In 1975 the Khmer Rouge began a systematic “purification” of Cambodia, resulting in a genocide that killed over 1.6 million people. These people were taken to remote locations outside the cities and buried in what are now known as the Killing Fields.
While the scale of the genocide wasn’t as great as the Holocaust, it’s estimated that around 25% of the population were killed in the Cambodian genocide. The deaths may have been fewer, but the impact on the country was just as devastating.
When I went to Cambodia, I knew very little about the genocide. I’d learned a little through osmosis. I knew about the Khmer Rouge, I had heard of the killing fields, and I knew it was a genocide. But overall, I was very uneducated about the subject.
But I was eager to learn more, so I went to the Genocide Museum in Phnom Penh located at one of the killing fields the Khmer Rouge used. One of. What I hadn’t realised before I went to Cambodia was that there wasn’t just one site. The whole country was full of them, scars from the oppression of the Khmer Rouge.
Entrance to the museum is cheap, only a few dollars. It comes with an audio guide that is really well produced. The guide will take you through the site, showing many important events that happened in the field as the subjects were “processed.”
As you walk around you can’t help but notice the central building. It tempts you toward it as you walk around, but if you follow the tour it keeps you away. It’s saving the best for last. Or in this case, the worst.
The building is a Buddhist memorial to the victims of the genocide. Inside the building is a large glass case, and inside that are a huge pile of skulls. Skulls that were exhumed from the pits the Khmer Rouge buried their victims in.
I’m no stranger to the inner workings of the human body. I’ve seen a couple of Body Worlds exhibitions, even held a human brain. These never disturbed me. But this pile of skulls did. Each one of them was once an innocent life, dragged away and murdered for simply daring to exist.
At the bottom there is a sign indicating that the skulls there belonged to victims under 20. In other words, children. They kidnapped and murdered children.
As I looked at the skulls my thoughts couldn’t help but go to Myanmar, or Palestine. How many children are being murdered in those genocides? How many skulls will they dig up years from now? Will people even care?
And these were just the genocides I was aware of. After the fact I looked up ongoing genocides and I found there were far more going on in the world than I realised. And many have happened since the Holocaust. They said “never again”, but that was a lie. It kept on happening, and it keeps on happening. The genocides never stopped.
While I was here I heard a phrase that still haunts me to this day:
Doing nothing is not enough.
I need to do more.
