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November 08, 2002

Urgent Request to the Blue Fairy: Please Turn these Children into Stone

Fairy tales often have a universal appeal and draw children of all nations into their magical world. Pinocchio is no exception where the Blue Fairy rewards moral behavior and grants a puppet flesh-and-blood status.

I do doubt, however, that children in Iraq or Afghanistan could understand why an inanimate, man-made object would ever want to be a child of the flesh and blood kind. In their world, the flesh of children is there for the maiming and the blood for flowing --unlike those beautiful, sacrosanct objects of art which must be preserved and doted on.

As the British Independent reports, "an international band of curators and historians anxious not to repeat the damage inflicted on Iraqi treasures during the Gulf War 11 years ago are appealing to the American government to take the historic sites into account."

A similar surge of concern was observed when, about six months before the 9/11 attacks, Afghanistan made a brief appearance in the news. The world was outraged then, but not because hundreds of thousands children's lives were flickering away in refugee camps where lack of education, food, and opportunities stole away their childhood and diseases and lack of medical care made sure many never grow into adults. The world was not outraged because the Taliban regime was denying medical care to women (and children) by not allowing women healthcare workers to work and men to take care of women. The outrage was not that the United States had pushed the U.N. to slap economic sanctions on the country -because of its refusal to turn over Osama bin Laden- that made things worse for the worst off, the poorest, the most vulnerable in the country (according to some estimates, the sanctions increased the price of basic medicines up to 50%) without providing leverage or means to make things better.

It was the 1,400-year-old Buddha statues carved into the mountainside at Bamiyan that triggered the heart-rending cries of concern. The New York Times (03/19/01) reported that Taliban envoy Rahmatullah Hashimi explained that the decision was made after an international NGO offered money to restore the statues but refused to allow the money to be used in refugee camps -- where 300 children had just died. Hashimi recounted that the NGO was asked that “instead of spending money on statues, why didn't they help our children who are dying of malnutrition?” Upon being told that “this money is only for statues”, they decided to destroy them.

Germany, Malaysia and Japan joined Russia, India, United States, Egypt and others to decry the barbarity. Offers poured in: money to restore the statues, money to remove the statues for safekeeping somewhere else, money to change the rulers' minds. Money that had not been pouring in for the refugee camps, for food, for clean water.

Now the world's archeologists and curators are afraid a similar outrage will occur to the historical artifacts in Iraq. The Independent quotes Helen McDonald, of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq, based at Cambridge University, who explained that last time the Iraqis had tried to move a great deal of their most important objects out into storage in the countryside and that they have already begun to do so again.

"But some things are immovable, such as huge stones. If a bomb hits a museum or something, that would be it," she said.

Sure enough, she notes, "The British School of Archaeology in Iraq has written [about this]. They wrote to the Foreign Office during the Gulf War to express concern, not just on the humanitarian grounds but the effects that it would have on the culture."

Bombing of stones isn't the only potential cause of horrors, according to Charles Tripp, of the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. He warns that in the wake of the Gulf War, sanctions had inadvertently caused as much damage to the archaeological sites of Iraq as direct attack. Trip notes: "The conditions of poverty had led to much looting of archaeological sites and site museums, which often contained significant finds even after the best items were removed to Baghdad. Numerous finds have turned up on the art market in the West." Dr Tripp observes that "there is a lot of temptation in a destitute country to rip something out that has a saleable value in the West."

Yes, especially since UNICEF reports that at least half a million children have died due to those sanctions. I can imagine parents looting and prying loose every single stone, rock, tablet, gem or otherwise inanimate object in that country to try to obtain food or simple medicines.

It has been reported that when a journalist asked Mahatma Gandhi what he thought about Western Civilization, he replied, "it would be a good idea."

Indeed, it would be a good idea; unfortunately, it's unlikely we'll be able to muster that up in short order so we need a more serious, urgent and miraculous intervention.

We need the Blue Fairy who turned Pinocchio into flesh to perform a reverse miracle.

So here goes.

Please, Blue Fairy, turn the children of Iraq into stone. The older the stone better. Stone with cracks and signs of aging and weather damage would be perfect. Hopefully, that will evoke some protective reflexes and caring in their direction.

And, Blue Fairly, while you are at it, please do the same for the children of Afghanistan which is once again facing famine since the investment required and promised has not been delivered, and the children of Southern Africa which is in the midst of a progressing famine due to the drought which might have been triggered partly by global warming, and the children in Central America which is now threatened by famine thanks to the crisis in the coffee industry which never paid farmers more than a pittance of their enormous profit.

If Blue Fairy does not come through, I encourage the Iraqis to start their own make-a-wish foundation, which grants wishes to children with terminal illnesses. Of course, in Iraq, because of the sanctions, easily curable diseases like cholera and treatable childhood problems like leukemia are often terminaland then there are the congenital birth defects in the depleted-uranium-polluted south.

