Rwanda has almost always been something of a melting pot, just like other African nations. People of various ethnicities, occupations, and social classes lived in the country without many more problems than surrounding nations. Nonetheless, just like other nations, Rwanda still had underlying issues beneath the surface that had yet to be addressed. On April 9, 1994, the genocide began, leading to the systematic killing of over 800,000 Rwandans. For what reason were these people killed? Each of these people was killed because they belonged to the Tutsi, an upper-class ethnic group in the nation, or for refusing to take part in the barbaric bloodshed. After the fighting between the “upper class” Tutsi and the “lower class” Hutu had calmed down in the early summer of 1994, the grim horror of what had just happened finally took hold. in dull horror as Rwandans – neighbors, friends, families – massacred each other and, instead of helping each other, continued with their daily activities, as if nothing was happening. Even the organization that was set up to prevent exactly this dilemma from happening, the United Nations, had failed to help anyone, even though there were many UN members right there in Rwanda while this was happening. Overall, the United Nations, and the entire world itself, had been too poorly organized, too cowardly, or too apathetic to begin to do anything good outside of their respective nations. Before the genocide even began, the Hutus and Tutsis had already faced fierce hostility years before any violence was immediately apparent. Even before colonialism began in the 1800s, the Hutu and Tut... center of paper... 2010. .Hunter, Jane. “While Rwanda was bleeding, the media sat on their hands.” RIGHT. July/August 1994: 8-9. Hilsum, Lindsey. "UNITED NATIONS - What the hell were they doing?" People, ideas, action in the fight for global justice | New internationalist. December 1994. May 24, 2010. .Moeller, Susan D. Compassion Fatigue: How the Media Sells Disease, Famine, War, and Death. 1st ed. New York: Routledge, 1999.Overfield, James. Sources of twentieth-century global history. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2002. Rusesabagina, Paul and Tom Zoellner. An Ordinary Man: An Autobiography. Boston: Penguin (Non-Classics), 2007. Twagilimana, Aimable. Hutu and Tutsi (Heritage Library of African Peoples of Central Africa). 1st ed. New York: Rosen Publishing Group, 1998.