This seems like a good time to bum people out.

I was mentioning to Pat, after my post about my grandfather, that I had hoped, with my next post, to write about a topic of great social and political import. (Not about the state of my automotive ownership, not unless a certain manufacturer starts producing hybrids.) Anyway, as you can probably tell already, I didn't do that, as I was occupied with other extremely important matters.

So, what would I like to talk about? Well, as I'm sure you know, for a while now there has been bad shit going on in the country of Sudan. That's right, Darfur. I'm not exactly sure what my point in posting this will be, or why I feel compelled to talk about it. The bottom line is this: The situation in Darfur fucks me up. I know I haven't mentioned this before. I haven't actually mentioned this to anyone at all. I don't do a lot of talking about things like this, even though, truth be told, I think about them frequently.

I've always been a bit fascinated with the African continent. After all, that's where the monkeys come from. But even before I was interested in monkeys, I knew that I had a greater interest than your average citizen of the Western Hemisphere. When I was in [insert year of school here, because I can't remember], I took one of three classes that took me by complete surprise, both with how much they taught me and how much they influenced me. This class was called Anthropology of Africa. (The other two were Geology And Human Evolution and Storytelling.) It was a cultural anthropology course, which may explain why I didn't have too much enthusiasm going in. (I tend to be more interested in dead people's clay pots and, of course, monkeys, than I am in ethnographies.) On the first day of class, we were immediately quizzed and challenged to write down the names of all the African countries we knew. Glancing around at my peers, it seemed that most of them were coming up with about 5-10. Maybe for some a few more. I got all but three: Seychelles, Comoros, and Lesotho. (The first two because I forgot their names, and the last because I, um, forgot it existed. Sorry Lesotho! Blame Swaziland!) Yes, I was a total teacher's pet.

But, you know, going in, all I had were names, things I had picked up from maps. A few details here and there, but that was largely it. Coming out, I was able to converse on pretty much any issue facing the whole of the continent from the time of colonization up to the present.

We didn't talk about Sudan. I'm not even sure if we knew it was happening at that time, though it was definitely happening. What we did talk about was Rwanda, and the genocide that took place there in 1994. Learning about this devastated me. Watching the news footage devastated me. Listening to the stories of the survivors devastated me. Watching President Clinton intone "Never Again" in front of the Washington D.C. Holocaust Museum as a real live genocide was being committed devastated me. Knowing that the whole thing was basically ignored, devastated me.

It also allowed me to engage in fantasies about What I Would Have Done. Now, obviously, I was around when this was going on. But I was 10. That's as acceptable excuse as any. And of course, the American media gave it hardly any coverage, and I wasn't socially aware enough to seek out information on my own. I was 10. There's that. Then there's also, as you may have gathered, the uniquely personal events that made 1994 so devastating. Seriously, I don't remember much of what happened that year. There are periods of nothingness as if I had blacked out for months. So, I give myself a pass for this time. But if that were going on now? Why, surely I would be doing something. I'm not sure what exactly, but it would be impressively noble. It would be commendable. If it were, I would be.

And of course, it is. And I'm not. I'm doing nothing. I say that I am doing nothing. I have done some things. I have given hundreds of dollars to various humanitarian efforts. I have written to my elected officials and the United Nations impassioned missives on the need to do something. I support Amnesty International, who do the most. I haven't actually left my house. I have a hard time thinking that I've done anything but sit around and blink dully. Because that's all I have done. That's all it's amounted to. I have not done anything commendable. I have not done anything that would make a difference. Most of the time, I try not to think about this. I try not to think about the fact that I'm not thinking about it.

What's worse than devastated?