That make-a-wish foundation should take those children, whose childhood we have collectively destroyed, to the precious museums and let them play with all those precious stones and tablets. The children should paint them with indelible ink. They should throw them to the ground from high buildings to see from which floor they pulverize most easily. They should be encouraged to play team games and see which team can hammer a tablet into dust fastest.

Maybe, just maybe, what must surely be the collective wish of all those children and their families will come true. Maybe, amidst the predictable outrage over crushed stone, the world will notice them.

And maybe, just maybe, the biggest miracle of all will happen without the Blue Fairy -- our hearts of stone will turn into flesh and blood.

Posted by zeynep at 09:57 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

November 01, 2002

Let Them Eat Cake: TV blames Africans for famine

Published in Extra! November/December 2002

A famine is raging through southern Africa--a famine that Doctors Without Borders has called among the worst in Africa in the past decade. The international relief organization CARE reports that the famine "is largely the result of one of the worst droughts in a decade" and that "severe hunger--even starvation--threatens millions, particularly among the most vulnerable: children, the elderly, and pregnant and nursing women" in Angola, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

This is occurring against the backdrop of an AIDS epidemic in Africa that has claimed 25 million lives and counting, leaving behind about 14 million orphans. It's a tragic story, full of suffering, especially of children; it's also a story of the heroism of those who relentlessly struggle against the odds under the harshest conditions. It's a story that produces haunting pictures of despairing mothers, of fading children -- and of the courageous people who are working against time, against all odds, to try to restore life.

But it's not good television, apparently.

Network by network

An analysis of transcripts of news programs for the six months between March 11 and September 11, 2002, by the three major broadcast networks--including daily news shows and such weekly programs as Nightline and 60 Minutes--demonstrates a striking lack of attention to the plight of Southern Africa. The rare stories were almost always without any substantive reference to the role of rich countries, transnational corporations and the international finance system in triggering or worsening the crisis. Analysis seemed to be present to the degree that blame could be put on the shoulders of African nations--fairly or not.

The best network--among dismal competition--was ABC News, which had a total of 14 mentions of the words "famine" or "starvation" in connection with Africa. Of these 14 stories:

CBS had a total of seven stories during the same period:

  • Four of the seven stories were about Zambia's refusal to accept genetically modified corn,
  • Two mentioned the famine in the context of Zimbabwe's land reform,
  • One was a 57-word brief that stated that 10 million people faced starvation.

    NBC had a single story regarding famine or starvation in Africa in its news programs during the same six-month period. Ironically, NBC's lone piece (8/9/02)--about Veronica, a 12-year-old AIDS orphan struggling to feed her siblings--was the only story among the three networks that was filed from the ground and concentrated on the fact that children were starving. The NBC story did mention that the famine was looming since the strategic grain reserve, meant to be kept at hand for emergencies exactly like this one, had been sold off. NBC, however, did not mention why it was sold: The president of Malawi had publicly stated (BBC, 4/9/02) that the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank “insisted that, since Malawi had a surplus [of maize] and the [government's] National Food Reserve Agency had this huge loan, they had to sell the maize to repay the commercial banks.”

    Blaming the victims

    As can be seen from the list, almost all the coverage concentrated on the perceived faults of African governments. Zimbabwe, which is only one country out of the six that face starvation, generated most of the coverage. Most of the criticism of Zimbabwe came from U.S. officials and white farmers who had lost their property. Only once (CBS, 8/18/02) was it mentioned that in a country of 12 million black people, the white minority of 40,000 owns most of the productive land--a legacy of the colonial occupation of the country that had ended 20 years ago.

    According to the London Guardian (4/3/00), "About 4,500 white farmers own 11 million hectares of Zimbabwe's prime agricultural land, while about 1 million blacks own 16 million hectares, often in drought-prone regions." In other words, this is a country where a minority of less than one hundredth of one percent owns almost two-thirds as much land as the majority--and owns the choicest land, because they once ruled the country.

    These whites were generally portrayed as hard-working, honest farmers who just wanted to till their land, rather than as giant land-owners who had usurped the most productive territory--although they were surely that, given the amount of starvation that such a small number of farms was reportedly able to cause.

    Mugabe's administration in Zimbabwe has been thoroughly criticized by his own citizens, and the subject is clearly newsworthy. However, the omission of basic facts such as the skewed land ownership turned a potentially useful examination of the motives of Zimbabwe's land reform program into a one-dimensional promotion for a single message: It's their own fault they're starving.

    Zambia's refusal of genetically modified corn also generated what was, relatively speaking, a flurry of coverage. While this finally got CBS to cover the issue of the famine (8/30/02), only once was it mentioned that a major concern was the consequences for the ecosystem and the economy if people planted some of the corn--quite a likely scenario since, as seen in all famine situations, what corn seed stock did exist has probably been eaten by the starving population. This is critical because Zambia exports corn to the European Union--an issue that CBS alluded to only once by saying one of Zambia's concerns was that Europe was "nervous" about GM corn. In fact, far beyond "nervous," the EU for all practical purposes bans imports of GM foods, and Zambia would indeed lose access to European markets.

