{Over the weekend, ABC10 News received an email from a local viewer, Julia Wyman.}<\/p>\n
She wanted to know why we hadn\u2019t covered a massacre that had occurred in the Democratic Republic of Congo earlier this month. More than 60 people had been killed.<\/p>\n
She wrote: \u201cBlack lives in America matter, black lives in Europe matter, but based on media coverage, black lives in Africa do not matter. If 60 people were killed in Louisiana, or Paris for that matter, it would be all over every news service.\u201d<\/p>\n
We had to hand it to Wyman \u2013 she had a point. So, we went to meet her at a diner in San Andreas, near her home in Sonora, to talk.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe people are people, and they’re complex just like anybody, but they are the most loving, generous people I’ve ever met,\u201d Wyman said, describing the Congolese. Wyman lived in the Democratic Republic of Congo until she turned 18, having moved there as a baby with her missionary parents.<\/p>\n
The civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the ongoing fighting in the country, has claimed the lives of more than 5 million people. Wyman described the recent massacre in the town of Beni.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I know is that some armed men came into the town and massacred whole families,\u201d Wyman said. \u201cThey went into houses, pulled people out and committed atrocious crimes. I don’t even want to describe them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wyman doesn\u2019t want to talk about the killings \u2013 but she says somebody needs to.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere’s definitely a blind spot for sub-Saharan Africa – black Africa. It’s a very misunderstood part of the world, and frankly not very important to people, largely because of race,\u201d Wyman said.<\/p>\n
With attacks in Europe and in the U.S., ABC10 News has made an effort to talk about the victims as people with full lives \u2013 lives that were tragically cut short by violence. Wyman says the Congolese deserve the same.<\/p>\n
\u201cI like to refer to myself as an African-American, because I grew up in Africa, and it’s kind of a funny joke among us who grew up there. But I am \u2013 and it breaks my heart to see Africans being ignored by the world,\u201d Wyman said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{Over the weekend, ABC10 News received an email from a local viewer, Julia Wyman.} She wanted to know why we hadn\u2019t covered a massacre that had occurred in the Democratic Republic of Congo earlier this month. More than 60 people had been killed. She wrote: \u201cBlack lives in America matter, black lives in Europe matter, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[99],"byline":[2573],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-28200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-greatlakesnews","byline-abc"],"bylines":[{"id":2573,"name":"ABC","slug":"abc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":2573,"name":"ABC","slug":"abc","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28200\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28200"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=28200"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=28200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}