Pre-Writing Activity

1. Pre-Writing Activity With someone sitting next to you, discuss the following questions: - What is genocide? - Where has it occurred? Record your and your partner’s answers on a sheet of paper that you will turn in at the end of the period.

2. Gregory H. Stanton • Gregory H. Stanton is the Research Professor in Genocide Studies and Prevention at the George Mason University in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States. • He is best known for his work in the area of genocide studies. • He is the founder (1999) and president of Genocide Watch, the founder (1981) and director of the Cambodian Genocide Project,\ and the founder (1999) and Chair of the International Campaign to End Genocide. • From 2007 to 2009 he was the President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars.

3. Genocide The eight stages of genocide, as defined by Gregory H. Stanton

4. What are the eight stages of genocide? Classification Symbolization Dehumanization Organization Polarization Preparation Extermination Denial

5. Stage One: CLASSIFICATION Insert Photo Here

6. Stage One: CLASSIFICATION Everyday, we speak in terms of “us” and “them.” Our team and their team. Americans and Iraqis. Christians and Muslims. Straights and gays. This is the first stage of genocide, though it does not mean that every society in which classification occurs will have a genocide occur. The more “bi-polar” the society is, the more likely a genocide is to occur. The more separate - physically and ideologically - these two groups in a society, the more likely that one will attempt to exterminate the other group.

7. Stage One: CLASSIFICATION ON YOUR PAPER: Think of one way in which we separate people in our culture. Do you think this is likely to lead to a genocide? Why or why not?

8. Stage 1: Classification • “Us versus them” • Distinguish by nationality, ethnicity, race, or religion. • Bipolar societies (Rwanda) most likely to have genocide because no way for classifications to fade away through inter-marriage. • Classification is a primary method of dividing society and creating a power struggle between groups.

9. Classification (Rwanda) Belgian colonialists believed Tutsis were a naturally superior nobility, descended from the Israelite tribe of Ham. The Rwandan royalty was Tutsi. Belgians distinguished between Hutus and Tutsis by nose size, height & eye type. Another indicator to distinguish Hutu farmers from Tutsi pastoralists was the number of cattle owned.

10. Prevention: Classification • Promote common identities (national, religious, human.) • Use common languages (Swahili in Tanzania, science, music.) • Actively oppose racist and divisive politicians and parties.

11. Stage Two: SYMBOLIZATION

12. Stage Two: SYMBOLIZATION Once groups are classified, they typically - either of their own volition to establish their identity or by force so that the dominant group can easily identify them - adopt symbols so that they can be told apart. In some cases - particularly where race or ethnicity is concerned - symbolization occurs even before classification, as the symbols that suggest they belong with a certain group are innate, such as the color of their skin or their physical features. Again, this stage is one that does not necessarily lead to genocide.

13. Stage 2: Symbolization • Names: “Jew”, “German”, “Hutu”, “Tutsi”. • Languages. • Types of dress. • Group uniforms: Nazi Swastika armbands • Colors and religious symbols: • Yellow star for Jews • Blue checked scarf Eastern Zone in Cambodia

14. Stage 2: Symbolization (Rwanda) “Ethnicity” was first noted on cards by Belgian Colonial Authorities in 1933. Tutsis were given access to limited education programs and Catholic priesthood. Hutus were given less assistance by colonial auhorities. At independence, these preferences were reversed. Hutus were favored. These ID cards were later used to distinguish Tutsis from Hutus in the 1994 massacres of Tutsis and moderate Hutus that resulted in 800,000+ deaths.

15. Symbolization (Nazi Germany) Jewish Passport: “Reisepäss” Required to be carried by all Jews by 1938. Preceded the yellow star.

16. Symbolization (Nazi Germany) Nazis required the yellow Star of David emblem to be worn by nearly all Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe by 1941.

17. Symbolization (Nazi Germany) • Homosexuals = pink triangles • Identified homosexuals to SS guards in the camps • Caused discrimination by fellow inmates who shunned homosexuals

18. Pot Pol led genocide • In Cambodia, a genocide was carried out by the Khmer Rouge (KR) regime led by Pol Pot between 1975 and 1979 in which an estimated one and a half to three million people died. • The KR had planned to create a form of agrarian socialism which was founded on the ideals of Stalinism and Maoism.

