Unsung Heroes from History

I am at that point in the year with my World History classes where we head into the 20^th century. We begin with Imperialism and then cover World War I, the Russian Revolution, Between the Wars (Great Depression included), World War II (Holocaust included), the Cold War, and other issues such as Indian independence and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. Sounds quite encouraging, doesn’t it? I told these tenth graders of mine that we were going to be covering some pretty heavy stuff and that I would be informing them of some historical facts that are not necessarily mentioned in their textbook. I told them my purpose in doing this was not to be sensational but to explain accurately the “losers” side of the story. I also told them that I was going to strive this year to try and bring out more of the positive contributions that were made by unsung heroes in regard to many of these human rights abuses that have taken place over the last one hundred years.

Today, I lectured about King Leopold II and the Belgians “colonization” (insert rape and/or theft here) of the Congo. After discussing, the European reasons for seeking to get a “slice of this magnificent African cake” (nationalism, raw materials for industrialization, social Darwinism) I went into an explanation of how the Congolese were taken hostage and forced to extract the hardened sap from the abundance of rubber trees that existed there. Women were taken hostage until the men came back from arduous labor that involved climbing trees often a hundred feet high. The women were then sold back to the men (after having been raped), if and only if they returned with their quota fulfilled. If quotas were not fulfilled, consequences were often dire and included severe beatings with a chicotte, and even severed hands and feet. Small children were often not exempt from such punishments either. For a detailed discussion of these and other egregious atrocities, and more so for a compelling story overall I recommend reading this.

While this barbarity was transpiring, not everyone turned a blind eye. Enter one Roger Casement, a British consul stationed in Leopoldville. Casement began exposing the human rights abuses that were taking place in the Congo. His discoveries would lead to parliament taking control of the Congo from Leopold. To make a long story short, Casement’s eventual involvement with the movement for Irish independence got him into trouble with the Germans and he was captured and put on trial for high treason.

In his last days, he spoke in his own defense saying, “Self-government is our right. A thing born in us at birth; a thing no more to be doled out to us or withheld from us by another people than the right to life itself- than the right to feel the sun or smell the flowers, or to love our kind…. Where men must beg with bated breath for leave to subsist in their own land, to think their own thoughts, to sing their own songs, to garner the fruits of their own labours… then surely it is braver, a saner and a truer thing, to be a rebel… than tamely to accept it as the natural lot of men.” And in one of his last letters Casement wrote: “I made awful mistakes, and did heaps of things wrong and failed at much- but… the best thing was the Congo.”

I went on to talk about how all men die, but not all men truly live and I spoke about how Edmund Burke said that the only thing needed for evil to triumph was for good men to do nothing. I praised Casement’s courage and showed him to be an example for all of us.

For the first time in four years of teaching I saw 15 year olds that were completely riveted and hanging on every word I spoke, as I talked about how each and every one of us in that room had a responsibility to find out what drives us and make us tick. I implored all of us to live our lives in such a way that we could take our last breath and know that we had lived as Casement did in focused pursuit of righting wrongs and helping others. I told them that I didn’t just want them to become better students, but to become better people aware of what is currently going on in the world related to human rights abuses. It was reinforced to me through this class that it is a must that I regularly make dead people come alive and inspire purpose and hope in this next generation. I consider it a privilege to be surrounded by these kids as I continue to live a dream (more on that later).