    It was also not reported that the U.N.'s World Food Program began acquiring non-GM corn and wheat for distribution in Zambia, or that Zambia had agreed to distribute milled GM corn that could not be planted. Perhaps most alarmingly for U.S. consumers, none of the networks noted that the Zambia's request to the U.S. government for proof of the long-term safety of GM corn was answered with assurances (AP, 8/22/02) rather than with studies and reports.

    CBS and the other networks were uninterested in the famine that continued to rage in Lesotho, Angola, Malawi and Mozambique, countries that notably did not fit into the "it's their fault" theme--all four had accepted GM foods, and had no land reform program upsetting production.

    Causes closer to home

    Meanwhile, evidence is surfacing that the current famine may actually more the result of actions of the U.S. and other Northern countries, rather than a stroke of bad luck and/or mismanagement on the part of African nations. The U.N. Environment Program (UNEP) as well as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have been warning that it's quite possible Africa's droughts are now being largely exacerbated or triggered by global warming (IPCC/UNEP report, 2/21/01)--a phenomenon for which Africa is the least to blame, as Africa, with 14 percent of the world's population, is responsible for only 3 percent of global CO2 emission. UNEP and IPCC have also warned that Africa suffers disproportionately from global warming.

    Recent scientific papers also suggest that pollution from industrialized nations contributed to the tragic Ethiopian famine in the 1980s (AP, 7/21/02). These issues received only one mention on network news during the period studied--a reference on ABC (3/26/02) to a possible connection between climate change and drought in Africa.

    The almost complete lack of coverage regarding the global warming/famine connection was made more striking by the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) held in Johannesburg, South Africa. George W. Bush refused to attend the summit, sending Secretary of State Colin Powell instead--who was heckled by the delegates. The interruptions in Powell's speech occurred mainly at two points: first when he tried to blame Zambia and Zimbabwe for the famine, and again when he stated that "the United States is taking action to meet environmental challenges, including global climate change."

    The eruption of anger at Colin Powell among delegates and dignitaries from around the world might have been better understood had any of the networks explained the context of the famine, and reminded viewers that the U.S. withdrew from the Kyoto treaty earlier this year. During the WSSD, the U.S. further antagonized those concerned about global warming by torpedoing all attempts to set goals for increasing solar, wind and other forms of renewable energy. Another link between policies of the rich world and the famine that was repeatedly made my delegates at the WSSD, but ignored by the networks, was the issue of farm subsidies; they argued that it's not possible for the poor world to keep its agriculture alive when rich nations lavishly subsidize the exports of their own farmers (Food First, 9/02).

    Not even Colin Powell's subsequent visit to Angola, one of the famine-stricken countries, prompted the networks to cover the famine. Angola had been a breaking story over the summer because a 30-year-old civil war, with one of the sides armed and financed by the United States and apartheid South Africa, had just ended. The international aid community had access to Angola's remote corners for the first time in decades, discovering shocking levels of starvation.

    Powell's visit to Angola was indeed spurred by the end of the civil war, but he was there neither to apologize nor to assess the damage; rather, his trip was driven by Angola's 11 billion barrels of proven crude oil reserves, second only to Nigeria in sub-Saharan Africa, and the country's non-membership in OPEC. The famine in Angola was apparently on nobody's agenda: During the whole six-month period, it was mentioned only once by the three networks.

    In 53 words, ABC News (6/12/02) duly reported that Doctors Without Borders attributed the starvation to "the chronic criminal neglect of the Angolan government," and the organization had accused the U.N. of being "shamefully slow in responding to the crisis since the civil war there ended earlier this year." In keeping with the "it's their own fault" rule, no mention was made of previous deep involvement of the United States in the war that devastated the country.

    Some of the most surreal coverage occurred on Nightline (7/17/02) when Chris Bury reported that "the overall response still falls far short of what the U.N. says is needed," and went on to explain that "part of that is blamed on the slow onset of famine. By the time those familiar television images of starving children appear, it's too late to help them." So the lack of attention is not the media's fault but somehow the famine's fault because its "slow onset" delayed the images.

    Never mind that the U.N. and aid agencies had been warning of the famine in Southern Africa at least since February 2002; never mind that images of malnourished children had been available for months; never mind that it is quite possible to file a news story about dangers posed to children who have not yet managed to consume all their body fat and develop the swollen bellies and aged faces of kwashiorkor. Never mind that all famines, almost by definition, have a slow onset.

    We are not going to report the perfectly predictable course of events because they have not yet happened, the media seem to be saying, and when they do happen, we are going to duly inform you that "it's too late to help them"--and continue to ignore the story for all practical purposes. It's their fault, anyway.

    Posted by zeynep at 10:34 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack