006 and is aimed towards a younger audience. Darfur is Dying was the winning submission from a group of students from the University of Southern California who entered the Darfur Digital Activism Contest sponsored by mtvU, the Reebok Human Rights Foundation and the International Crisis Group.

I actually ran across this game in the spring of 2008 when I began research for my story on Google Earth's Crisis in Darfur map and unfortunately, I'm just getting around to discussing it nearly a year later.

The game is meant to put you in the shoes of the 2.5 million displaced Darfuris who must fend for their lives in refugee camps. In my attempts to play, my body tensed as I became a young Darfuri girl who must fetch water outside of the camp where the threat of being raped and/or murdered follows her day in and day out. While this is just a game, I found myself thinking that if I'm feeling the stress of this virtual life after 15 minutes of playing, I can't even begin to imagine the fear and anxiety those in Darfur have been living with for over five years now. This is the whole point of the game--to make people more socially conscious. It is a great way to really get people to pay attention and empathize and hopefully, take action. Again, the question is how much outreach was the game able to get?

With all of these great ways to spread information and bring awareness, the more pressing issue is how do we make people aware of these tools?

Getting Active the DigiActive Way

My attention was recently drawn to a new site (well, it launched in February so I'm a little behind, but better late than never) known as DigiActive. The site's co-founder, Amine, described it to me as an organization that "seeks to promote and explain the digital tools of social change so activists can use them effectively."

What I really like about it is the different types of information it provides. DigiActive combines a substantial helping of human rights campaigns and issues along with guides, tools and examples on how social media is being used for human rights. So a bit of education with a bit of "can-do" attitude makes it a great resource for people interested in getting involved in social change or those who are already knee-deep in it.

It even has an introduction video to digital activism which includes commentary from some of the major sites involved in human rights including Global Voices Online, Ushahidi and FrontlineSMS. It's not the most thrilling of videos but does give some good advice on how to get started with Daudi Were (blogger for mentalacrobatics.com and Ushahidi) noting that it really comes down to basic journalism: grabbing a notepad and a pen and writing what you see.

Check it out:



The feature that stands out the most to me is its Activist Map which makes finding different campaigns easy, interactive and fun. With about a dozen different campaigns, the map gives a snapshot of information about the issues each one covers. Hopefully, as the site expands, it will include even more campaigns.


The other great aspect is that DigiActive is extremely eager for user participation (which makes sense given that social media depends on it) and encourages people in a variety of ways including an email list, writing for the site or adding their cause to the Activist Map among others.

So, whether you're interested in just trying to learn a little more about what's going on in the world or whether you want to take the extra step in getting involved, DigiActive is a good way to get going.

Ogaden: The Darfur of Ethiopia?

Darfur, the tormented region of Sudan, has played a pivotal role in demonstrating the power of satellite imagery for human rights ( as I discussed here) but a new region has come to light. The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) released information on June 12 that satellite imagery has been used to uncover evidence of brutality in the Ogaden region of Ethiopia.

Lars Bromley, project director for the AAAS Science and Human Rights Program was behind the project and also handled obtaining the satellite imagery for the Crisis in Darfur map. The "before" and "after" images that were gathered displayed tangible proof that the Ethiopian military has attacked civilians and burned down villages within the region.

In addition, Human Rights Watch issued a report on the same day as AAAS about the surge in violence and extent of the abuse to which civilians have been subjected, including executions, torture and rape at the hands of the Ethiopian military.

Although the conflict has been brewing for years between the Ethiopian government and an Ethiopian Somali rebel movement, it came to a peak in mid-2007 with ethnic Somali civilians as the main victims.

The New York Times' Dot Earth Blog, covered AAAS' use of satellite imagery and considering the Ethiopian government has had a tight grip on who is allowed within the Ogaden region, more exposure is bound to result from something as concrete as these documented images.

While satellite imagery wasn't used for Darfur until years after the conflict had erupted, it has still paved the way for exactly the purpose it was meant for: to bring light to human rights issues at the beginning of the conflict. Yes, these images of Ethiopia are coming forth a year after the height of violence, but one year versus four years down the line (as in the case of Darfur) can make a dramatic difference. It demonstrates the evolution of the use of this technology and can hopefully be even more instrumental in uncovering humanitarian issues as they happen or even before they happen.

