Title: Why Genocide? - TheHumanist.com
Headings: Why Genocide?
Why Genocide?
Content: Of special interest is the fact that Kambanda pleaded guilty to the offense. And the tribunal has so far completed twenty-one trials, resulting in the convictions of twenty-eight people for various crimes in connection with the Rwandan genocide. So the machinery for indictment, arrest, trial, and conviction is not only in place but its reach and influence are expanding. This is because the world has grown increasingly impatient with both nations and individuals that commit such crimes. With the existence of such worldwide interest in stopping genocide, the question naturally arises: why do mass killings and genocide occur in the first place? What could possibly motivate human beings to visit such inhumanity, such extreme levels of violence and murder, upon their fellow humans–even a portion of the population of their own country? How do people get past normal human empathy and the natural promptings of conscience so as to even be able to carry out such horrors? Are such people mad? That would be a difficult case to make, given the large number of human beings who have, throughout history, abetted mass killings and genocide.