Sociology Paper Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Sociology Paper - Essay Example In the reading, â€Å"making sense of the senseless: understanding genocide†, the authors begin with a statement that solidifies their greater purpose. That is, â€Å"all genocides are horrific, but not all genocides are the same. they can arise from cold-blooded calculations, realistic fears instincts for revenge, or ideologies of purification. understanding-and perhaps forestalling- genocide requires clear distinctions,† (Chirot & Edwards, p.406). A clear distinction to be made would be that, while genocide and the wars that come about are horrid, their root causes can differ to varying degrees, by what caused them in the first place. The inner meaning of the text, as written by Daniel Chirot and Jennifer Edwards, is to consider the frightening human atrocities of such events as the ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia in the 1990s, as well as the extermination of the Jewish people during World War II, along with Rwanda, but to look at them through the means in which they were initiated. â€Å"The inevitable comparisons of these recent atrocities to those of the past, most notably the Holocaust, are highly controversial. Classifying an event as a genocide can be used to legitimate the claims of survivors or as justification for reprisals against perpetrators. Therefore, several questions about genocide should be considered: (1) How successful does an attempted â€Å"cleansing† of a group need to be to warrant classification as genocide? (2) Does a certain number or percentage of a population need to be killed? (3) Does the intent of the perpetrators make any difference? (4) Should the term genocide be reserved for the murder and expulsion of religious or ethnic minority groups or can political dissidents or enemies in war be victims of genocide?† (Chirot & Edwards, p.406). The subjective facts listed within the article would be the tendency of many to want to classify any form of