Author, activist, feminist and poet Margaret Randall spoke Friday evening about genocide, failed activism efforts and continuous social inequalities in Central America over the
past century.
Her lecture, “We Don’t Mean You … Well Yes We Do,” took place in the EMU Ballroom and was part of a three-day symposium about Central America during the Cold War. It honored the late Bishop Oscar Romero and Ben Linder, an activist from Portland who was killed in Nicaragua, said Cultural Forum Contemporary Lecture Coordinator Alicia Parter.
“Margaret Randall has lived incredible experiences in Latin America, Mexico, Cuba and Nicaragua,” University Spanish instructor Bryan Moore said. He added that she lived in these places during unique historical moments, which enables her to “provide reflection and insight.” He said she has published works of some of the greatest Latin American authors and has written about 80 books.
“Fifty years ago the modern Cold War manifested itself in Central America with the CIA overthrow of the democratically elected government in Guatemala, which led to nothing less than decades-long genocide and murder,” Moore said during his introduction.
After Randall took the stage she spoke about the social responsibility people should feel for those less fortunate.
“If one of us is made invisible, or ignored, or abused, or enslaved, no one is free,” she said.
The title of her speech reflects a famous quote uttered by a Lutheran minister after he narrowly escaped death at a concentration camp. She shared the quote with her audience: “First they came for the communists and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a communist. Then they came for the Jews and I didn’t speak up because I
wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics and I didn’t speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time, there was no one left to speak up.”
Randall then listed numerous genocides throughout history, including the 1915-16 Armenian genocide that killed 1.5 million people, the Nazi Holocaust that ended with more than six million dead and the genocide in Cambodia led by the Khmer Rouge that resulted in two million deaths. She also mentioned the Iraqi attack on the Kurds in 1987-88 and criticized the U.S. government for continuing to sell wheat and rice and send aid to the country until 1991, when the United States’ interests changed.
Randall said the United States “labeled Saddam a terrorist, invaded his country, toppled his government and made him a prisoner, leaving chaos and death where there had been a secular government amidst a fundamentalist regime, a society with excellent public education and health, and a position of women that was progressive for the Middle East.”
She added that there is solid evidence the CIA has been directly involved in torture sessions from Central America to the Middle East.
Randall said it is her belief that all groups of people must be included in the struggle for a just society, and if they are not, it paves the way for the marginalization that makes genocide possible.
“Muslims, whose history is ripe with oppression and marginalization, are today engaged in some of the worst acts of violence against others,” Randall said. “Genocide is happening now in Sudan.”
Randall also claims that domestic violence against women and
children by someone more powerful is directly related to the “invasion or occupation of a small country by someone more powerful.”
She said three things can be learned from the failures of 20th century revolutionists: Everyone counts, social inequities are reflected in the home, community and world, and future activists must find ways to ensure that power is distributed among all people and exercised fairly.
“When (democracy) becomes nothing more than majority rule and that majority turns out to be a powerful minority, then an analysis of representation may be overdue,” Randall said.
With hatred of “the other” becoming a virtue in the United States, Randall said people should “hold onto and teach values of true honesty, thoughtfulness, intellectual curiosity, fairness, inclusion, respect and solidarity.”

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