generalspeaking

Good From Evil

Is there any action more cruel than to deprive children of their childhood? Yes, there most certainly is, and it has been demonstrated time and again in places like Somalia, Sudan, Sierra Leone, Democratic Republic of Congo and other war-torn and miserable places of the world we inhabit. There, children are abducted, and young as they are, inducted into the world of unspeakable evil.

Children too young, weak and fearful for their own lives, to mount a defence against forced labour, sex, and killing, are forcibly taught to obey instructions however much they shrink from the dreadful ceremonies into bleak and heartless misery they are forced toward, learning to obey. And quietly, in their lonely fear, do as they are forced to do, upon pain of torture and death.

Western aid agencies and dedicated workers, along with involved religious groups desperately attempt to discover the whereabouts of these child sex-and-war slaves, to bargain for their release from the depravity they've been sunk into. These wasted childhoods and hopeless young people are taken away, bought from their captors, and undergo a process of rehabilitation.

Those who are ultimately rescued represent a small proportion of the children whose lives have been taken from them and replaced by a living nightmare. Yet for every child saved from the savagery of sex slavery and war-mongering, a world of good has been accomplished; the child unleashed from the dread misery of a living nightmare, and given encouragement to become as close to normal as possible.

One such is a young man, uncertain of his true age given the dreadful destruction of his early years, named Emmanuel Jal, who has written his memoirs as a child soldier, in a publication titled War Child.
He's also a hip-hop star, attempting through his art to inform those who think of war and violence as romantic, how misinformed they are.

He was a child soldier for five years in his native Sudan. The writing of his memoir, he said, was helpful in "delivering" him from the pain and guilt of his past life. He details the Sudanese government seizing tribal lands to grasp their natural resources, and how his family among countless others experienced rape, death, and homelessness, his father becoming a Sudan Peoples Liberation Army commander.

And he was himself recruited as a child soldier into the SPLA; taught, as a ten-year-old half starved and confused, to fire an AK-47. He underwent ruthless drilling as a child soldier, beaten continually, and forced to viciously whip other child soldiers as part of the training process. "My time at the front of the front line taught me just one new thing about war - the worst is when it is over", he recounts.

"As the battle falls silent, only the screams of the injured can be heard, and when the guns stop firing and the smell of smoke fades away, the stench of flesh and blood fills the air ... When the battle at the front of the front line had been very bad, I didn't want to eat meat for days as I remembered the smell." He remains haunted by what he was forced to do, and by the unspeakable horrors he experienced.

"When I'm idle, that's when my brain actually messes me up and sometimes I'm worried" he explains. He criticizes other rappers for their glorification of violence and their use of violent language. He has taken responsibility for creating a charity called Gua Africa, and plans to build a school in his village in southern Sudan, while living in London, England.

He was fortunate, at age 13, to have been discovered by a British aid worker who managed to smuggle him into Kenya and enroll him in a Nairobi school. His story is an inspirational one, informing that irrespective of how desperately horrible children's lives can be, they can, with good will and intent, be taught to live again, to trust and have hope for the future, to take their rightful place in society.

For such as he is one must have compassion, and admiration for the manner in which he has disciplined himself to live with the thought of the barbarity he was forced to engage in, and despite that, dedicate himself to healing himself, and to using his experience in a positive way to help others understand, and to educate them through his experience.

So why, one might muse, might people have difficulty feeling compassion for someone like Omar Khadr, held at Guantanamo Bay prison by the U.S. on charges of murder and war crimes in Afghanistan, as an enemy combatant for the last six years? Well, Omar Khadr, born in Toronto to fanatic Islamists, his father a colleague and supporter of Osama bin Laden, had a rather different background than did Mr. Jal.

Omar Khadr was not born into poverty, did not experience the cruelties of war first hand, and lived a normal child's life in Toronto, until his father and mother took him to Pakistan and enrolled him in madrassas there. He was taught, like his older brothers, how to handle explosives and arms, and inducted into the Islamist jihad against the West. And he remained there, even after his father's violent death.

His parents had utter scorn for Western values, though they saw nothing amiss in living in Canada, and taking advantage of the social welfare available to them there as Canadian citizens. Omar Khadr was fifteen years old when he was found with other jihadists in Afghanistan, battling against foreigners in the country. He was severely wounded and his life was saved by American medics.

Canada is not well served by continuing to host the Khadr family; mother, daughter and sons. The women's expressed disgust for Canadian values and imperatives, morals and society are well known, as is their support for al-Qaeda. To welcome another member of this hostile family back into the fold is not in the best interests of Canada. In Omar Khadr's case, evil resulted from good.

In the case of Emmanuel Jal, good resulted from evil. They are quite distinguishable.

Labels: Political Realities, Terrorism

posted by Pieface @ Monday, February 16, 2009