Mapping Genocide: Google Earth and Darfur

*Final Paper

Chances are you’ve never heard of Furawiya—a village of 13,000 in northern Sudan primarily made of farmers. The people who lived in this thriving community depended on livestock as disposable income and had shops and open markets. Now, it is described by John Heffernan from Physicians for Human Rights as a “virtual ghost town” in the online video Lives Destroyed: A Refugee's Story.

The village was demolished in January 2004 by the Janjaweed militia in a conflict that has raged since 2003 and continues today. Furawiya is one of the many villages that have been victim to the violence and destruction plaguing the Darfur region. Now between 8,000 and 10,000 people from Furawiya are living in refugee camps along the border of neighboring Chad.

Furawiya’s story can be found on the PHR Web site, but it is also part of a bigger project exploring how new media can play an active role in spreading education and awareness about
human rights issues.


While the conflict in Sudan seems worlds away for most Americans, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) and Google Earth have collaborated on an innovative project to place these human rights violations in front of everyone’s eyes.

In April 2007, the two launched the Crisis in Darfur Map on Google Earth—a virtual map of the Earth that uses high-resolution satellite imagery to view different parts of the world. Layered with data and multimedia, the map includes testimonies, videos such as the story of Furawiya and images of the different damaged and destroyed villages as well as images of refugees and internally displaced people, providing an interactive experience for others to learn about the crisis.

The project is the brainchild of Michael Graham who was an intern at the USHMM when he proposed it. He had wondered how mapping technology could be used to shed light on issues such as Darfur even before Google Earth’s launch in 2005. Now, as coordinator of the museum’s Genocide Prevention Mapping Initiative, he has seen his idea come to fruition.

“I had been having ideas along that before Google Earth,” he said. “Then Google Earth came out officially while I was at the Museum and it was sort of an ‘A-ha!’ moment.”

It was then that a team of volunteers known as Bright Earth was established and explored different mapping tools while collecting data on Darfur from destroyed villages to humanitarian access and refugee camps. The team worked with United Nations agencies, the U.S. Department of State and numerous non-governmental organizations like Amnesty International, a human rights organization that provided testimonies of the atrocities in Darfur. However, the team lacked the high-resolution imagery to present the data and thus the collaboration with Google Earth began, with Google agreeing to make obtaining the necessary imagery a top priority.

“We prioritized the acquisition of high-resolution imagery which is important in being able to see what is going on in the region,” said Kate Hurowitz, a spokeswoman for Google. “The ability to provide that was a big contribution to the effort.”

Combining the mass of data collected with the high-resolution imagery created a whole new use of multimedia for human rights. In addition, Google also agreed to make the Darfur layer on Google Earth as default content, making outreach even easier.


“[Darfur] was so important and we felt strongly that people needed to see what the Museum was offering,” said Hurowitz.

Since Google Earth’s launch in 2005, there have been 350 million unique downloads, according to Hurowitz, clearly making it a powerful tool with the potential to make an impact.

The use of multimedia has greatly affected the way people obtain information around the world, particularly in news coverage. As Graham noted that newspapers give the general big picture with text and photos, people have become desensitized to issues such as Darfur. The point of the museum’s Mapping Initiative is to “re-sensitize” people to it.

“Visual media can be much more effective,” he said. “For me, Google Earth is perfect as a presentation tool to see with your own eyes what is happening and showing people what that looks like. An 80 page report may be well researched and comprehensive but it’s easier to dismiss.”

Tribal clashes between “non-Arab black African” Muslims and “Arab black African” Muslims—known as the Janjaweed—peaked in 2003 after decades of drought, oppression and small scale conflicts in Darfur, according to the Save Darfur Coalition. In order to oppress the rebel groups formed by the “non-Arabs,” president Omar al-Bashir responded by increasing arms and support for the Janjaweed who have wiped out entire villages, destroyed food and water supplies and systematically murdered, tortured and raped hundreds of thousands of Darfuris.

After nearly five years of genocide in Darfur, more than 90,000 people are believed to have been killed by the conflict, about 200,000 are believed to have died from conflict-related causes and 2.3 million have been internally displaced, according to a 2008 report issued by Amnesty International.

In February, violent attacks resurfaced leaving thousands to flee to Chad and many others dead. As the crisis continues, it has grown more important for people to become aware and motivated to take action.

