Analysis Of Stassen's Deogratias: A Tale Of Rwanda

The word “sympathy” is often used to mean one person’s response to the suffering of another individual. By giving our sympathy, it means we send our compassion and pity to the individual. However, we usually have certain considerations before we give our sympathy. Stassen’s Deogratias: A Tale of Rwanda has made people argue whether to throw out their sympathy or not. Deogratias, a teenager who gets trapped in the middle of the genocide tragedy that happened in Rwanda, gets criticisms as the result of what he had done in the past. Skeptics blame him when he slaughtered many people—mostly Tutsi, but also some of the Hutu—in the genocide tragedy. They also criticize him for his not so well mannered attitude, which he showed in some parts of Stassen’s …show more content…
Deogratias had done some remarkable actions, which show us that he opposed the genocide. Deogratias showed a different attitude compared to the other Hutu (18). His word that said his teacher was a fool clearly indicating that he hated to see the Hutu discriminating the Tutsi. He encouraged Apollinaria and Benina not to take the teacher’s word into mind, which indicating that he still cared for the Tutsi even though he was a Hutu. Another brave action from Deogratias was when he defended Benina from the sergeant. After she questioned the sergeant why was he treating the Tutsi differently (23). Skeptics may say that Deogratias’ good attitude towards the Tutsi girls was because he had feeling on them. However, if we read carefully to the conversation between Apollinaria and Benina when they were hiding from the Hutu, we know that the skeptics’ perception is wrong. Deo was not only helping Benina and Apollinaria, but he was also helping the others—when Apollinaria asked Benina where was Deogratias, she answered that he was with the others, doing what he could to help people (65). Deogratias’ persistence to save the others gives out another point for us to throw our sympathy to …show more content…
At the end of the story, Deogratias made a confession to Brother Philip. Deogratias told Brother Philip that he had killed many people, “I had to kill them…Venetia. Benina. Apollinaria…(70).” Deogratias’ decision to confess his sin to Brother Philip is appreciable. It indicates that he deeply regrets his mistakes. Instead of making people hate him, his action leads to a greater sympathy. Confession, the act of admitting your wrongdoing, is something that hard to be done if you don’t have enough guts to admit your mistakes. It needs courage to spill out every single of your mistakes. People tend to hide their mistakes, because they are afraid that their friends will stay away from them. But Deogratias proves that he is brave enough to claim his guilt