On Nov. 20 the World Health Organization, otherwise known as “WHO,” released a statement that said “More than 250,000 men, women and children living in eastern Aleppo are now without access to hospital care following attacks on the remaining hospitals over the last week.”
Videos on social media and news outlets spread throughout the internet showing men, women and children fleeing for their lives and being treated for severe injuries.
Watching the videos and reading the news stories gave me pause for thought on the events that have unfolded this year.
When I was a high school student, my class was made to read history and watch videos outlining horrific events of the past.
The reasons for teaching students about the past are countless, but one reason perhaps is to ensure that our generation does not allow history to repeat itself and to show that genocide is not a new phenomenon.
As a student, I watched what people did in history, I acknowledged the brave and the cowardly, and through my classes I made decisions on who I would try to be when my generation’s actions were written down.
As an adult I watch history unfold around me and consider how this time in my life will be recorded in the future.
As children, when we see genocide and then see the fight for rights for those long oppressed, we began to think that as society evolves so do its leaders, its citizens and values.
After all, in American history, we try to tell students it is the brave and those who stood against oppression that are honored, not the silent or cowardly.
Being shown history in this fashion, along with having a Vietnam veteran for my grandfather and a father who served in the Navy, also helped shape a healthy appreciation for my country and a great deal of pride in patriotism for this nation.
But at its core, pride is earned, and my pride as a child stemmed from my family’s actions and the actions of the brave in history. As an adult, this continues to remain true.
President Obama did not have a perfect presidency — I doubt any president does — but while he was in office the LBGTQ community did receive rights long denied to them and, as president, Obama offered to take in Syrian refugees.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
As is the case with all historical decisions his announcement was met with praise and conflict.
In hard times, the world has been overwrought with xenophobia and fear, and presently the same can be said.
But it is the individuals that overcome the xenophobia and fear that give our society and nation reasons to be proud and give our children examples to follow.
On Nov. 8 actor George Takei tweeted an account of the events that led him and his family to be held in Japanese internment camps: “The unthinkable happened before, to my family in WWII. We got thru it. We held each other close. We kept our dignity and held to our ideals.”
The actions of the few that are willing to fight against fear and try to ignite hope will always be remembered and honored.
When the New York Times printed on Sept. 18 that “The Obama administration has proposed resettling 110,000 next year” (referring to refugees) I saw the leader of one of the most powerful countries in the world trying to do something with that power to benefit and save human lives.
Agree or disagree with his decision, his actions could have and may still save lives.
There comes a point when I have to consider what patriotism for me even is. Being an American and being born in this country, even as part of the poorer class, I can work hard and keep a roof over my son’s head.
I can even afford to go out to McDonald's every once in awhile if I so choose.
But if my home, my city or my state was held by a rebel group and the hospital where I could get my son treated in was gone, I would hope that someone as powerful as the president of the United States would at least try to aid me and my family.
So regardless of what any nation ends up doing in this Syrian conflict, during this time of the holidays I acknowledge I am thankful for President Obama for at least trying to save human live, for looking past citizenship, religion or race, and seeing that despite our nationality we all bleed red. We’re all human.
Historically, America’s past is filled with blood and those who wouldn’t act. But it’s also filled with hope and those who dedicated their lives to benefit someone else without reward to themselves.
If I am to be proud to be an American, then it is because I am proud of that which has endured despite history’s or the present day’s xenophobia and fear.
The Statue of Liberty stands as a symbol of this nation, the poem at its base reading: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
Our generation is no longer reading history — it’s making it, and the world I want my son to grow up in is a world where those that act lead humanity and those that lead act for humanity’s benefit regardless of race, religion or citizenship.
Nichole Harwood is a news reporter at the Daily Lobo. She can be reached at news@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @Nolidoli1. The views presented in this column are her own.
