Blood Seen From Space, The Horror In Sudan Continues

Ever learn something, and you don’t know how you’ll think of anything else, for the rest of the day, for the next few months, or even that you might find yourself reflecting on it time and time again, for the rest of your life? For me it’s this, the mass slaughter that is happening in Sudan, is so, beyond our imagination, that the blood of the victims can be seen from space:

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/blood-splatter-rsf-massacres-sudan-visible-space

It really puts into perspective, statements made over the years by space enthusiasts, philosophers, and just, people who want to maintain an optimistic outlook on our species, that seen from space, there is no conflict, no war, no aggression, that from there our world is just a beautiful blue ball floating in space. Regardless of the good intentions of these statements, they are wrong. The horrors that humanity is capable of are just as visible from the blackness of space as they are from the ground.

No offense to Nancy Griffith, or Julie Gold, the author of the song, but “From A Distance, there is harmony”, is both figuratively and literally, extremely not true.

Yale University’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL), published deeply disturbing images a few days ago, showing dark reddish brown patches on the ground, in areas where the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia committed an unspeakable mass murder. This absolute nightmare took place in the Sudanese city of el-Fasher in North Darfur.

And if you want further evidence that this monstrous crime is visible not just from the ground, but way up high, where everything supposedly looks peaceful, how about this:

“At least three of the reddish instances have objects nearby measuring approximately 1.3-2.0 meters, consistent in dimension with human bodies,” from the HRL report.

Blood seen from space. Human bodies seen from space. I have sat here, just writing nothing, for the last few minutes, because I don’t even know what to write.

We may look at this horror and say to ourselves, “How are people so uncivilized in Sudan?” “How are they capable of such horror?” “Why can’t they be, well, I hate to say it, but, why can’t they act and behave in a manner more similar to, you know, Europeans?” “Oh shit I made it too obvious didn’t I?”

It would be nice to think, and by nice I of course mean, it would help us to believe that the West had no complicity in the Sudanese genocide, if it was just a case of, you know, people in Africa, they just love killing each other, not much can be done about it eh! And it’s nothing to do with us! Not so, not so, a million times not so. Let me explain.

For a long time now, Sudanese activists have been calling for a boycott of the United Arab Emirates, or UAE:

https://www.middleeasteye.net/trending/sudan-war-sparks-calls-boycott-uae-and-emirati-companies

Ah you might be thinking, the United Arab Emirates is, eh, is it in Africa?, I don’t know, Asia I think, still it’s nothing to do with us!

I’ll be coming back to this point shortly, don’t you worry.

But isn’t the United Arab Emirates that country where everything is like, really advanced and stuff? Don’t they have that building that’s really really big?:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burj_Khalifa

That’s how the UAE operates. They like to build really big exciting stuff, to distract attention away from the fact the UAE is where human rights comes to die. Think of it like someone who’s doing a really exciting card trick with one hand, to distract attention from the fact that they’re repeatedly punching an innocent person in the face with the other.

The United Arab Emirates. The country of big, shiny, bold, thought provoking, human rights abuses!

So while you’re staring up at the top of the Burj Khalifa, marveling at the fact that the sun sets at a different time on the higher floors than from the ground, (which incidentally isn’t all that impressive, I’m sure you could get the same effect on Patrick’s Hill), you’re not thinking about the fact that the United Arab Emirates is one of the main funders of the Rapid Support Forces!

In this interview from Pod Save The World, U.S congresswoman Sara Jacobs talks about how the United Arab Emirates is funding the RSF:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/QTc5zm8mUVM

So, I hope it’s clear to everyone at this point, that it isn’t simply the case that people in “those African countries” don’t just randomly start murdering people because, they’re just not like us you see! The United Arab Emirates is sending weapons to the RSF, which in turn is having weapons sent to it by the United States.

The West is complicit in the genocide in Sudan. I repeat, the West is complicit in the genocide in Sudan.

Even if our governments had nothing whatsoever to do with the genocide in Sudan, I still wouldn’t understand the logic of not wishing to help. Sure, in this instance you could argue that maybe our attempts to help would make things worse, but, surely we should still try to figure out a way to help as best we can. But, it’s not even the case that this is “nothing to do with us”. The U.S supports the U.A.E, which in turn supports the RSF. The governments of the West are responsible for the blood that can be seen from orbit.

The despicably racist notion that Africans are just not like us, that they just randomly fly into a genocidal fury, is comforting to white westerners who just don’t want to think about what’s happening in Sudan. But it’s not true. Even if it were the case that there were already pre-existing problems in Sudan that were in part to blame for this genocide, and frankly, even this I feel is a difficult case to make, because Europe has treated Africa as it’s plaything for so long, it is still the case that the United Arab Emirates, along with its ally, the US, has made things a whole lot worse.

So don’t let all the shiny and futuristic construction projects of the UAE lull you into a false sense that it’s some kind of utopia. The Burj Khalifa, and whatever giant monstrosity they’re going to build next, is there to impress you so much that it turns off your conscience. Don’t fall for it. The UAE has blood on its hands. A blood that can be seen from high above the stratosphere.

Boycott the United Arab Emirates

Free Sudan