Seriously? It’s a waste of time! More than that: it seems to be another attempt of the US Congress to improve American image by pointing its fingers to other people’s mistakes. What about the American war against Vietnam? How many innocents died in that war? How can the world forget the My Lai massacre or napalm falling on children?
Sure, the American people and their government have had many good moments in their history, as have the Turks and people from many other countries. But there is no such a thing as a monopoly on virtue. No group has the moral authority to say that they never made a mistake or oppressed another group of human beings. During the early years of Brazil’s colonization, there was a terrible massacre of indigenous people. Sure, we Brazilians could excuse ourselves by saying that this was a Portuguese sin. However, we cannot deny that we share some of the guilt for the resulting 350 years of slavery that began in colonial times but continued for more than six decades after our independence.
This resolution would help more if it were passed within the context of a strong commitment to avoid the same sad events in the future. Unfortunately, humankind is still in danger to repeat old and abhorrent mistakes, including ethnic massacres of which we can find too many examples in the course of human history.
Please e-mail PostGlobal if you'd like to receive an email notification when PostGlobal sends out a new question.
