A nadie debería dejar de importarle el dolor o la muerte ajenas, mucho menos cuando las víctimas de ese dolor o esa muerte se refieren a niños o niñas. Nadie debería ser indiferente a la aflicción que supone el sufrimiento de críos o crías cuyo único «delito» ha sido el de confiar en que nosotros como adultos haríamos todo lo humanamente posible para preservarles de toda pena.
Sin embargo me resulta repugnante y repulsiva la utilización de la muerte de un niño o una niña para hacer apología de ideologías cuyo único sustrato se encuentra en la oportunidad de conseguir votos, papeletas que aplaudan su idea de cómo construir una mejor sociedad, cuando curiosamente esas ideas suyas se basan en imposturas, mentiras, verdades a medias, manipulación mediática, cinismo e hipocresía.
No es soportable ver como unos y otros se rasgan las vestiduras de dolor ante una muerte y no ante otras muchas. Ninguna muerte violenta de nadie es menos dolorosa que otra, ninguna muerte de un niño o una niña es más soportable que otra. Resulta totalmente farisaico seguir ocultando mediáticamente unas muertes de otras, porque en realidad somos todos responsables de la muerte a causa de la guerra, de la inmigración, de la persecución, del hambre, de la violencia de género o de la furia violenta sin más.
Nos conmovemos y sublebamos cuando un niño, entre nosotros, muere cruelmente, pero miramos a otro lado cuando tomamos de una playa un cuerpo sin vida de otro pequeño que solamente intentaba estar con nosotros, o cuando vemos sus frágiles cuerpos inánimes entre escombros después de haber sido bombardeada su casa, o cuando son decapitados por pertenecer a una secta distinta a la dominante, o cuando son tiroteados mientras trataban de estudiar en su aula.
La violencia no es sólo la muerte, la violencia es también la segregación, el racismo, el clasismo, el machismo y todo abuso de poder por razón del sexo, raza, ideología, religión o condición social y humana.
Lynsey Addario (Norwalk, USA, 1973) es una fotoperiodista que trabaja regularmente para The New York Times, National Geographic y Time Magazine. Las imágenes que les presento pertenecen a distintos escenarios de guerra o violencia acontecidos en los últimos años y que han sido cubiertos por ella no sólo con extraordinaria profesionalidad sino con grave riesgo para su vida, las guerras de Syria, Ukrania, Afghanistan, Iraq, Uganda, Darfur, Congo, las crisis de los refugiados y desplazados, el Genocidio de los Rohingyas son solamente algunos de los conflictos que recogen sus fotografías y me parecen de lo más apropiadas para la reflexión que les hago más arriba.
Foto portada y fotos: diferentes series, de Lynsey Addario.
-
- Iraqi Yazidi families live in the Dera Boon camp near the Iraqi border with Syria, in Northern Iraq, August 17, 2014. Since fighters with the Islamic State started making its way across Iraq, and overrunning various towns, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have been displaced across the country. The American military is helping fight IS with targeted airstrikes on IS positions, and Peshmerga are fighting on the ground. (Credit: Lynsey Addario for The New York Times)
-
- Iraqi Yazidi families camp out near Bahjad Kandal camp close to the Iraqi border with Syria, in Northern Iraq, August 16, 2014. Since IS started making its way across Iraq, and overrunning various towns, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have been displaced across the country. The American military is helping fight IS with targeted airstrikes on IS positions, and Peshmerga are fighting on the ground. (Credit: Lynsey Addario for The New York Times)
-
- An Iraqi Yazidi family from the al jazeera village in Sinjar arrives at the Bajid Kandal camp after spending four days at the Nowruz camp in Syria before crossing back into Northern Iraq, August 17, 2014. Since fighters with the Islamic State started pushing through Iraq and murdering and terrorizing thousands of civilians, hundreds of thousands have been displaced from their homes across the country. The United Nations is beginning its largest humanitarian aid distribution in a decade. (Credit: Lynsey Addario for The New York Times)
-
- A Rohingya man, Burmese Muslims, sells food at a stall at night in the Thay Chaung camp for the Internally Displaced outside of Sittwe, which houses nearly 3000 people, November 23, 2015. There are limited opportunities for the Rohingya to work and make a living to support their families, as they are unable to travel outside the camps. An estimated one million stateless Rohingya have been stripped of their citizenship in Myanmar, and forced to live in modern-day concentration camps, surrounded by government military checkpoints. They are not able to leave, to work outside the camps, do not have access to basic medical care, or food. Most aid groups are banned from entering or working in the camps, leaving the Rohingya to their own devices for sustenance and healthcare. Journalists are also routinely denied access to the Rohingya, Myanmar’s way of ensuring the world doesn’t see the slow, intentional demise of a population.
