On Remembrance Day
I dedicate this November 11th, Remembrance Day, to the memory of Shidane Arone.
Shidane was a sixteen year old Somali boy who was savagely beaten to death for sport by Canadian soldiers in 1993. For me he is an emblem of all the people we do NOT remember on Remembrance Day. These are the innocents - millions upon countless millions of them - who have died at the hands of those we honor on this grisly day.
All those girls and boys, women and men and babies, who were vital and alive until the moment when some soldier pulled a trigger, flipped a switch, pressed a button, thrust a knife. And then they were gone. Gone, forgotten, dismissed as collateral damage. They are the faceless ghosts of war.
Perhaps it is too painful a rebuke to remember their names or faces. Well, here is one name from among those countless millions. Shidane Arone. Today I remember you, and the way you died, and who killed you.
May your soul find peace, and may we the living find forgiveness.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somalia_Affair#Death_of_Shidane_Arone
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