On the Front Lines: Taking Up Arms As a Local Citizen
How would you respond to someone accusing you of exploiting minors for military purposes?
During high school, my class took part in a mock United Nations discussion where each of us had to represent a nation and speak out on behalf of their position on child soldiers. I was assigned the Central African Republic.
It was jarring to understand that the reality I perceived as a United States citizen was not a reality shared by the rest of the world. For nearly a decade, the Central African Republic had gone through genocidal civil war — with armed children serving on the front lines. As appalling as it seemed, I had to set aside my affronted morals and weave a political statement in defense of a nation I owed my temporary allegiance to. I scoured the Internet in an effort to understand the rationale behind their government’s conscious enlistment of child soldiers.
For me, the important takeaway from the UN discussion was not the research I conducted, nor was it a newfound empathy for the Central African government and its people. I could never find it in myself to be understanding towards the idea of child soldiers. No, the value of the experience lay in the fact that, for the first time, I felt as if the world was against me (and it was). My response to overwhelming arguments, interruptions, and rants from classmates who spoke on behalf of “bigger and badder” first-world countries was an inexplicable need to defend my people, the Central Africans, and play the role of the persecuted underdog.
I believe that it is impossible to truly be a global citizen, just as it is impossible to take on the persona of every belief and every individual on Earth. Being a global citizen means tossing a bottle in the recycle bin instead of the trash can, forcing on a smile when sampling a neighbor’s cultural food (even if the taste is not to your liking), or chatting with a long-distance friend on Facebook. Others may express the belief that a global identity is defined by the interconnectivity of people who share a belief in upholding morals and confronting issues that are “universal.” But the bottom line is that while we are occupied with diversity and racial equality here in America, the people of Central Africa concern themselves with clean drinking water and defying death-by- malaria which, to them, is of more importance than child soldiers. Their deployment of child soldiers stems primarily from their century-long struggle to forge a stable democracy, still unachieved today.
Born, bred, and product of Hawaii, I come from a place that knows no boundaries when it comes to race or ethnicity. But as global as we seem to be in breadth of culture and magnitude of aloha, or acceptance, we are markedly different in values and concerns from the rest of America, and the rest of the world. As a Hawaiian, it is only natural to adopt the worldview, preferences, and identity of my homeplace. And it is distressing for my people and I when outsiders do not possess the gravity of local consciousness we share, just as the world may not understand the plight of the Central African Republic and what they consider important.
“No one seems to understand me” is more than a cliché outcry of teen angst — it is the truth for third world countries and disconnected communities that do not enjoy the privileges that the rest of 21st-century society take for granted. From the outside looking in, it can be very difficult to relate.
