Eric Lee
Professor Gomez
English 1A
December 7, 2010
Essay 5 Rough Draft
Throughout history there have been many monstrous events that humans have caused and
struck unexplainable horror to peoples’ lives. There are two events that sadly show many
similarities. The two events are the Holocaust and the Rwanda Genocide. The Holocaust was a
government supported mass killing of European Jews and other people which the Nazis deemed
“racially inferior.” About six million Jews were murdered by the Nazi regime. But these mass
murders did not spontaneously occur; the killing of the Jews was intricately planned by the
leaders of Nazi Germany and was termed “The Final Solution.” In this “Final Solution” the
leaders of Nazi Germany systematically took away all the rights Jews have, created fear within
people, blamed them for the economic situation that Germany was in at that time, and eventually
murdered them all. After the Holocaust there were many more genocides that happen around the
world. Humans tend to allow history to repeat itself, and sadly horrific events such as the
Holocaust do reoccur. The Rwanda Genocide was a civil war between the Hutus and the Tutsis.
Before the European colonist moved into Rwanda, the Hutus and Tutsis had a fair relationship.
As the Europeans colonist moved in a divide between the two was set. Because of this divide in
class, the Hutus started to feel more like peasants. Soon a civil war broke out between the Hutus
and Tutsis and as a result an estimate of more than 800,000 people was murdered. The Rwanda
Genocide also has a “Final Solution” plan similar to the Holocaust. Although these genocides
may have seemed inevitable because of the current situation at that time, there could have been
many ways in which these horrific events could have been prevented.
During the early 1930s, at the time when the Nazi rose to power, Germany was
experiencing great economic and social hardship because of the war reparations Germany had to
pay. Hitler saw this as a great opportunity to gain power and popularity among the Germans. He
used the same ideas and tactic as Karl Lueger who was also a famous politician. Hitler used the
Jewish people as a scapegoat preaching to all the people that it is the Jews fault for the tough
situation Germany was in. The Nazi party promised to resolve these issues, and in 1932 won
37% of the vote. This is the first signs of scapegoating prior to the Holocaust and was one of the
first seeds of the genocide. By blaming the Jews that Germany’s economic downfall is their
fault, it made it easier for everyone to hate them and be okay with a mass murder of Jewish
people. “Throughout history Jews have faced prejudice and discrimination, known as antiSemitism.”… “In European societies where the population was primarily Christian, Jews found
themselves increasingly isolated as outsiders. Jews do not share the Christian belief that Jesus is
the Son of God, and many Christians considered this refusal to accept Jesus' divinity as arrogant
(ushmm.org).” But this isn’t the first time Jews have been scapegoated. In fact Jewish people
have been blamed for everything for centuries. The Jews have been through everything from
being forced to convert to Christianity in Spain or be killed, to being the cause of the “Black
Death” a plague that caused thousands of deaths throughout Europe during the Middle ages.
Preceding the Holocaust, religion played a large role because the Jews did not share the same
beliefs as their Christian neighbors so the Jews were exiled. Added to religious conflicts were
economic ones. Rulers placed restrictions on Jews, excluding them from holding certain jobs and
from owning land.
“For centuries the Church taught that Jews were responsible for Jesus' death, not recognizing, as
most historians do today, that Jesus was executed by the Roman government because officials
viewed him as a political threat to their rule (ushmm.org).” Because of these teachings it
eventually led people to use Jews as a scapegoat for everything. Even when Jews started to get
equal rights by law, the Europeans argued that whites were superior and took over the so called
“weaker race”. As a result of scapegoating for hundreds of years it made it easy for the Nazi
regime to call out to all of Germany to blame the Jews for their misfortunes. The Rwanda
Genocide tells a very similar plot.
The Rwanda Genocide was a civil war between the two main ethnic groups that occupied
Rwanda which are the Hutu’s and the Tutsis. Most of Rwanda’s population belonged to the
Hutus but “For 600 years the two groups shared the business of farming, essential for survival,
between them. They have also shared their language, their culture, and their nationality. There
have been many intermarriages (ppu.org).” Because of their historical background, the Tutsis
were usually land owners and the Hutus were the one who usually worked the land. When the
European colonist moved into Rwanda a divide was set between the two groups.
“It was the practice of colonial administrators to select a group to be privileged and
educated 'intermediaries' between governor and governed. The Belgians chose the Tutsis:
landowners, tall, and to European eyes the more aristocratic in appearance. This thoughtless
introduction of class consciousness unsettled the stability of Rwandan society. Some Tutsis
began to behave like aristocrats, and the Hutu to feel treated like peasants. An alien political
divide was born (ppu.org).”
The invasion of Europeans into Rwanda is wrong and was probably the main reason the
whole genocide started in the first place. The move in of Europeans was one of the first seeds of
the Genocide. Before they invaded the Hutus and Tutsis had a well balanced way of life. There
was no real separation of classes or an existence of a class system at all. All these ideas were
brought from the European colonist. The relationship between the Hutus and Tutsis before the
colonization was merely a fair agreement among the two groups where one would own the land
and one would work on it, but as soon as the Europeans got involve the Hutus began to feel the
effects of the classification system and did not like being unequal to the Tutsis. “Missionaries,
too, came from Europe, bringing a new political twist: the church taught the Hutu to see
themselves as oppressed, and so helped to inspire revolution. With the European example before
them, and European backing behind them, it was armed resistance that the Hutus chose
(ppu.org).” As the Europeans brought in religion into Rwanda this was the next seed of the
genocide. Missionaries from Europe taught the Hutus that they were being oppressed and further
encouragement was pushed for the Hutus to do something. The missionaries’ involvement was a
form of scapegoating because they taught the Hutus to blame the Tutsis for their misfortunes and
unequal treatment in the classification system that the Tutsis gladly followed and accepted it.
