Motley Moose – Archive

Well, the start of the genocide, anyway. It lasted 100 days and took roughly 800,000 lives. What most of us in the west do not realize is that this was a particular instance of extreme violence that flairs up from time to time in a much larger scale war that is still playing out today.

This war goes by many names, and sometimes the names people use point to wars that supposedly ended some time ago. But make no mistake — this war is still going full throttle, and it’s currently most widely recognized as playing out inside the borders of Democratic Republic of the Congo.

But that isn’t what I am writing about today. War is one story that comes from that part of the world, no doubt. But it isn’t the only story. There is love and hope and community. There is a collective conscious that wants a different future, and there are brilliant people who know how to make it work.

But not with a gun.

And when I think of all the western people who lament that we didn’t do something different to help the people in Rwanda twenty years so, I wonder if they want to know that it still isn’t too late. We can still act in this world to make a difference in that conflict.

** note: as usual, my film reviews are just my collected thoughts.  don’t expect Roger Ebert here (read: I swear a lot)…just sayin’ **

So, I went to an advanced screening of this film, “God Loves Uganda” tonight.  It was sponsored by Political Research Associates and shown at the SAIC.  I can’t remember how I found out about it…twitter, I suppose…but I’m glad that I did go.  There was a panel discussion afterward as well.  

There were some snacks and chatting beforehand, but I had a bout of social awkwardness and ate cookies off to the side and tooled around on tumblr, etc.  

The film is a documentary about how US evangelicals are shaping anti-gay hate in Uganda.  The film covers several aspects of the bill before the Ugandan parliament.

Posted at SexGenderBody’s tumblr

As August 1st approaches, the day the British passed the Slavery Abolition Act in 1833, which would be put in effect, August 1, 1834, freeing over 700,000 people held in bondage, which is celebrated in parts of the English speaking Caribbean as “Emancipation Day”, this last month has seen debate and discussion throughout the Caribbean, and in Great Britain, France and the Netherlands about a somewhat surprising unanimous statement issued by CARICOM in July on their final meeting day.  

Caribbean nations launch joint effort for slavery compensation former colonial powers

Leaders of more than a dozen Caribbean countries are launching a united effort to seek compensation from three European nations for what they say is the lingering legacy of the Atlantic slave trade.

The Caribbean Community, a regional organization that typically focuses on rather dry issues such as economic integration, has taken up the cause of compensation for slavery and the genocide of native peoples and is preparing for what would likely be a drawn-out battle with the governments of Britain, France and the Netherlands.

Caricom, as the organization is known, has enlisted the help of a prominent British human rights law firm and is creating a Reparations Commission to press the issue, said Ralph Gonsalves, the prime minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, who has been leading the effort.

For two years the Lithuanian government had banned the public display of Soviet and Nazi symbols, but suddenly lifted the ban on Swastikas last May. This Friday a large Neo Nazi demonstration marched through the streets of an EU capital with Government permission and police escorts.

Hundreds marched through the streets of Vilnius with  swastikas and SS insignia. Many people wore badges with swastikas sewed onto their clothing. Some were wearing white armbands with flames (that essentially resemble a swastika, a symbol that was also on some of the flags).

But this was no normal fringe Neo Nazi movement. Among the participants were Ricardas Cekutis, current head of PR at the state-sponsored Genocide Research Center – a government subsidised institution which tries to make an equivalence between the horrors of Stalinism and the horrors of the holocaust, seen here (on the right) with Mindaugas Murza, the infamous neo-Nazi. More astonishing still, MP Kazimieras Uoka, a member of parliament from the ruling Homeland Union faction was at the front of the March.

Something is going very wrong in Lithuania.