That's It. No more!

From time to time, I am revolted by the way human beings can treat each other. I hear on the news every now and then how one human being tortured, killed, violated, or in some other way robbed another human being of their dignity, sanity, or even life. Those instances of violence repulse me, and are part of the reason I don't often watch the news. Really there is nothing I can personally do about the incident, and agonizing over the pain of those people, and poking into their private pain through the media, doesn't really help anyone. But some things that happen in the world are just so wrong, and so damaging, that I wonder if there isn't something we, as human beings, should be doing, instead of standing by and shaking our heads and turning the channel. I have run across a couple stories on cnn.com in the last few weeks that have left me dumbstruck.

One horrifying incident that caught my attention was the stoning of a thirteen year old girl in Somalia. This girl told officials in her area that she had been raped by three men, and as a result, she was dragged, screaming for mercy, to a "killing hole," burried up to her neck, and stoned to death by fifty men while a thousand specators looked on (according to un.org) for being an adulterer. Oh, and the rapists weren't charged.

The second incident happened in Afghanistan. School girls walking to school Wednesday morning were sprayed with water pistols full of acid on their way to school. It seems that in this particular area, girls did not attend school for from 1996-2001, because the area was ruled by the Taliban during that time, and girls were denied education. It's believed that the men who squirted acid on the girls were Taliban militants. At least two of the girls are blind as a result of the attack.

I've actually been thinking about this post for several weeks now, because there are no words. I started out by thinking these were crimes against women, and that this was a hideous pattern involving the women of our world not receiving the respect and honor that they should. While I know those circumstances exist, I realized that this is something else, equally repulsive and appalling. These are CHILDREN. School girls. The girl who was stoned was 13. The schoolgirls burned by acid were probably about that same age. All I can think to write is, what is WRONG with people. While researching the two incidents, I've come to a realization. What I realized was that none of us like to hear about these incidents. They are unpleasant, and they make us feel uncomfortable and powerless. I believe that this is part of the reason we don't hear much about them. Maybe this is naive of me, but what if we all paid attention? If this were something that we as human beings cared about and and vigilently opposed, wouldn't the people in power do something about it? Wouldn't it become a priority to them? Shouldn't we do something?