Some of the stories are horrifying,” said Selena Brewer, a Darfur researcher for Human Rights Watch (HRW). Brewer was in Darfur in 2004 working for another organization, noting that the last couple of months before her departure in 2005, there was massive violence. As the years have gone by, people have turned a deaf ear to the situation. “People are treating it as business as usual and it’s really not,” she said.

What have left an impression on Brewer are the people of Darfur. Along with smiling faces, she commented on their charm and sense of humor despite the atrocities they have witnessed. But one incident has made a big impact on her.

Right before Christmas in 2004, there was a series of attacks leaving 30,000 displaced. Children had seen their families killed in front of them, women were raped. Brewer, accustomed to seeing children laughing and playing in the camps, was shocked by the stark contrast of the newly arrived displaced villagers.

“They had completely hollowed eyes and were desecrated from exhaustion,” she said. “These groups were silent. To see a whole community in that state is hard to describe.”

Online mapping tools such as Google Earth have made it possible for people to bear witness to stories like these and have shown the importance of satellite imagery. Mainly used by the government, geospatial technology is relatively new in the public realm.

“Behind [Google Earth] is the underpinning of geospatial information systems (GIS),” said Frank Taylor, an entrepreneur who writes the Google Earth Blog, which is not affiliated with the company. “It’s been around for a long time and is well established. It’s been used by the government but not well known by the general public.”

Geospatial technology refers to the different tools such as GIS, satellite images and Global Positioning Systems (GPS) that are used to map and analyze specific locations of the earth. The federal government has used it for everything from managing forests to determining voting districts, according to the Geospatial Information & Technology Association.

Google Earth has combined satellite imagery with GIS, which is any system used for capturing, storing, analyzing and managing data for mapping and has opened this type of technology to the general public.

It has evolved for public use from mapping services such as MapQuest to more complex visualizations like Google Earth. While people are able to direct themselves from point A to point B or hone in on their house using satellite imagery, geospatial information can make a far more compelling argument when it comes to human rights violations.

“Google Maps really shook up online mapping because it was interactive,” said Taylor. “Google Earth had a profound influence on how important it is to zoom in with satellites.”

Other factors making Google Earth a powerful tool is its ease of use. Along with satellite images, all of the information is found in one area and the user is able to customize the layer as they see fit. The interactivity creates a whole new level of learning, providing a different experience from reading an article in the mainstream media.

Beyond raising awareness, the bigger challenge is motivating people to take action. While there is no way to monitor how many people have been influenced by the map to join an advocacy group, lobby congress or donate money, a case study report on the project noted that “more than 100,000 have visited the “What Can I Do?” page on the museum’s site to find out how they can help.” The page provides a variety of ways to take a stand including contacting the media to tell them there is a lack of coverage on the issue and communicating with decision-makers such as the U.S. government and the United Nations about the need for humanitarian assistance.

While crediting the Crisis in Darfur Map as a great awareness tool, Joshua Goldstein, a graduate research assistant at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School noted that the obvious pushback to a project like this is that “at the end of the day you’re not saving lives.” Although awareness about Darfur is critical, Goldstein makes the point that awareness that leads to activism is even more crucial.

Despite declaring the conflict in Sudan as genocide in 2005, President Bush has been criticized for being too lax in his peacekeeping efforts. Motivating the American people is the key to getting the U.S. to act, said Goldstein.

“For America to play a role, the public needs to be motivated. Maybe we have these incredibly fancy tools,” he said, referring to Google Earth, “but maybe there’s a limit to what people can feel. How do you motivate someone from looking at a map to contribute to change?”

The potential of Web mapping lies in developing better ways for people to communicate. Ushahidi, a site using mapping technology to report acts of violence during the post-election times in Kenya, is a great example of what mapping can do, said Goldstein. The site relies on citizens to report what they see as it is happening using SMS, or text messaging, and e-mail reports. He suggested that the real difference will be when the technology can be used for emergency and early warning alerts.

“We’re at a really interesting point where we can see all of these experiments,” he said. “It’s a pretty fascinating space but there’s a lot of room for improvement.”

