I did something last night which is as far away from my norm as it’s possible to get. I actually sat down and watched the news, but not just any news. I watched the Rachel Maddow show. Although a friend had recommended her to me months ago, I just am not prone to watch the news as I don’t see a need to bring someone else’s drama into my home. But this particular edition had a segment which brings another viewpoint to something which has been blasted all over the social media sites (although I’m going to assume it’s all of them though I only subscribe to a couple), but only with part of the story.
Since I am a “give me the whole story or none of it” kind of gal, I listened very carefully and was flabbergasted by how much is being left out as everyone focuses only on the victimization of a single group of girls, and not on the entire issue. Here is the story which is opening my eyes, and which I am deviating from my norm to share tonight.
Meanwhile, Facebook, alone, is being plastered with stories like this one:
Each
one of these girls is our daughter, our sister, our niece, our aunt and
our mother. The future of Nigeria and Africa and New York and Europe
and the United States etcetera,
etcetera, is threatened by the robbing of these young women’s future. We
must have our darlings back so that we can help them to heal from this
horror.
Not only has the fact that the Boko Haram terrorist organization which, by the way, roughly translates to “Western style education is forbidden”, announced a year ago that they were going to start abducting girls, been completely ignored, but those abductions of a few girls here and a few girls there have yet to be mentioned alongside the stories about the 200 and some odd who were abducted at once. Not only that, there have been more abductions in the last few days!
While the parents of the girls abducted from their school searched for them, armed only with bows and arrows, the Nigerian military falsely reported that they’d been freed. Nobody knows why. Meanwhile, the richest nation in Africa is hosting the World Economic Forum which has been moved from Switzerland this year. In spite of deadly bombings in the capital city, they are trying to show the world that they are a good choice for investment dollars as they are oil rich.
Do we really want to invest in a country which has yet to declare a group which kills 70 innocent people at a pop and abducts teenage girls on a regular basis because they don’t believe in Western style education, a terrorist organization???
Meanwhile, the US in typical fashion has offered to help bail the Nigerian government out of this fiasco and the offer has been accepted. We are sending a “coordination cell” which, as far as I can figure out, consists of counter terrorism experts and hostage negotiators, to Nigeria. Meanwhile, though I am not sure I understand why this needs to happen, neither the Nigerian government nor the UN have seen fit to declare Boko Haram a terrorist organization. Only the US has stuck their necks out on this one! (again!)
I know I’m going to get blasted for this one, but my biggest question is, if we are sending all of this expertise which doesn’t come cheaply, to Nigeria which is so very, very rich, are we going to use our brains and not only send them a bill for our services, but also ensure that it’s paid? And what if (though it’s more of a “when” than an “if” in my opinion) we end up engaging our military troops as well. Are we, once again, going to foot the bill for another country’s problems, or are we, finally, going to insist that they pay for our services, just as should be done in any business transaction?
Finally, the bigger issue is that human trafficking, and especially the sale of young girls into sexual slavery, is going on all over the world, including right here in the United States of America. It is, in fact as big a problem here as it is anywhere else!
So here we are again. We feed people abroad while our own citizens are starving. We build homes, schools and churches in other countries while our own citizens are homeless. We save victims of human trafficking abroad. but are failing to solve the problem between our own borders!
So here it is again, if you’re so inclined to watch the video and do some research of your own. The abduction of over 200 school girls in Nigeria is barely the tip of the iceberg. Why is nobody posting about saving the untold number of girls who are the objects of human sex trafficking worldwide? Why is nobody addressing the fact that the head of Boko Haram told the world he would start abducting girls, and has probably abducting far more than the 200 and something he happened to have his people take in one, fell swoop?
I, myself, will be following the actions of Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota who seems to be taking the entire issue seriously, and not simply the bits and pieces which make good copy.
{whew!} I’m stepping off of my soapbox now, if anyone has even stayed with me to this point.
My gratitudes tonight are:
1. I am grateful for wild hairs which cause me to widen my perspective.
2. I am grateful for people who are willing to dig into the seamy underbelly of our own nation to expose things nobody wants to admit to.
3. I am grateful to live where it is possible to acquire information on many levels and from many different perspectives.
4. I am grateful that, once in awhile, I can step away from my world of rose colored glasses and see that there is a great deal left to work towards making better. (note, I do NOT say fighting against as that only gives fuel to what we don’t want.)
5. I am grateful for a very productive day which causes me to be proud of myself and my accomplishments.
Love and light.
