Salgado Post #4: The Product of Hate

          Salgado was once visiting Tanzania and Rwanda during the Rwandan genocide in 1994. He witnessed many of the tragedies and horrors that occurred during this event. One of the things he saw was the dumping of the bodies of murdered Tutsis and moderate Hutus into the Akagera River. He writes, "In just 30 minutes, I saw 20 corpses swept over the waterfalls" (Salgado 172).
          It is so horrifying to think of what people are capable of doing when they are persuaded into thinking that a group of people is inferior. The perpetrators of the Rwandan genocide were not only Hutu extremist militia, but also the government and even many average citizens. People were hunting down their own neighbors just because of the race printed on their ID card.
          Although many may believe that such a thing can only happen in faraway countries, we need to be on the lookout to keep similar atrocities from happening within our communities. The genocide did not just suddenly happen--it was the product of years of segregation and racism. It is the responsibility of each of us to make sure these things do not happen around us. If we can stop the small acts of hate, then the huge acts can never happen.

From Migrations page 172

Work Cited

Salgado, Sebastião. Migrations. 1st ed. New York, NY: Aperture Foundation, Inc., 2000. Print.