Rallying for change is a necessity for human rights violations such as Darfur, but raising awareness is also a critical factor in the United States. According to Be a Witness, a campaign of the American Progress Action Fund and the Genocide Intervention Fund examining media coverage of the crisis in Darfur, the mainstream media are not doing their job. In analyzing broadcast news coverage in 2004, Be a Witness found “the ABC, CBS, and NBC network nightly newscasts aired a total of only 26 minutes on genocide and fighting in Sudan. ABC devoted 18 minutes to Darfur coverage, NBC five and CBS only three. By contrast, Martha Stewart's woes received 130 minutes of nightly news coverage. Stated differently, only about 1 in every 950 minutes of news coverage in 2004 covered the genocide in Sudan.

In 2005, news coverage revolved around the Michael Jackson scandal, the infamous Runaway Bride and the relationship between Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes.

Although Brewer acknowledges that coverage has been sparse given the intensity of the issue, she is at the same time surprised that Darfur has remained a topic in the news for so long.

“It has stayed to some extent in the news for five years,” she said, noting that the crisis in the Congo has barely managed to get coverage. For her that is a testament to why the visual aspects of mapping projects like the museum’s is so important. The use of high-resolution satellite imagery has provided a window into parts of the world that people had little access to before, thus motivating people to take action.

“It gives many more people ownership of Darfur,” said Brewer. “There are stories of so many groups working on Darfur, putting their heart and soul into activism and they haven’t even been to Darfur. But they feel it as personally as I do. That ownership is incredible.”

Another project that intends to spark people into action using satellite imagery is Amnesty International’s Eyes on Darfur Web site. Like the Crisis in Darfur Map, Eyes on Darfur incorporates mapping technology and multimedia, including videos, testimonies and pictures, to create a compelling presentation.

The site launched in June 2007, shortly after the Crisis in Darfur project and along with exposing the genocide, it also helps monitor villages at risk. Information on monitored villages is provided on the site where people can then email, print or fax a letter to President Bashir.

Inspired by Amnesty International’s previous use of mapping technology to expose the Zimbabwean government’s forced eviction campaign, the success in Zimbabwe led to the realization that this type of technology could be applied to Darfur.

"Darfur was always something we aspired to use this technology for,” said Blätter.

To make the project a success, Amnesty International teamed up with the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), which helped collect the satellite imagery, a tedious and time consuming task, according to Lars Bromley, a project director at AAAS who worked on Eyes on Darfur. Bromley also served on the advisory board for the USHMM’s Google Earth project.

Because the Sudan region has so many remote villages, it was hard for Bromley and his team to match coordinates to images especially to villages that had been destroyed.

“The challenge of finding the coordinates of a town is significant,” said Bromley. “You come up with coordinates for an actual town and then see what images are available for those coordinates but it’s generally a different process without a pre-existing image of what a village looked like beforehand. It’s a meticulous process of identifying two images and changes.”

Despite the challenge, the site has made an important impact. Blätter noted it has gone viral with 85,000 viewers per day averaging six and a half minutes per visit, which is a big deal in what she refers to as the “techie-world.”

The outreach ability of satellite imagery has also greatly affected the Sudanese tactics in Darfur. Blätter said that until the recent bombings in February, scorched earth attacks, which were common in the beginning of the conflict, have been rare due to the powerful evidence these images have provided.

They recognize we intend to make it harder for violence to take place,” she said.

Together, both Eyes on Darfur and the Crisis in Darfur Map have been instrumental in raising awareness and in motivating people to take action. The USHMM has also realized the use of this technology to spread awareness about the genocide of World War II, using Google Earth to create another layer known as Mapping the Holocaust. Along with mapping key sites of the Holocaust, the museum’s Holocaust Encyclopedia provides historical content to further educate people in an interactive way.

Although the Genocide Mapping Initiative has been successful, some at the museum needed a little convincing that Google Earth was a good endeavor for the Museum.

“Some disagreed about whether it was worth pursuing,” said David Klevan, education manager for Technology and Distance Learning Initiatives at the museum. “Was it the best way to use the museum’s resources? Eventually, the project got support with the understanding that it would draw a much larger audience to the museum.”

That’s exactly what happened once the layer launched in Google Earth. The museum’s Web site has experienced a significant spike in web traffic. The case study referenced earlier also reported, “Two months after the launch, the museum's Web site is still receiving 50 percent more traffic than before. The project has significantly expanded the global reach of the site -- the percentage of the visitors from outside the U.S has jumped from 25 percent to 46 percent over the past year. The number of hits from Sudan alone increased more than tenfold.”