The events which preceded the Rwanda Genocide are very similar to the Holocaust. The
Holocaust and the Rwanda Genocide both deeply involves all the aforementioned ways of
thinking; xenophobia, scapegoating, dehumanization, and “us-them” dichotomy. “The
persecution of the Jews began systematically, shortly after Hitler came to power. The Nazis
introduced anti-Jewish decrees, which gradually eliminated the rights of Jewish citizens. Jews
were regularly persecuted and humiliated (ushmm.org).” Dehumanization was clearly present in
both acts of genocides. Both of the genocides did not treat the other party as humans. They did
everything they could to make them physically and mentally lower than normal people. In the
Holocaust the Nazi regime put out propaganda portraying Jewish people like cockroaches, or a
monster that would eat kids. The Nazi was successful at convincing the people of Germany that
Jews were not human and are merely pests that the Nazis will help get rid of. This is why so
many Germans supported Hitler in his scheme of annihilation of the Jewish race. Scapegoating
is also seen in both genocides. In the Holocaust, the Jews were scapegoated because the
Germans need someone to blame for their economic crisis. Hitler used this factor to his
advantage for his separate agenda which is to eliminate the “weaker race.” Xenophobia was an
important factor in the Nazi regime because without this aforementioned way of thinking they
would have never got the entire nation of Germany to support their agenda. Xenophobia was
spread through articles, speeches, propaganda, etc. They always portrayed the Jews as
something dehumanizing or something stereotypical like how Jews are wealthy, fat, ugly
business men that are taking all the money away from Germans and living a selfish, lavish
lifestyle. This was an effective way of xenophobia because Germany was in terrible shape.
People were finding it hard to make a living or even purchasing food. So seeing propaganda or a
cartoon in the newspaper portraying Jews as wealthy people with plenty to eat would make
Germans really angry and envious. In the Rwanda Genocide it was very much similar to the
Holocaust. “Every adult African with 10 brain cells would know this was what the Hutu
nationalists of Rwanda called the Tutsi minority as part of a dehumanizing exercise that led to
close to a million Tutsis being slaughtered in about 100 days in 1994 (Preez).” In the Rwanda
Genocide the dehumanization of the Tutsis is when Hutu power radio constantly referred the
Tutsis as cockroaches. In the Rwanda Genocide the Hutus brutally murdered thousands of Tutsis
with clubs and machetes. Corpses were lying all over the streets. The dehumanization in the
Holocaust and in the Rwanda Genocide were both effective at doing what they intended to do
which was make it justifiable to the people that it was okay to commit these mass murders
because they were not human but merely pests. Scapegoating was very similar in both the
Holocaust and the Rwanda Genocide. Because of the conditions present at that time in both of
the genocides it allowed an opportunity for both the Hutus and the Nazi regime to accomplish
their agenda. All these factors played a role in both of the genocides “Final Solution” without
these aforementioned ways of thinking it would not have been possible for these two genocides
to commit such atrocities. Although these horrors in history seemed impossible to prevent there
could have been a non-violent solution to prevent these acts of hate.
There could have been many things done to prevent these aforementioned ways of
thinking which these two genocides relied heavily on to accomplish their agenda in the attempt
to wipe out an entire race of people. In these two genocides dehumanization was important for
the Nazi and the Hutus to succeed because if they didn’t dehumanize their victims people would
be really concerned about the victims they are hurting. So in order to counteract these attempts
of dehumanizing, they should have tried really hard to make it aware that they are human. They
can accomplish this by showing acts of kindness and showing people what is really happening
and make it aware to people that what the Nazis or the Hutus are telling them is false
information. Another factor that contributed to the genocide was that people were threatened if
they did not do what they were told. What they should of done was form a large enough
resistance so that the Nazi or Hutus would have no support from their people and their plan will
eventually fail. Scapegoating was also an important factor in the genocides. Conditions in both
the genocides made it possible for the Nazis and Hutus to convince the people that the Jews and
Tutsis were the cause of their misfortunes. What should of happen is that the victims of the
genocide should have made it aware that they weren’t the ones to be blamed for their misfortunes
and give them the truth. The Jews and the Tutsis should of made it aware how ridiculous the lies
that they are being told and educate all of them on why the events that were taking place are
happening. These are the factors that needed to be tackled first to prevent any further damage
resulting in genocide.
The fact is, these genocides would have never gotten this far if it weren’t for the
conditions at that time and the aforementioned ways of thinking in which preceded these two
genocides. The events that preceded the Holocaust and the events that preceded the Rwanda
Genocide have the same base ingredients to start genocide. They both have forms of
scapegoating, dehumanization, xenophobia, and more. These are all factors that contribute to an
event leading up to genocide. To prevent these seed of ideas, people must be willing to believe
in the truth and not rely on lies or falsified information just to make themselves feel better. In
the end, if people constantly believe in the lies they are being told, the seeds of genocide will
keep spreading.