The Weekly Darfur Report

Courtesy of the Coalition for Darfur:

Plagued by Technicalities

Last week, David Loyn of the BBC wrote about the crisis in Niger and
asked "How many dying babies make a famine?"

Famine is a troublesome word with a very specific meaning to the professional aid community.

It is usually taken to define a situation in which a high proportion of the general population are vulnerable to death by hunger-related disease.

This describes a much more intense situation than the loose way that famine is generally understood - and the pictures of starving babies in Niger certainly look like "famine" to the outside world.

In technical terms Niger's President Mamadou Tandja may be right to say that this is not a famine.

The debate over "famine" is much the same as the debate over "genocide" in Darfur

"For those who are dying from acute malnutrition and related diseases, the debate about whether there have been enough deaths to justify the famine label, and the extent to which this exceeds the normal hungry season mortality rate is not helpful.

"Avoiding the famine label has often been convenient for those seeking to justify slow or failed responses." Last September, the US declared that genocide was taking place in Darfur, but three months later, the report(PDF file) of the International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur concluded that it was not, though it also stipulated

The conclusion that no genocidal policy has been pursued and implemented in Darfur by the Government authorities, directly or through the militias under their control, should not be taken in any way as detracting from the gravity of the crimes perpetrated in that region. International offences such as the crimes against humanity and war crimes that have been committed in Darfur may be no less serious and heinous than genocide.

But the press responded, not with headlines reading "Massive Crimes Against Humanity in Darfur," but rather with headlines such as "U.N. report: Darfur not genocide."

But the point was essentially moot, as one thing quickly became clear:
overwhelming evidence of massive crimes against humanity could not get
the world to act, nor could a genocide declaration. In fact, it seems
that nothing could prod the global community to act to address the
situation in Darfur, be it genocide, quasi-genocide, or "merely" crimes against humanity.

As Loyn reports of Niger, warnings of an impending food crisis have been raised since November, but nobody paid attention until it was too late

They did not respond to the requests on paper as they did to pictures of dying babies.

The reverse is now occurring regarding Darfur. It has become, in the words of Eric Reeves, a "genocide by attrition," and the world has stopped paying attention.

Last month, the UN reported that violence in Darfur had diminished over the past year, mainly because militia have run out of targets after destroying hundreds of villages.

As Reeves has written, the genocide in Darfur is now

[M]ore a matter of engineered disease and malnutrition than violent killing. In other words, disease and malnutrition proceeding directly from the consequences of violent attacks on villages, deliberate displacement, and systematic destruction of the means of agricultural production among the targeted non-Arab or African tribal groups became
the major killers.

It is entirely possible that Darfur will not begin to receive sustained coverage again until this "genocide by attrition" has taken the lives of tens of thousands more and footage of dying babies in Darfur begins to show up on the nightly news.

And then, in lieu of actually addressing that problem, we can have a debate about whether or not this new situation meets the technical definition of "famine."

It's chilling. Bureacrats argue over technicalities while people die. Leaders posture to the press over technicalities while people die. The press tussle headlines that bandy the technicalities about while people die. The public doesn't care until they see the photos and video clips of the dead and dying.

What jaded malaise has consumed the West? What sloth so infects the progenitors of Democracy and technological triumph that they won't concern themselves with the politically-motivated African genocides?

Relevance. That's what.

Relevance. What does Darfur have to do with us? Do they buy our stuff? Do we buy theirs? Do their lives--or deaths--have any discernible effect on our lives? No. Therefore, our societies ignore them. They are irrelevant.

Relevance is the cost of entry to our consciousness. That's what the Dictatorship of Relativity has done to our Western Culture. We, the people, possessed of all our self-centeredness and sinfulness, determine for ourselves whether or not what we do is right or wrong. If you want us to make that determination for Darfur, pay our price. Make it relevant.

Otherwise, why should we pay attention? What's in it for us?

Our cultures have become deadened to the silent screams of 40 million unborn children. Already the Reasonable among us pave the road for Euthanasia of the less-than-useful, particularly the sick. Young and old. Already our culture begins to see the relevance of such policies. Of course we'll find a way to make it right. Who wants to be a burden? Why should any one have to suffer? Of course we can do with our lives whatever we want.

Of course we can do the same with our children. And our elderly or sick parents.

Should it come as such a surprise, then, that our societies see and hear no evil in Darfur? When the Reasonable among us push the Absolute Individual Great-I-Am down our collective throats, we all find our consciences shrivel. We have embraced the insanity that says our eyes do not really see what they see; Things are only real in our minds. There is no objective world beyond our perception. There is no truth other than what we make. And we're not going to make the truth that Darfuris die unless we're properly motivated. So somebody better make their plight relevant.

As in, what do they have to do with us? How's our bottom line affected by them?

The deafening silence of the West in the face of the Darfur genocide demonstrates the insidious horror of the Culture of Death. We Fools have shouted ourselves blue in the face about this horror for far too long. The Reasonable have laughed and the Foolable have taken us to task. The Reasonable see no culture of death because they have decided that their sacrament to Moloch has killed no one. The Foolable believe we obsess over the sacrament to Moloch while the poor throughout the world suffer and die, like the Darfuris. The truth, however bears us out. When the West fails to oppose the COD and the Dictatorshio of Moral Relativism that makes it possible, The West will then fail to act in the face of genocide. Too many people, enslaved to the subjectivity that swears Absolute Individualism, fail to see what Darfur has to do with them.

Our societies will continue to argue over technicalities. Reasonable elites and their Foolable useful idiots will continue to disparage Fools that speak the truth. People will continue to die. So have we made the world.

Until we overthrow the Dictatorship of Relativism and execute the AI Great-I-Am. Until we establish a Civilization of Love in it's place. Until we create a Culture of Life that banishes the worship of Thanatos and Moloch. For when we have done thus, we will have remade the world.

Then, we won't have to ask, "What's in it for me?" when we learn of the Darfuris' plight. We'll already know: Our brothers are in trouble. We have to help them.

May we make that world soon. May we make it before it's too late to stop the next genocide.

We're already to late for this one.