J. Pharoah Doss: Victim response to UN’s 30th commemoration of Rwanda genocide

Day of Remembrance of Rwandan Genocide Victims (Adobe Stock Illustration) & The Rwandan genocide stunned the entire world in 1994. The Hutu majority systematically exterminated around 800,000 of the minority Tutsis in 100 days. Noam Schimmel, a Global Studies instructor at UC Berkeley, published an essay in 2022 titled What Caused the Rwandan Genocide Against the Tutsi? & Schimmel stated that the Belgian colonialists pursued a strategy of divide and conquer that sowed the seeds of hatred and resentment that yielded a Hutu supremacist regime. During a candlelight ceremony on April 12, the United Nations pledged to never forget the 1994 Rwandan genocide. If the Rwandan genocide victims could talk, they would expand on Schimmel’s remarks and chastise the United Nations. The Rwandan genocide victims would claim that the Belgians intensified preexisting tribal conflict by promoting a pseudoscientific notion known as the Hamitic Hypothesis. Westerners are more aware of the Curse of Ham. The name Ham means “burnt” or “black” skin in Hebrew. According to the Roman-Jewish historian Josephus, the descendants of Noah’s son, Ham, populated Africa. In the Old Testament story, Noah cursed Ham’s son to be a servant of servants to his brothers. European Christians used Josephus and...