19. Symbolization (Cambodia) • People in the Eastern Zone, near Vietnam, were accused of having “Khmer bodies, but Vietnamese heads.” • They were deported to other areas to be worked to death. • They were marked with a blue and white checked scarf (Kroma)

20. Stage Two: SYMBOLIZATION ON YOUR PAPER: Do groups you identified for the last stage have symbols that allow them - or others - to tell them apart? If so, what are they?

21. Prevention: Symbolization • Get ethnic, religious, racial, and national identities removed from ID cards, passports. • Protest imposition of marking symbols on targeted groups (yellow cloth on Hindus in Taliban Afghanistan). • Protest negative or racist words for groups (“niggers, kaffirs,” etc.) Work to make them culturally unacceptable.

22. Stage Three: DEHUMANIZATION

23. Stage Three: DEHUMANIZATION One group denies the humanity of the other group. Members of that group are equated with rodents, insects, other vermin, and even diseases. If this stage takes hold, it becomes more difficult to stop the progression of genocide.

24. Stage 3: Dehumanization • One group denies the humanity of another group, and makes the victim group seem subhuman. • Dehumanization overcomes the normal human revulsion against murder. Der Stürmer Nazi Newspaper: “The Blood Flows; The Jew Grins” Kangura Newspaper, Rwanda: “The Solution for Tutsi Cockroaches”Cafards ? .

25. Dehumanization From a Nazi SS Propaganda Pamphlet: Caption: Does the same soul dwell in these bodies?

26. Dehumanization • Hate propaganda in speeches, print and on hate radios vilify the victim group. • Members of the victim group are described as animals, vermin, and diseases. Hate radio, Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines, during the Rwandan genocide in 1994, broadcast anti-Tutsi messages like “kill the cockroaches” and “If this disease is not treated immediately, it will destroy all the Hutu.” • Dehumanization invokes superiority of one group and inferiority of the “other.” • Dehumanization justifies murder by calling it “ethnic cleansing,” or “purification.” Such euphemisms hide the horror of mass murder.

27. Stage Three: DEHUMANIZATION ON YOUR PAPER: Why is it necessary for a dominant power to dehumanize the victims of a genocide? Why would it be impossible for a genocide to accomplish its goal without this stage?

28. Prevention: Dehumanization • Vigorously protest use of dehumanizing words that refer to people as “filth,”“vermin,” animals or diseases. Deny people using such words visas and freeze their foreign assets and contributions. • Prosecute hate crimes and incitements to commit genocide. • Jam or shut down hate radio and television stations where there is danger of genocide.

29. Prevention: Dehumanization • Provide programs for tolerance to radio, TV, and newspapers. • Enlist religious and political leaders to speak out and educate for tolerance. • Organize inter-ethnic, interfaith, and inter-racial groups to work against hate and genocide.

30. Stage Four: ORGANIZATION

31. Stage Four: ORGANIZATION In order for the final stages of genocide to take place, organization must occur. The group that organizes in preparation is typically part of the state due to the amount of financial support required. It can, however, be a terrorist group; because of the amount of organization required, though, any group that successfully organizes a genocide is usually sanctioned - at least to some extent - by a state. To a certain extent, you should think of this stage as the proverbial “calm before the storm.” The roots of the final stages are beginning to take hold, but very little is actually being done to the victimized group yet.

32. Stage 4: Organization • Genocide is a group crime, so must be organized. • The state usually organizes, arms and financially supports the groups that conduct the genocidal massacres. (State organization is not a legal requirement --Indian partition.) • Plans are made by elites for a “final solution” of genocidal killings.

33. Organization (Rwanda) • “Hutu Power” elites armed youth militias called Interahamwe ("Those Who Stand Together”). • The government and Hutu Power businessmen provided the militias with over 500,000 machetes and other arms and set up camps to train them to “protect their villages” by exterminating every Tutsi.

