Off Topic - Yet Important

Last week my History 441 class was invited to attend a discussion on the crisis in the Congo. I was extremely shocked by the overwhelming statics presented. I left the meeting quite confused as to why the news media fail to cover this type of news and I felt cheated by out government. Let me explain why I felt this way.

I was told that more people in the Congo have died than all the deaths of World War II combined. There has been over five million murders in the Congo. I have never heard this before but I watch the daily news every morning as I dress for work. As a matter of fact, we saw a clip from a documentary and there was a guerrilla soldier picking up bodies from the ground and tossing them into the garbage truck just as you would any rubble, on of which was a baby of no more than 6 months old. I cried. I am a mother of three children and that visual touched my heart like never before. I was saddened to know that there isn't more being done about it.

Afterwards it was reported that over 80% minerals comes from this poverty stricken land, especially the Coltan used in this very computer I'm typing on right now. As I type my fingers feel like I'm touching the backs of the people who are dying, suffering, and being robbed of their land. The most horrifying part is I was ignorant to all of this before last week. Now that I am aware my heart is open and what I read and saw not only missed the stomach, it has touched my heart in such a way that I hope this message can feed the curiosity of others to research this matter as well to try and help these innocent people - BABIES. I can't speak for the world, I can't change the world alone, but I do think that any effort beats idleness. Honestly, I can't even look at my cell phone and laptop the same way as I did before. This is why I chose to type this as my random post.

I hope I didn't come off as preachy, I am just passionate about what I learned.