Fish Sticks and Green Jello

This is wonderful. Get some kleenex ready before you watch it.

The Beauty of Life

Labels: entertainment

It amazes me how many people around me worry about so many trivial things every day. I live in America around people that make money and spend money, lots of it. I play a video game that people pour a huge part of their lives into. Whether it be emotionally, socially or financially. It's bizzare how MUCH things like a video game matter to people over REAL people in the rest of the world. I'm bringing up the video game because I spend a lot of time playing one called World of Warcraft (an MMORPG) and I see how much people invest in it and it's disturbing.

I'm not an overly political person but there are times when I think it's important to get a message out to others around me. Not everyone is aware of Darfur or that there's genocide going on there at this very moment. Not everyone is even aware of what genocide is. If you're one of those people then it's your responsiblity as a citizen of this planet to educate yourself and understand what is being down to your fellow human beings. It's important that we all do what we can, whether it's donating money, time or educating others to take action. Here's one of the ways I want to help.

"Darfur has been embroiled in a deadly conflict for over three years. At least 400,000 people have been killed; more than 2 million innocent civilians have been forced to flee their homes and now live in displaced-persons camps in Sudan or in refugee camps in neighboring Chad; and more than 3.5 million men, women, and children are completely reliant on international aid for survival. Not since the Rwandan genocide of 1994 has the world seen such a calculated campaign of displacement, starvation, rape, and mass slaughter." Read and learn more....

Here's your chance to make a difference. Don't ignore what's going on here, instead take action. If you could go back in time and take action against past genocides would you have? You have a chance to make a difference now. Please do.

Go to http://www.savedarfur.org and fill out the form to send a message to Bush and Secretary General Kofi Annan. If you're not seeing the form anymore, delete your cookies and revisit the link again.

Go to http://www.darfurscores.org/ to see how members of Congress in your state score in terms of working to end genocide. Yay for California!

What is genocide?
genocide

1. The systematic killing of substantial numbers of people on the basis of ethnicity, religion, political opinion, social status, or other particularity.
2. Acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.

Some examples of genocide in history:

Germany
Upwards of 11 million people were systematically exterminated by the Nazis and their collaborators during the Holocaust. The main targets of the Holocaust were the Jews of Europe, of whom between five and six million were killed, including 1.5 million children, in what was called by the Nazis the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question". Other targets of the Holocaust included Russians,Poles, Roma, Serbians, (see Porajmos), Slavs, homosexuals, and political opponents such as communists.

The resources of a major industrial power, Germany, were harnessed to industrialize mass murder. Jews and other victims were massacred in massive open air shootings by the organized killing squads called Einsatzgruppen, or confined in ghettos before being transported to extermination camps where they were killed.

Cambodia
Killed approximately 1.7 million Cambodians between 1975-1979. The Khmer Rouge, or more formally, the Communist Party of Kampuchea, led by Pol Pot, Ta Mok, Duch and other leaders, organized the mass killing of ideologically suspect groups, ethnic Vietnamese, ethnic Chinese or Sino-Khmers, ethnic Chams, ethnic Thais, former civil servants, demobilized soldiers, Buddhist monks, secular intellectuals and professionals, and refugees. Khmer Rouge cadres defeated in factional struggles were also liquidated in purges. The number of the victims is disputed.

Rwanda
During a period of 100 days in 1994, officially 937,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed by Hutus in Rwanda. The rate at which people were killed far exceeded any other genocide in history. Bodies of those slain were left in the streets. Bodies were left wherever they were slain, mostly in the streets and their homes. The method of killing was done mostly with machetes. See also History of Rwanda.

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) is a court under the auspices of the United Nations for the prosecution of offenses committed in Rwanda during the genocide which occurred there during April and May, 1994, commencing on April 6. The ICTR was created on November 8, 1994 by the Security Council of the United Nations in order to judge those people responsible for the acts of genocide and other serious violations of the international law performed in the territory of Rwanda, or by Rwandan citizens in nearby states, between January 1 and December 31, 1994.

So far, the ICTR has finished nineteen trials and convicted twenty five accused persons. Another twenty five persons are still on trial. Nineteen are awaiting trial in detention. Ten are still at large. The first trial, of Jean-Paul Akayesu, began in 1997. Jean Kambanda, interim Prime Minister, plead guilty.