-
- Syrian refugees cross into Turkey after the Muslim Holiday of Eid al-Adha through unofficial border crossings in villages around Reyhanli and Hacipasa in Turkey, October 20, 2013. Many Syrian refugees cross back and forth from Syria into bordering countries to work as laborers and visit family across borders. Syrian refugees now total over 2,000,000 in countries neighboring Syria as the civil war rages for the third year. (Credit: Lynsey Addario for The New York Times)
-
- Syrian refugees collect their daily bread rations from a distribution site run by the World Food Program in Zaatari Camp, in Jordan, September 16, 2013. There are an estimated 120,000 Syrian refugees living in Zaatari camp, 600,000 refugees in Jordan, and two million refugees in countries bordering Syria as Syria’s civil war rages in its third year. (Credit: Lynsey Addario for The New York Times)
-
- Syrian refugees wait to be transported to a refugee hours after crossing into northern Iraq near the Peshkhabour border point in Dahuk, Northern Iraq, from Kamishli, Syria, August 21, 2013. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees estimates that over 30,000 Syrians have crossed into Northern Iraq since the border was re-opened last week, and roughly three to four thousand continue to cross daily. The mostly ethnically Kurdish refugees are fleeing increasing insecurity, economic strife, and a shortage of electricity, water, and food in their areas. (Credit: Lynsey Addario for The New York Times)
-
- A Rohingya family, Burmese Muslims, live in the Thay Chaung camp for the Internally Displaced outside of Sittwe, which houses nearly 3000 people, November 23, 2015. The mother, pictured here, claimed all her children were malnourished, but because of the lack of medical professionals in the area, it was impossible to confirm. An estimated one million stateless Rohingya have been stripped of their citizenship in Myanmar, and forced to live in modern-day concentration camps, surrounded by government military checkpoints. They are not able to leave, to work outside the camps, do not have access to basic medical care, or food. Most aid groups are banned from entering or working in the camps, leaving the Rohingya to their own devices for sustenance and healthcare. Journalists are also routinely denied access to the Rohingya, Myanmar’s way of ensuring the world doesn’t see the slow, intentional demise of a population.
-
- Iraqi Yazidi families live in the Dera Bon camp near the Iraqi border with Syria, in Northern Iraq, August 17, 2014. Since fighters with the Islamic State started making its way across Iraq, and overrunning various towns, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have been displaced across the country. The American military is helping fight IS with targeted airstrikes on IS positions, and Peshmerga are fighting on the ground. (Credit: Lynsey Addario for The New York Times)
-
- Breast Cancer patient Jessy Acen, from Gulu, plays tenderly with one of her sons, Jered Kakanyero, 4, as he caresses her swollen arm and hand in Pece Vanguard, on the outskirts of Gulu, Uganda, July 23, 2013. Jessy Acen first discovered a lump in her breast in 2009. She traveled from her home in Gulu to Mulago Hospital in the Ugandan capital of Kampala to have her diagnosis of breast cancer confirmed. She began chemotherapy soon after but, unable to afford the cost of transport the 300 km from Gulu to Kampala, she was forced to stop treatment. By the time she’d returned to Mulago in 2011 her cancer had spread to her lymph nodes, liver and lungs. (Credit: Lynsey Addario for The New York Times)
-
- A seven week old boy fighting with malnutrition and intestinal blockage is held on the x-raying table by a technician as his mother looks on in the government hospital in Geneina, in west Darfur, March 8, 2007. Since the beginning of the war in Darfur, over two million people have been displaced from their villages throughout the region, and hundreds of thousands have been killed. Though much progress has been made by NGOs and the United Nations in flighting disease and malnutrition in IDP camps and throughout darfur, many darfurians are still struggling with malnutrition, malaria, respiratory infection, etc.
