This is a video done by Daniel Goldhagen, based on his book Worse Than War. In this video Goldhagen traces genocide through personal interviews with survivors and perpetrators. He starts with his father who is a Holocaust survivor, and meets with others from Bosnia and the Srebenica massacre, Rwanda, and Guatemala. He looks at what actions are necessary to get a mass group to participate in genocide, and what the psychological and social influences are. The most disturbing piece takes place about 1hr 29min into the video when he meets with Rios Montt in Guatemala. Here Rios blatantly states that there is no proof he committed genocide simply because there is no proof that he wiped out an entire population of Mayans. His cavalier attitude is really disturbing. Another interesting point is the watch his interview with Hutus now in work prison camps due to their partaking in the mass killing of Tutsis in 1994. What do you feel is the role of international democracies in persecuting Montt, or even getting involved with these situations to prevent them from happening again? If many of the actions were deeply rooted into the society, do you feel there is hope for preventing it from happening again in Guatemala?
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