34. Prevention: Organization • Treat genocidal groups as the organized crime groups they are. Make membership in them illegal and demand that their leaders be arrested. • Deny visas to leaders of hate groups and freeze their foreign assets. • Impose arms embargoes on hate groups and governments supporting ethnic or religious hatred. • Create UN commissions to enforce such arms embargoes and call on UN members to arrest arms merchants who violate them.

35. Stage Four: ORGANIZATION ON YOUR PAPER: What specifics would have to be worked out by the enactors of a genocide?

36. Stage Five: POLARIZATION “Go where you wanted me to go, you evil spirit.”

37. Stage 5: Polarization • Extremists drive the groups apart. • Hate groups broadcast and print polarizing propaganda. • Laws are passed that forbid intermarriage or social interaction. • Political moderates are silenced, threatened and intimidated, and killed. • Public demonstrations were organized against Jewish merchants. • Moderate German dissenters were the first to be arrested and sent to concentration camps.

38. Polarization • Attacks are staged and blamed on targeted groups. In Germany, the Reichstag fire was blamed on Jewish Communists in 1933. • Cultural centers of targeted groups are attacked. On Kristalnacht in 1938, hundreds of synagogues were burned.

39. Stage Five: POLARIZATION During this stage, the groups are driven even further apart ideologically. Hate groups begin broadcasting propaganda with greater frequency, and laws typically are enacted to forbid any sort of relations between the two groups. At this stage, it is not just the victimized group that suffers. Any “sympathizers” or moderates are either threatened or attacked by the dominant, oppressing group.

40. Prevention: Polarization • Vigorously protest laws or policies that segregate or marginalize groups, or that deprive whole groups of citizenship rights. • Physically protect moderate leaders, by use of armed guards and armored vehicles. • Demand the release of moderate leaders if they are arrested. Demand and conduct investigations if they are murdered. • Oppose coups d’état by extremists.

41. Stage Five: POLARIZATION ON YOUR PAPER: Have you ever seen a piece of propaganda intended to polarize groups? If you have, please describe it. If you have not, please try to imagine what it might look like.

42. Stage Six: PREPARATION

43. Stage Six: PREPARATION Whereas in the previous stage the victimized group was separated ideologically from the dominant group, in this stage the victimized group is separated physically from the rest of the society. The victimized group or groups are gathered together, either in ghettoes or concentration camps. At times, they are even forced into a famine-struck area and starved, beginning the seventh stage of genocide. At this stage, the world typically becomes aware of what is going on, whether they actually step in or not.

44. Stage 6: Preparation • Members of victim groups are forced to wear identifying symbols. • Death lists are made. • Victims are separated because of their ethnic or religious identity.

45. Preparation • Segregation into ghettoes is imposed, victims are forced into concentration camps. • Victims are also deported to famine-struck regions for starvation. Forced Resettlement into Ghettos – Poland 1939 - 1942

46. Preparation • Weapons for killing are stock-piled. • Extermination camps are even built. This build- up of killing capacity is a major step towards actual genocide.

47. Prevention: Preparation • With evidence of death lists, arms shipments, militia training, and trial massacres, a Genocide Alert™ should be declared. • UN Security Council should warn it will act (but only if it really will act.) Diplomats must warn potential perpetrators. • Humanitarian relief should be prepared. • Military intervention forces should be organized, including logistics and financing.

48. Stage Six: PREPARATION ON YOUR PAPER: Assuming that at this stage, the world cannot help but notice that the victimized group is being forced from their homes in preparation to be slaughtered, why wouldn’t this be the stage where every genocide ends? This is not a rhetorical question.

49. Stage Seven: EXTERMINATION This is the stage where this process legally becomes genocide. Mass killings occur quickly and systematically. When genocide is sponsored by the state, as it almost always is, the armed forces typically work with well-organized militias to exterminate the victims.

50. Stage 7: Extermination (Genocide) • Extermination begins, and becomes the mass killing legally called "genocide." Most genocide is committed by governments. Einsatzgrupen: Nazi Killing Squads