After a quick conversation with Tas while watching a documentary on Hurricane Sandy (while we were getting ready for bed), many relevant thoughts and a problem that I have with our society surfaced... since it connects to Cambodia, I figure why not share it.
Americans, for the most part, have portrayed 9/11 to be the worst thing to have ever happened in the world, or at least they make it seem that way. I'm not saying that what happened isn't bad, but terrorist attacks happen constantly all around the world. If someone just mentions those two numbers together, then everyone knows what you're talking about. But, if, on the other hand, you say Khmer Rouge, at least half of the people won't know what that is. Who determines which event deserves to be better known?
If you look at what happened in Cambodia next to 9/11, so many more people were not only killed but also tortured (2,753 people were killed during the New York attack while 2,400,000 were murdered by communists in the Khmer Rouge). The main difference I found was that Cambodia just didn't have the means to publicise it to the extent that the United States did; it wasn't all over the news. So, just because the US is a more developed country than Cambodia, it's as if they deserve more awareness on things that happened to their country, but that's not true; it's twisted and it's wrong.
This means that just because the media through which society receive their news is, mostly, American-based we are led to the assumption that 9/11, the 'Dark Knight' massacre, the Boston marathon explosion and more are the worst things happening in the world, when, in reality, there is so much worse. For example, here, in 2012, when Hurricane Sandy hit the States everyone, everywhere, knew about it and were, for lack of a better word, freaking out about it. But, 71 people died. Only. I'm not saying that that's not horrible or that the number of deaths is the way to measure the severity of an event but, come on, SO many tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes and every other natural disaster you can think of have hit India, Bangladesh, the Philippines and many other countries in Southeast Asia, without the majority of the world (that has access to sources of news) knowing about it.
I find this horrible because, as a result, events like these that occurred in the West will receive a lot of aid (pity, donations, volunteering and more) while those elsewhere don't, when, arguably, they need it more. I know that this is a touchy subject and I don't want to be misunderstood, but I'm just saying that as a result of our source of information we are more exposed to Western issues and are sheltered from those of the rest of the world, which leads us to assume that the events that have happened in North America are the worst out there, when, they're not.
LM
Americans, for the most part, have portrayed 9/11 to be the worst thing to have ever happened in the world, or at least they make it seem that way. I'm not saying that what happened isn't bad, but terrorist attacks happen constantly all around the world. If someone just mentions those two numbers together, then everyone knows what you're talking about. But, if, on the other hand, you say Khmer Rouge, at least half of the people won't know what that is. Who determines which event deserves to be better known?
If you look at what happened in Cambodia next to 9/11, so many more people were not only killed but also tortured (2,753 people were killed during the New York attack while 2,400,000 were murdered by communists in the Khmer Rouge). The main difference I found was that Cambodia just didn't have the means to publicise it to the extent that the United States did; it wasn't all over the news. So, just because the US is a more developed country than Cambodia, it's as if they deserve more awareness on things that happened to their country, but that's not true; it's twisted and it's wrong.
This means that just because the media through which society receive their news is, mostly, American-based we are led to the assumption that 9/11, the 'Dark Knight' massacre, the Boston marathon explosion and more are the worst things happening in the world, when, in reality, there is so much worse. For example, here, in 2012, when Hurricane Sandy hit the States everyone, everywhere, knew about it and were, for lack of a better word, freaking out about it. But, 71 people died. Only. I'm not saying that that's not horrible or that the number of deaths is the way to measure the severity of an event but, come on, SO many tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes and every other natural disaster you can think of have hit India, Bangladesh, the Philippines and many other countries in Southeast Asia, without the majority of the world (that has access to sources of news) knowing about it.
I find this horrible because, as a result, events like these that occurred in the West will receive a lot of aid (pity, donations, volunteering and more) while those elsewhere don't, when, arguably, they need it more. I know that this is a touchy subject and I don't want to be misunderstood, but I'm just saying that as a result of our source of information we are more exposed to Western issues and are sheltered from those of the rest of the world, which leads us to assume that the events that have happened in North America are the worst out there, when, they're not.
LM
