Anecdote of a collapsing civilization on the eve of an anniversary.

Nyamata Genocide Memorial, Rwanda

Nolan Finley has a column today: "Still too much hate in Detroit."

Steven Utash wasn’t as lucky. The Clinton Township man was also driving a pickup on a dark Detroit street last week when he struck a kid who had stepped in front of him. Utash also stopped and got out to help.

What happened next is sickening. Utash, who is white, was seized by a mob of bystanders and beaten senseless in the street. As of this writing, he was still clinging to life. You want to see what a breakdown of society looks like? Watch the video of the attack.

This racial madness reminded me that we're in the twentieth anniversary year of the Rwandan genocide.

On April 6, 1994, an airplane carrying Habyarimana and Burundian president Cyprien Ntaryamira was shot down on its descent into Kigali, killing all on board. Genocidal killings began the following day: soldiers, police and militia quickly executed key Tutsi and moderate Hutu leaders, then erected checkpoints and barricades and used Rwandans' national identity cards to systematically verify their ethnicity and kill Tutsi. These forces recruited or pressured Hutu civilians to arm themselves with machetes, clubs, blunt objects and other weapons to rape, maim and kill their Tutsi neighbors and destroy or steal their property. The breach of the peace agreement led the RPF to restart their offensive and rapidly seize control of the northern part of the country before capturing Kigali in mid-July, bringing an end to the genocide. During these events and in their aftermath, the United Nations (UN) and countries including the United States, Great Britain and Belgium were criticized for their inaction, including failure to strengthen the force and mandate of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) peacekeepers, while observers criticized the government of France for actively supporting the genocidal regime.

Somewhere between a half million to a million people were slaughtered in this genocide, with the best guess being about 800,000. 7 out of every 10 Tutsis were murdered. Some points:

1. The government forces of Rwanda carried out many killings and stood by while others were perpetrated by the Hutu militias.

2. The minority Tutsis were demonized and dehumanized as "cockroaches" by the Rwandan mass media.

3. Government-issued ID cards were used to identify targets because they listed the ethnic background of the victims.

4. The subject population was unarmed and lacked the means of fighting back until the Tutsi rebels attacked and drove both the army and the militias away from the capitol and other cities.