This is good news for Klevan,who has been an influential part in integrating multimedia on the museum’s Web site to make it more interactive. The site now features online exhibitions of a lot of the displays guests will find in the actual museum alongside exclusive online presentations. Visitors to the site will find a plethora of pictures, documents, videos of survivor testimony and informative animated maps.

“The biggest challenge is how to make the site a place where people come and do things and engage in activity,” said Klevan, who acknowledged that the explosion of multimedia is still new for everyone.

Despite the new territory, the museum is embracing multimedia to the fullest extent by launching its newest project on April 4 with Google Earth known as World Is Witness, a “geoblog” that documents and maps genocide and related crimes against humanity. Blog posts found on the World Is Witness site appear in a layer on Google Earth while images of Google Earth are available on the site, providing multiple platforms for people to explore.

The innovation behind these projects has the potential to be instrumental in preventing future human rights violations through early warning systems. The world was slow in reacting to the extermination of six million Jews during World War II and the massacre of an estimated 800,000 Rwandans in only 100 days in 1994.

As thousands of Darfuris continue to live in refugee camps fearing for their lives, Brewer, who continues to raise advocacy about the crisis in Darfur at Human Rights Watch, has seen the meager conditions they live in. With little food and water, it is unsafe for the men to leave the camp, as they will be killed by the Janjaweed militia. Instead, women and children are sent to retrieve what they can, often facing the threat of rape and abuse.

Brewer notes that the biggest factor to contributing to change is staying informed.

“[Genocide] is so hard for people to believe,” she said. “Even I hear stories from Darfur and I’m staggered.”

World is Witness

The delay in my posting has been due to finals and projects...but I'm proud to say, I'm officially done with college! I'm attempting to keep this blog up and running but we'll see how that goes once I find a job and get sucked into the world of being a full-time adult.

For the time being, I'd love to point your attention to a new site, or "geoblog" as its being called, by the United States Holocaust Museum. World is Witness launched on April 4, so I'm a little late (the whole finishing college thing got in the way) and it is the second major collaboration with Google Earth to document crimes agaist humanity.

The first was its Crisis in Darfur Map, (I'll be posting my final paper from my Reinventing the News class which focused on the topic, on this blog) which solely focused on the genocide in Darfur.

It's a great awareness tool and it paved the way for World is Witness, which more broadly focuses on numerous human rights issues around the world. It's called a "geoblog" because of the combination of blogging and Google Earth--while you can view the blog posts on a layer of Google Earth, you can also view the mapping aspects of Google Earth on the blog. So, there's multiple platforms to access the site through.

The first posts are from recents visits to the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda and provide a glimpse into the 1994 genocide. It also, like Crisis in Darfur, provides multimedia including pictures, testimonies and videos for an interactive learning experience.

Driving For A Cause

The oppression of women in the Middle East is no secret. So when I stumbled across this BBC article about women's rights activists in Saudi Arabia who posted a video on YouTube to protest against the ban for women to drive cars, I found it to be a testament to the good that video can do.

Although Saudi women are allowed to drive in residential areas, they are not allowed to drive on main highways. The woman in this three minute video defied Saudi law and drove directly onto forbidden territory.

The video was posted to commemorate International Women's Day.

It might not be the most interesting video in the world (and unless you speak Arabic, you can't understand it) but it is a bold move by these women.

It's simple and short but here it is:



As she drove, the BBC reports she said:

Many women in this society are able to drive cars, and many of our male relatives don't mind us driving...I hope that by next year's International Woman's Day, this ban on us will be lifted.

The most recent example of citizen journalism's effect on society is the turmoil in Burma which came to a high point this past fall. The Wall Street Journal covered the peak in citizen journalists in this article. The surge in blogs, pictures and videos and text messages helped bring the civil unrest in Burma to the forefront and helped shed light on the power of citizen journalism.

People can visit Burma's YouTube channel, Burma Digest to view the efforts made by everyday people.

If people in Burma are able to utilize new media in this way, perhaps there is a chance for women in the Middle East to do so as well. In fact, the woman in the video, Wajeha Al Huwaider has had quite the experience challenging the Saudi government.

It's easy to get bogged down in the meaningless amount of videos out there, so I found it refreshing to see something so simple yet so daring posted online. A basic task such as driving on a highway is nothing people in the United States think about but yet this video is garnering coverage from all over.

It's a small but bold reminder on the power that new media is having in the world.